Today is my 48th birthday, and this year I’ve been very aware of how fast time passes and how much of my time has already passed. My kids are getting older and the two oldest will be out of high school soon and the youngest will be starting middle school. It’s exciting and sad all…

I’m writing this from my basement office where I finished moving my stuff back in here after trying for the last month or so to work from a desk in my bedroom or at the kitchen table. Those places are a nice break when I need a change of scenery, but for the day-to-day work…

In my last newsletter I mentioned two things that were going well, and I’m happy to say they are still going well. First, I think I’ve finally found a medicine mix that’s working for me and know I just have my fingers crossed that it stays this way and doesn’t turn on my body like…

I know a post about fresh starts during the first week of spring is a cliche, but sometimes we need to embrace the cliche if it fits. And honestly, I’m doing a little wishful thinking and hoping I can manifest some spring beauty in my life by writing about it. February was another lost month…

Happy New Year! One of the goals I made for myself this year was nurture my newsletter better and grow the audience so I’m not as beholden to the grip of social media. I really like having control over my content so I can up and move it without too much hassle when one platform…

This isn’t going to be a long note, I just wanted to share some final words of encouragement to end the year with good momentum. I’m not at all a proponent of hustle culture, but I’ve seen how ending a day, or week, or month, or year strong helps keep the momentum going on long…

The last two months have been rough. At first I thought I had taken on too much and was melting down because of it, but it turns out that toward the middle of September my medicine stopped working. I gained almost all of the weight back I lost, I was having trouble sleeping, I was…

After revamping this newsletter to focus on joy and happiness and magic then updating regularly for five months, I disappeared. While this is absolutely a stock move from the ADHD playbook, it had less to do with the immediate effects of my disease and more to do with needing more space and time to process…

“People who need people are the luckiest people in the world.” – Jule Styne and Bob Merrill Since it’s February and we’re thinking about love, I wanted to tackle one of the most enduring toxic literary tropes, especially for men – the lonely tortured artist grappling with the pettiness of life and the weight of…

Happy New Year! I know it’s weird to still say that more than halfway through the month, but because of vacation and illness I got a late start to the new year. Then we had a holiday yesterday so today really feels like the first official day of this year to me. Which is great,…

I’m not very big on regret, but I’ve been thinking a LOT lately about wasted opportunities. There was a recent opportunity I had that I really thought was going to change the trajectory of my career, and it did sort of. But after one book I was let go and found myself back to square…

In my last post I mentioned coming back from Bouchercon and being excited to write again, but even though that was sort of true, I still couldn’t get any traction on any of the book projects I tried to work on. So I took a break to work on a short story I’ve been noodling…

Last month I was able to get back to Bouchercon for the first time in three years and it was just what my soul and creativity needed. I’d been working on the same novel for more than four years before finally abandoning it right before the conference. Talking to folks and sitting in on panels…

Sooooo, uh, we drove to the middle of Amish Ohio this morning and brought back a new friend. Say hello to Mr Leo.

All I ever wanted was a dog. Growing up, my parents tempted me twice with dogs but ours wasn’t a dog family and both times the dogs went back to where they came from after a month or so. Until I was 30 and met Becky. We got to talking about our future together and…

My dad and I have talked for ages about road-tripping to Nashville and Memphis but never got around to it. Today we’re doing it.

I took the remaining Christmas decorations down last night and it got me thinking about how this time of year used to be so depressing for me. Eventually though, I stopped thinking about the past and missing the holiday buildup and started getting excited about the future and making plans and dreaming about the possibilities…

So, it’s been a while. I had a newsletter drafted and ready to go for June when my latest book was published, but that got caught in TinyLetter’s security net and was never sent. I moved everything over to MailChimp, but my life got insane, then fell apart a bit, after that. Also, the interface…