Karen Healey's Blog: That Healey Girl

Just a quick one today. There are two things I don’t want you to miss out on just because I’m trying to pick the perfect phrasing again!

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Sweet

Savory & Supernatural has a cover!

I am so delighted by Liz Casal’s retro stylings on this - all these adorable sparkles and swirls, and the old-fashioned film camera! And the cute free-standing oven!

Kingston and Amalia look so connected and a little uncertain, as is appropriate for any swift romance which is just a touch complicated by a ghost. Also, once again, I desperately want to make that dress.

The book is coming out on April 30, so pre-order now!

Spicy:

Do you like fairytale and mythological retellings? I am assuming yes, if you enjoyed any of my Olympus Inc books!

Then you ought to head over to the Fairytale Bub, where, for TODAY ONLY you can pick up 25 romantic retellings, including Persephone in Bloom, for FREE.

Seriously, this is a blink and you’ll miss it deal, so go check it out! There’s a lovely selection of paranormal romances, a regency romance I’m personally looking forward to, and a number of fantasy romances that look super interesting.

Feel free to pass this on to anyone else who might be keen!

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(If you’re curious about the title, it’s because Co-Star the astrology app once gave me this as my daily thought to ponder, and I have remembered it forever because 1. WHATEVER, astrology is fake and 2. what a devastating thing to say to a Leo.)

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Careers

This week I had occasion to travel to Wellington for my Careers teaching job. The purpose of the trip was to spend two days cramming information about four tertiary institutions into my brain so as to better inform my students of their options. The effect of the trip was to make me want to immediately return to tertiary study and start seven different degrees at once.

I mean. I mean. I got to see the costume workshops at Toi Whakaari! I got to look at a costume continuity binder for a film in progress! Those of you who have read Bespoke and Bespelled, starring costume designer and stitch-witch Marnie Taylor, may appreciate what that kind of detail meant to me.

I got to see THREE tuatara, including a tuatara who was actually moving, scuttling on her wide-set legs at a pace I found startling, given that I have only ever seen tuatara staying absolutely still.

“Hello, little sphenodon,” I cooed, in the gooiest voice imaginable. She froze, unblinking.

I got to walk through art studios and campus housing, fabrication labs and libraries, computer suites and galleries. I met smart, interesting people and marveled at student work. I was told about the efforts institutions are taking to decolonise their practice, the attempts they are making to recentre indigenous perspectives and provide safety for those who currently cannot be safely who they are in most of the places where they study.

Two Game Design students asked if I was planning to take the course and sounded only a little bit dubious. “No,” I said. “My job is to talk to the people who might. What would you want me to say to them?”

“Tell them it’s good,” they said. “Tell them they should come.”

Curiosity

I am, and always have been, insatiably curious. I always want to know more, understand more, put this thing by that thing connected to the other thing, and see the pattern made.

When I’m reading and I come across a reference I don’t understand, I look it up. I get reviews where people are like, “I didn’t know what this meant” and my automatic reaction is always, “so why didn’t you find out?”

I know, of course, that there are lots of reasons why they didn’t—people don’t want to interrupt reading flow, they don’t want reading time to be internet time, they don’t necessarily know where to find that information, they’re reading a paperback and their phone is on the other side of the room etc etc. These are all good and reasonable reasons1!

But my first reaction is still “but you could find out!” because that’s what I do, every time, because I’m curious.

So I have this job where one of the things I get to do is find out how other people do their jobs, how they qualify, how they learn and practice and develop, and I thought I would like this job, but I didn’t realise how MUCH I would like this job.

People are so interesting! Careers are so interesting! Sign me up for Advanced Millinery!

Decolonisation

Learning is my second favorite thing, but my most absolute favourite thing in the entire world is reading, and because I spent some hours waiting in airports, being in planes, and filling in time between meetings2 I finished three books in two days.

