June was a busy month!
On June 13, book 2, of my Daughter of Arden Trilogy, Wandering, released from Bandersnatch Books. It’s as beautiful as Exile. Every time someone picks up these books, they admire the covers, but then often say something like, “This feels so nice!” The books really do feel good–they have a matte cover that feels good to the touch, and the quality of the paper is clear. Also, when you line up the books next to each other, the pattern on the spine is continuous. That was a touch that Rachel Donahue of Bandersnatch Books has worked hard to make happen.
Anyway! I could keep gushing about that, but I’ll refrain.
I also had two podcast interviews, and they went up over the past couple weeks. Both were interviews with friends, which made them extra enjoyable to record, and both are podcasts I’ve enjoyed following.
The first podcast is a new one, “Leaf by Lantern,” created by Alicia Pollard of Stories of Yearning. Alicia has hosted numerous writing projects on her blog, and she’s now launched this podcast to talk about retelling fairy tales in the light of scripture. Her ability to research and then communicate what she’s learned is beautiful to see, and I’m thoroughly enjoying the episodes from this podcast. She asked great questions about different elements that made their way into Exile. I’m also biased toward this podcast because the cover art for the podcast is by my daughter Ev (based on a concept of my daughter Clare).
The second podcast showed up last Tuesday on “Dwell,” a podcast for homeschool moms hosted by Renee Mathis and Karen Kern of Circe Institute. I’ve gotten to know Renee through The Habit writing community, and we encouraged each other through the November Poem a Day challenge last fall. This conversation was another good one, with great questions that made me think back through all the years of when the kids were little and somehow a lot of Maid Maleen’s story emerged, too. How did I write when they were little? It’s all a bit fuzzy!
No more interviews are on the horizon, but it’s nice to know these are out there. This month will involve final edits on Promise, and Clare and Ev are busy putting the artwork together. In mid-July the Realm Makers Conference will converge in St. Louis, and we’ll find out if Exile will make it past the finalist stage for Fantasy novel and Debut novel. I won’t be able to go to that conference, but my Habit friend, Katie Williams, will be there, and she’s offered to be my award receiver stand-in if for some crazy reason Exile wins. Wouldn’t that be wild?