Dearest Squad,
I got home from my travels up north right before my birthday in January, and thanks to some pretty crushing anxiety and depression about my career (and Piper, and the state of the world in general) it took me over a month to get sleep and food and medicine and exercise and everything else back on a decent schedule. But I rallied my troops—and myself—and life feels almost “normal” (minus, you know, any income) again.
Most importantly: It finally, FINALLY feels possible to get to the end of this book.
Tempest and I moved our daily weekday meditation to earlier in the morning, which was a huge help. Afterward I do some PT, stretches, and yoga while we chit-chat. Then I sign off (usually around 10am) and get to work. At 4pm, I find a stopping point and get on the elliptical machine for an hour. I shower, eat, and then go back into another online writers workroom from 6:30 to 8:30pm. I try to get to bed by 10pm. I try to sleep 8-9 hours. And then I get up and do it all over again.
Chris comes over about once a week for a writing day (plus now we’ve added Storm Chase prep). Casey calls me once a month. And on Sundays, Tempest and I still have a workday writing product reviews and adding stuff to the Magic Shop. (Have you checked it out lately? I added a bunch of new categories and there’s some really cool stuff in there now.)
I work while on the elliptical, too, of course. Writing doesn’t stop just because I don’t have a computer open. Like I tell the school kids: if I’m awake, I’m writing.
I start by playing music on my Pandora station. I can’t afford the monthly non-commercial version of the app anymore, but sometimes sponsors will give you an hour of no-ads for free if you watch some commercial. Perfect! If I don’t get the hour, I switch to Spotify, where I have already started working on our Storm Chase 2026 Road Mix playlist. (Most of my playlists are public, if you ever want to check them out.) I even have one called “Friends Mix 2026” where YOU CAN BE A COLLABORATOR and add songs you think would be fun for us to listen to while we’re cruising through all those flyover states. Go on – click through and try it out!
If I do get the ad-free hour, I just stay on Pandora and listen to the “Rose Garden” playlist I’ve been curating there for literal years. I close my eyes (yes, I work out in the dark with my eyes closed – thanks, exercise migraines) and do some brainwork on the next chapters in the queue.
The thing about the end of great books like THIEFTESS is that there are a lot of goodbyes. You’ve lived with these characters for 30-odd chapters (or, in my case, 11 years) and you’ve come to love them like friends. And now it’s time to say goodbye. So lately I’ve been spending these solid ad-free hours on the elliptical listening to music…and crying. If it’s a really good scene or line I don’t want to forget, I’ll even open my phone and email it to myself. And let the tears fall as they may.
I cry at the end of my books a lot. (Yup, just like my hero Joan Wilder!) Purging all those emotions is good for you. It’s part of the therapy of writing.
But yeah…I’m a little bit terrified about how I’m going to feel when I finally finish writing the last book in this series. Hopefully by then I’ll be making an income again and I can book a trip to Korea or something.
Or…you know…just go storm chasing again.
Much love!
xox
Princess Alethea
PS: Throughout this whole chapter, I kept accidentally writing “Rumbold” instead of “Hawk.” I realized it was probably because Rumbold spent most of ENCHANTED in a version of this post-spell-amnesia state Hawk is in right now. And I felt a little proud of myself, because that’s exactly the voice I was going for.
This Patreon has been keeping me alive. You can either subscribe to the Thursday Chapter level and read everything so far or just pay-per-post. Thank you for your continued support!
✨🖤✨🖤✨🖤✨🖤✨🖤✨🖤✨🖤✨
This Patreon has been keeping me alive. You can either subscribe to the Thursday Chapter level and read everything so far or just pay-per-post. Thank you for your continued support!