First, I read Lyorn, the latest and presumably antepenultimate Vlad Taltos novel by Steven Brust. This is a series that is only two years younger than I am, so I am not going to summarise the previous sixteen books, other than to say Vlad is an ex-assassin for a criminal organisation who keeps encountering world-shattering, fate-altering events and is finally wondering what that means for him personally and what, if anything, he should be doing in response. In this book, he’s doing a lot of that wondering backstage in a theatre where a musical about putting on a censored play is perilously close to being censored, and it’s all incredibly meta and I liked it a lot3.

Part of Vlad’s problem is that he knows empire is wrong, but he is friends with the Empress and a lot of people who are dedicated to preserving the empire. These are intelligent, loyal, brave people and he likes them a lot. He’s fought and died for them4 and vice versa. But they are insiders, and he is outside, and they can never see what he sees. Moreover, Vlad knows that the current system is unjust and unfair, but it’s been going for two hundred thousand years and it feels inevitable. He finds it really difficult to conceive of an alternative. Due to Some Stuff, it may have been literally impossible for anyone to even conceive of alternatives until very recently5.

As you would expect, in the forty-one years of writing this series, Steven Brust’s interests and concerns have changed, and one of the things that comes up in the book is the place of art when it comes to challenging the status quo. What does it mean to defy the powers-that-be when you also, to some extent, comply with and profit from their systems of power? How can the written or performed word affect history or shift perceptions? What responsibilities do artists have, to their principles, to their colleagues, to their patrons, to their society?

And, fundamentally, what is the right thing to do, and how do you do it, even when it costs you? How do you convince other people to do the right thing, even when it costs them?

The people around him think that art can be very powerful in prompting right action from others, even at the cost of their own comfort, freedom, or lives. Vlad is more skeptical, partly because he’s a skeptical s.o.b., and partly because he doesn’t care for musicals. However, at the end of the book he makes a momentous decision. The art he’s been reading and watching and participating in isn’t the sole reason for that decision—he’s been thinking about the problem for a long time. But I’d claim that the art had some impact on his decision and his ability to make it, and that, I think, is Brust’s argument.

Art isn’t the whole of the thing. It’s not the totality of resistance. But it can be a vital element.

I’ll get back to this in Part Two6, where I’ll discuss the other books I read: Kate Beaton’s graphic memoir, Ducks: Two Years in the Oil Sands, and R.F. Kuang’s magnificent Babel, or the Necessity of Violence: an Arcane History of the Oxford Translators Revolution.

Also, and not unrelated, I’m switching to Ghost instead of Substack for my newsletter service. Ideally, you won’t notice a thing, but heads-up, just in case!

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Book Stuff:

I’m doing a creative writing workshop with the Teece Museum of Classical Antiquities, open to everyone 12+. Sign up, Ōtautahi folk! I know at least one adult who plans to be there, so don’t let the “young writers” tag turn you off.

The Love Should Be Fun promo is still running and still v. cute. I can recommend Monica Ross’s Thick as a Brick as a really fun romance author/audiobook narrator romp!

Persephone in Bloom is currently 99 cents, tell your friends!

1

I am considerably less patient about “this book set in New Zealand written by a New Zealand author used a Māori or Samoan or New Zealand English term that I didn’t understand!”

2

And also didn’t have to cook or do dishes or laundry. I always forget how much travelling removes daily labour from the equation, and as a result it’s always a massive surprise to be handed giant chunks of time.

3

Each chapter opens with a filked song from the musical, based on a real life musical. I enjoyed singing along to the ones I recognised and looked up the ones I didn’t.

4

Death isn’t necessarily permanent in this world.

5

Which is to say, in the last five hundred years, but that’s like a decade to most of the people Vlad hangs out with.

6

I wasn’t planning a two-parter but I have to stop and get on with some actual art-making instead of art-discussing. See you next time!

A couple of weeks ago I started a conversation with my BFF with “SOOOO my favourite local candle place is releasing a candle that smells like the West Coast1 and goddamn if that doesn’t sound good.”

She: “I love that you have a favourite local candle place, you bougie nerd.”

While I was recovering from being so accurately described, I did the math on whether I could afford the candle (no) and contemplated my dwindling candle collection. Autumn was coming. I would need really wanted more candles2.

