I’ve been thinking today about what I love about writing what I write.
(A thread on the same topic is over on Bluesky: this is expanded from that since I have a little more space and can explain why each book is relevant where I put the images..)
I write romance. I love being able to spend time writing about things getting better after challenging times. About getting through the tricky bits of life in good company (friends as well as lovers and beloveds…). About making the world better together.
For me, writing is often about exploring and learning.
(Eclipse is in many ways the book of my heart, drawn from more than a decade working in a high school library and all the chaos and glory of teenagers, the dozens of things going on that you only get a glimpse of. And as Thesan would say, it’s also about figuring out what’s there from what you can see and also what you can’t. Astronomy is like that.)
I learn new things for every book. The entire Mysterious Arts series was partly an excuse for me to explore a wide range of different arts and crafts – book binding, perfume, weaving, and listening to a lot of music! (I did not actually try shoemaking, but I loved learning about it.)
(Harmonic Pleasure let me explore a great deal of fascinating London lore, as well as dive into what a magical nightclub might look and sound like in the 1920s.)
And then there’s Best Foot Forward, and how it brought me back to being able to listen to the bulk of the classical music repertoire after twenty years.
But every book is also a chance to see the world from new perspectives. My characters live in our world, but with a bit more visible magic. They have many of the same problems and concerns we do.
(And many of them live with chronic health issues, disability, trauma from their past, and/or neurodiverse brains that don’t quite fit the world. A lot like me and many of my friends.)
And they’ve got some we don’t. Not quite like that, anyway.
Whenever I come across another bit of horrifying history (and I still do, fairly regularly, in research), I take a breath and think about how people did come through that, and keep going, and keep doing good in the world. That it’s possible, and we can do that now.
I love figuring out how that works. Where the options are. What people of good heart, trying to do a bit better, can change. How to get to ‘happily ever after’.
(Facets of the Bench is about two people, both skilled in different things, looking at moving forward into new parts of their lives. Griffin, here, is an ambulatory wheelchair user, with all the assumptions other people make about what he can and can’t do. Annice is a jet carver, when tradition forbids that – and when jet has been rapidly falling out of fashion and demand.)
And sometimes the history is fascinating. The entire run of deception operations during World War II, especially leading up to D-Day is full of chaos, good ideas (and some daft ones), questionable implementations, and people pulling it together to make things work somehow.
(Illusion of a Boar is about magical deception to go along with the non-magical deception activities leading up to D-Day and the Normandy landings. Four people in tight quarters, with not nearly enough resources for what they’re being asked to do, each with their own concerns. But it’s also about two sets of chosen siblings taking care of each other, and learning to trust the other pair.)
I love writing a bit more hope and respect and collaboration into the world. Thinking about the ways that’s doable, no matter where we are or what else we’re dealing with. Not easy, maybe, but it’s worth doing.
And people can grow and change and figure things out, right?
(Fool’s Gold is my “villain redeemed” book, where Robin figures out how to do things better and find a place in the world he can fit. It’s also got a great custos dragon with opinions, and a lot of art and colour. Robin loves his colours.)
I also love thinking about the ways family and long-term connections change and shape us.
I’m now writing the third generation of the Edgarton family, as Unknown Depths comes out on May 1st. (And multiple generations of the Carillons and the Fortiers…) They deal with different challenges and situations, but some things thread through consistently.
These are just some of the many things swirling around inside my head. Making things better. Having hope. Letting beauty and magic touch us and inspire us and move us. Looking up and forward.