Now, autumn is here. I walk through the Red Zone and forage apples and figs. The air has bite, and the trees are glowing, red and gold and burnished brown. Some have already dropped their leaves, and face the wind, bare and unflinching.

New Zealand doesn’t have much cultural allegiance to the cosy woollen pumpkin spice aesthetic popular in more northern climes, although you can bet retailers are doing their best to import it. As I am both bougie and basic, I create my own Aesthetic, with candles, with blankets, with pumpkin chocolate scones.

They were good, but I need to try again to get to perfect.

The thing about bougie candles is that they smell nice3 and look pretty, but for me, mostly, it’s the flame. Fire fascinates me, and always has. I remember lying on the cork floor of our old house, watching my dad build the fire in the wood burner with pinecones and kindling. I remember hauling wood from the pile and setting it on the hearth to dry out, swinging the heavy glass door open, poking down the ashes, and watching the new wood catch with the satisfaction of an important job well done.

When I was sick in winter, and old enough to stay home alone, I would build the fire myself. Over the course of a long, listless day, I would tend it as I tended myself. I was too sick to read, too tired to think, but the fire demanded very little—oxygen, fuel—and gave back warmth and comfort and that lovely flickering glow.

You’re not hardcore unless you live hardcore.*for some values of it

I was an altar girl for a while. Among my duties (walking in procession with a face of appropriate reverence, kneeling without wobbling, hitting the little gong as the priest raised the Body of Christ to heaven) was lighting and blowing out the candles, in which I took a wholly pagan delight. I had an excellent example to follow: the statue of Jesus was pulling his robes aside to show us the Sacred Heart aflame, burning without consumption.

Fire was one of our first technologies, one of the things that made our ancestors stronger and smarter. Were the first stories told sitting around a fire? Does every campfire ghost story and beach bonfire yarn hearken back to those earliest days?

Fire is important and beautiful and powerful.

And dangerous. I never forget that. I have burnt myself many more times in the kitchen than I ever have with an open flame, but my awareness of the risk is much higher. This summer, while fire roared over the Port Hills and roadside verges in North Canterbury were going up in flames, I went for a walk by the river and saw two separate fires in progress. One of them was already being attended. The other, I called in to emergency services. The operator told me that they’d received several calls. Did I know if it was deliberately set?

Of course it was deliberate. Riverbank foliage does not spontaneously burst into flames and there are limits to my desire to watch stuff burn. I despair at the climate crisis that makes wildfires more frequent and more deadly, but arson makes me furious. Setting those riverbank fires was both vicious and stupid. The gender neutral toilet block at my school was out of action for months after someone started a fire. Gaza’s hospitals and apartment buildings burn under relentless bombardment. There’s no way to romanticise that.

** within reason

In literature, we can make the fire act however we want to. But my favourite writing that employs fire conjures both its destructive power and fascinating pull.

Anne Sexton, in her staggering, stunning work “Angels of the Love Affair”4 writes “Mother of fire, let me stand at your devouring gate/As the sun dies in your arms and you loosen its terrible weight.” Leonard Cohen, in “Everybody Knows”, finishes that bitter ballad of betrayal with “Everybody knows it's coming apart/Take one last look at this Sacred Heart/Before it blows/And everybody knows”.

Fahrenheit 451 opens with “It was a pleasure to burn” and describes the pleasure of burning things with a sensual delight I recognise. But what is burning is books, fluttering in the flames like desperate birds, in a society nearly denuded of literature and independent thought. Later, a woman ready to die in the conflagration of her books says “Play the man, Master Ridley.” She is referencing what the former Bishop of Worcester, Hugh Latimer allegedly told his fellow condemned man as they were led to the stake for the Protestant heresy.

I didn’t need to look these lines up5. They nestled into my head like Jesus’s burning heart within his chest.

When it comes to my own work, I appear to be torn between fascination and terror. As a YA writer, I wrote fires into The Shattering and While We Run, where they were dangerous and destructive. As a romance writer, my fires tend to be more metaphorical.

Fire is so commonly used as a symbol for desire that it’s almost useless as figurative language. But I still write heat and warmth into every sex scene. I want that tactile conjuration, that sideways comparison of wanting to sparks and embers and roaring flame, that awareness of fierce beauty and power.

Cliche? Sure. But sex is hot work. While you’re reading, I want you to hover near the flame.

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Book stuff!

Persephone in Bloom is currently $0.99, if you’ve been waiting for an excuse to buy it (or recommend it to a friend!)

Penelope Pops the Question appears in another collection of freebies, titled “Love Should Be Fun!”. I signed up for this one because the organiser’s only requirement was that the book should “make your readers giddy and smiley”. I have it on good authority that Penelope has done that! Myself, I’m particularly looking forward to Thick as a Brick (love that cover) and the sample of Me Before Lou (cute dogs! crimes!).

Savory & Supernatural, my second Movie Magic novella, is off to copyedits, and I should have a cover to reveal shortly! Pre-order now to be one of the cool kids. I also have some more exciting news about the Movie Magic series, which I will tell you as soon as I may.

1

We had recently visited the West Coast together, about which more later.

2

Neve had a seconds sale the other day and you bet your butt I bought their Wild Pine and Juniper.

3

Most cheap candles smell awful, which is why one time I ended up paying over a hundred dollars for one (1) small candle. In my defense, it smelled amazing, and also it was lockdown, and I feel like we all made some choices then.

4

I cannot find a clean copy of “Angels of the Love Affair” anywhere online - I have the strong suspicion typos and perhaps mispellings/wrong words have been introduced, but I don’t have this poem in print, and can’t check. If anyone could, I’d be grateful! Also, here’s an amazing essay about Anne Sexton’s epistolary emotional love affair with a Benedictine monk that I just discovered.

5

Though I did, because ACCURACY

Job news!

For over a year, I’ve been describing myself as a part-time relief teacher, full-time writer. That’s about to change.

The greatest joy of that period was the huge amount of creative time and brain space and the explosion of writing productivity that resulted. Going from full-time teaching to relief teaching + the occasional workshop/editing was a massive gamechanger in so many ways.

But it was also incredibly stressful to deal with so much financial precarity. I was mostly all right1, but the fact that I was never sure about when I’d have paid work or how much I’d earn in a given fortnight wasn’t great for me.

I know there are people who float along, trusting in the universe, positive that everything will all turn out all right, but I cannot do this. My brain is not a floating, trusting kind of brain. It’s a “do maths at 3am to make sure I can cover the mortgage and insurance that’s going out on Thursday, can I afford the fancy sourdough this week or should I make my own bread, hm, if this invoice comes in on time I can cover this bill but if it doesn’t I will need to dip into the emergency fund so I shouldn’t pay off the credit card just yet even if the interest is concerning” brain.

I mean, most of the time, things do turn out all right. Does the worrying make that more or less likely? WHO CAN SAY2.

What I can say is that I have a new part-time job! I am working three days a week as a Careers Development teacher, I’ve been doing it for four weeks, and honestly? I’m having a ball.

This timetable is a dream. Most part-time high school teaching positions are spread over five days, which limits the kind of dedicated writing time I work best with. This job gives me a four day weekend3, except for some travel here and there, which gives me plenty of writing time and means I can still do school visits and writing workshops. The Careers job itself is a mix of practical classroom teaching, administration and pastoral care/careers advice, with a lot of interesting variety, and a ton of learning. I’m really stoked.

But also… I will have less time to write.

Technically, I will be working fewer days than I might have as a relief teacher. But I will be working harder. Coming home and writing after relief days wasn’t usually a problem, but I suspect the same won’t be true here. I’ve opted for pessimism in goal-setting, optimism in everyday practice, and lowering my expectations. If I can do more, great! If my brain is done, it’s done.

Which is to say, I am now a part-time writer, part-time teacher, and that means I need to reassess my writing goals.

I mean, I could just ignore that and try to meet all my deadlines anyway, but I think I’ll skip the painful recovery from burnout this time and go straight to the part where I make a realistic plan in the first place.

Just as a reminder, my initial 2024 goals:

Publish Savory & Supernatural

Write a novella or begin a novel in another genre (secret project!)

Make and schedule social media content for three times/week

Launch Trojan Women arc with Ask Cassandra - eARC team, Olympian boxset release, push media and promo opportunities

Invest 30% of net income in advertising

Complete three productivity/marketing courses3 

Make $20k gross writing-related income

The goals I’m changing:

Write and publish the Trojan Women arc (Ask Cassandra; Love, Laodice; XO, Xena2). Write and publish Ask Cassandra and Love, Laodice. (I’m hoping to at least start XO, Xena too, but this may be a stretch goal.)

Write a novella or begin a novel in another genre (secret project!) Begin secret project novella (this story is eating me alive).

Complete three two productivity/marketing courses3 

Make $20k $15k gross writing-related income

My other goals are staying the same, although I may cut down on my Ask Cassandra launch plans, because that stuff always takes wayyyy longer than I think it will.

January Lows (and Highs)

January was a tough money month. Almost no income, scraping at the very bottom of my barrel tough. But it was also pretty fantastic, because with the release of Hera Takes Charge and some promo opportunities, I had my best sales month ever - and I’ll actually get the money for it at the end of this month.

Yes, thank you, I would like 626USD (gross). I will immediately spend most of it on membership to the upcoming Romance Writers of New Zealand conference, an excellent use for the money,

What I like most about this graph is that while Hera coming out is a big chunk of the pie, Aphrodite also has considerable sales. This is definitely a result of the huge downloads for Persephone during the free promotions in December. Building the backlist and then promoting the first book in series works4!

My next step is figuring out advertising on Facebook and Instagram, where the book people like to hang. I’ve made some limited forays into this space, but as my marketing budget grows, I’m looking forward to taking a more systematic approach.

I’m also looking forward to telling you more about it!

See you next time,

Karen.

1

Continually broke, but nothing like dire need.

2

Being a privileged, university-educated white woman with job experience and family support in case of emergency has definitely been more effective in making things turn out all right than any particular mindset tbh.

3

During which I will be working. I legitimately don’t know what I would do with a full weekend, in its intended use as two days of leisure. What do people do when they have nothing to do?

4

She declares optimistically, on the basis of limited data.

Right, I promised news for Valentine’s Day, and here it is!

Goodreads Giveaway for Bespoke & Bespelled!

Dear American readers, want to try my witchy romance novella Bespoke & Bespelled, starring social awkward star Rider and fat femme stitch-witch Marnie for free?

You just might get your chance. Enter the Goodreads giveaway draw, which is open from 14 - 21 February!

AND, regardless of where you live, pre-orders for the sequel, Savory & Supernatural, are now open! I’m working on the edits for Amalia and Kingston’s story now, and if you’re not hungry when you start reading, you will be by the end.

Celebrate Valentine’s Day with 11 Curvy Girl Romance Reads

Eleven women with dangerous curves get their Happily Ever After in these steamy romances! Every book is 0.99 USD on Valentine’s Day, including my own Persephone in Bloom!

There are short reads—just right for a one night stand—and long reads—perfect for a commitment. Grab your Kindle, a glass of wine, and snuggle in!

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Speaking of curves, last week I attended the Curve Collective’s Fat Babe Pool Party, a joyous, gender-neutral celebration of fat babes and their fat bodies at He Puna Taimoana, which are five glorious hot pools by the ocean, about a ten minute drive from my home.

(Have I mentioned recently that I love my city? I love my city.)

Moata and me, looking good as hell.

We floated! We soaked! We danced! Some of us (not me) plunged into the cold pool! I came home that evening slightly wrinkly and all buoyed up by this lovely event, and then I had half a glass of wine and fell headfirst into the deepest sleep I’ve had in weeks.

ALSO ALSO speaking of fat babes and Persephone in Bloom:

Muna and Broad, an excellent indie pattern designer for fat bodies (who created my beloved Tarawi Shirt and the extremely handy Nullabor Cami) have started running a Fat Book Club for their patrons. And lo! Persephone in Bloom was selected!

I’m right chuffed. This is going straight to the pool room. And other phrases that indicate I’m delighted by good opinions of my work from people whose own work I like and respect.

Not a bad job, this. Reckon I’ll keep it.

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Sleep

Remember this dream?

"It was two people in kind of a little circular meadow with really bright sunlight, and one of them was a beautiful, sparkly boy and one was just a girl who was human and normal, and they were having this conversation. The boy was a vampire, which is so bizarre that I'd be dreaming about vampires, and he was trying to explain to her how much he cared about her and yet at the same time how much he wanted to kill her.”

That’s the dream that started Twilight - Stephenie Meyer woke up, recognised she had something special, and wrote it down.

My dreams are not nearly that helpful for writing purposes1. I once dreamed a perfect locked-door murder mystery, fiendishly difficult, but logically sound once all was revealed. I woke up excited, determined to get this brilliant puzzle down.

Reader, the amazing solution to this cunning murder was “he came through the window”.

Ngaio Marsh, I am not.

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Snow in summer

Lately, I’ve been dreaming of snow, despite the sweaty heat suffusing the New Zealand summer. I know why - it’s not inspiration, but what I’m pouring into my brain. Ask Cassandra takes place on a rural vineyard, in that unpleasant transition from winter to spring, where a fresh future is just a distant glimmer as you trudge through the slush and mud of your present life.

(If you were wondering, no, I will never abandon the pathetic fallacy, especially when I’m writing about characters whose original mythologies were closely tied to the personification of natural forces.)

A lot of my research recently has been scrolling through wintry vineyard photos, all very picturesque, and wondering what it would be like to actually be there in the less romantic reality, to feel the ground icy-hard or precariously slippery underfoot, to have the cold air bite at your face. No surprises that such wondering has snuck into my sleep.

Surety

I occasionally describe my job as “sitting at home and making up adventures with my imaginary friends.” A lot of what I do is the (slightly) more grown-up equivalent of rubbing two Barbie doll’s heads together and proclaiming, “Look, they’re kissing!” It is work2, but it’s also play, and it’s a joy to play with love stories.

What I do is not, perhaps, “serious” writing, but I take it seriously. How to recognise and nurture love, how to negotiate desire, how to communicate and unite with others, how to behave with integrity and honesty in work, love, and life, how to turn the dream of romance into the reality of living love — these are issues of huge importance to many of us.

The real fantasy I offer is of a confirmed happy ending. In real life, we strive for those things with no surety of outcome. We might find ourselves in the dark days of late winter with no certain hope of spring. But why not indulge in hope anyway? Imagine that story ending well for someone else, and make it easier to find it yourself.

I’ve got some dreams to sell.

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Book stuff!

Pre-orders are immensely helpful for authors. Pre-order Ask Cassandra to earn my eternal gratitude today (happy ending guaranteed!)

The Love Month Romance Giveaway is still going strong (hi, new readers!) and you can find literally hundreds of FREE novels, novellas, prologues and excerpts there, including my own Penelope Pops the Question.

If you’re here from that giveaway, great news! The first full novel in the Olympus Inc. series, Persephone in Bloom, is only 99 cents (USD) this Feburary!

If you’re like me, then you’re anticipating Feb 14th will send you a FLURRY of romance author newsletters and deals. Mine most certainly included, because I have newwwws. More soon!

1

My brain has the delightful habit of noting I am anxious about something—say, an upcoming deadline—and then translating that into an anxiety dream about a different thing, like running late for the airport, or standing in front of a class without a lesson plan, so that I then wake up anxious about TWO situations. Thanks, brain!

2

After outlining and roughly plotting, I have FINALLY finished the first full chapter of Ask Cassandra. It was kind of a slog! But now I have a firmer grip on Cassie and Manny, and things should proceed forthwith!

Book stuff:

It’s February, the month of love1, so I’m discounting Persephone in Bloom to 0.99 USD!

I’ve also dropped Penelope Pops the Question into the Love Month Romance Giveaway, which has a ton of free contemporary and new adult romances. If you’re into smouldering billionnaires, you’re in luck! As ever, I am drawn to the illustrated covers - I’m looking forward to picking up Rough Edges by Elsa Jacobs and Make or Break by Diana Deehan.

You can pre-order Ask Cassandra, the first book in the new Olympus Inc. arc! I’m writing Cassie’s story now and after three days where I couldn’t get a grip on my opening scene, I dropped her in the middle of nowhere without a working GPS. This may be a metaphor.

As ever, reviews for both Karen books and Kate books are very welcome!

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Fifties Frocks

The second I saw Liz Casal Goodhue’s final design for Bespoke & Bespelled, I went crazy for Marnie’s dress. I love a fifties silhouette, and a lot of my favourite homemade outfits are that tight bodice, nipped waist, full skirt look.

I also want the shoes. If you see these shoes, @ me.

“Should I make this dress?” I asked my friends, who, because they know me well, knew that what I meant was, “I have decided to make this dress,” and encouraged me forthwith. So I am making Marnie’s dress out of some bright and slippery pink rayon2, using the Cashmerette Upton Dress pattern as a base, and making some adjustments, like adding belt loops.

(I am also planning to make a poofy tulle petticoat out of gold-spangled tulle, because, honestly, why wouldn’t I?)

Sewing is about 25% actually sewing and 75% cutting and pressing. I thought it would be fun (and also good marketing? idk) to document the process for social media, so it’s taking even longer than usual while I do exciting and difficult things like “get the subject in frame” and “crop out that half a sandwich sitting next to your cutting board”. If you’re on Instagram, follow me to watch the journey of cover to dress!

Fat Femininity

Like Marnie of Bespoke & Bespelled, I am a fat woman.

Unlike Marnie, who is a stitch-witch, and has been sewing from the moment she had the motor dexterity to pick up a needle, I came to sewing late3.

I mostly started learning to sew because it gave me something to focus on during lockdowns, but I kept it up afterwards because 1) I really enjoy it and 2) I now have a bespoke wardrobe and that’s nothing to sneeze at and 3) clothes off the rack that fit women my size, with my enormoboobs, are usually either MASSIVE BLACK SACK or polyester florals, both of which are great if they are your style, but neither of which gel with my personal preferences.

If I want cute cotton button-up blouses and dresses with fitted bodices — and I really, do — I need to make them.

I’m aware that as a smaller fat woman who likes full skirts and chunky heels, I often get a grudging pass from fatphobic people. At home I wear T-shirts and soft cotton pants 90% of the time, because 1) oh god the ironing, and 2) I don’t want to change my clothes to cook or clean and no, an apron is NOT sufficient coverage4. But in public, I’m often performing a very high-femme femininity, and that can easily be read as “at least she’s trying”.

I mean, people who really hate fat people are going to hate me anyway. There I am, existing in a fat body! Walking around like I have a right to enjoy my life and like myself! But people who hate fat people a little less, who maybe have some inherited fatphobia or internalised misogyny they may not be entirely aware of, they can look at me and think, “well, that’s not too bad.5”

The issue is that existing while fat isn’t at all bad. Thinking other people should change their bodies to make you more comfortable, that’s the bad thing.

Fat Liberation

I had an ex who once sneered, “Fat isn’t a feminist issue, it’s a FAT issue”, and at the time I was much younger and thinner and really wanted to impress him by echoing all his opinions back at him, so I nodded along.

Would it surprise you to know that this guy talked about diet and exercise a lot, and it was very boring? Or that he frequently made disparaging comments about other women’s bodies and occasionally mine? He was not, as such, mean to me, but I was left in absolutely no doubt that my breasts were too big, my ass was too flat, and if I got bigger I would be less attractive - not just to him as a matter of personal choice, but to all men, everywhere.

This guy has been out of my life for nearly twenty years, and anyone who tried this now would get rolled eyes and a sharp word as I walked away, but my god. He thought this was okay! He thought it was normal.

Here’s the thing. Does your feminism include the idea that of course women should have the right to bodily autonomy?

Awesome!

But does your feminism also include the idea that if you deem it necessary, women should use a lot of time, money and emotional labour to keep those bodies small, or make them smaller, or at the very least have the good manners to try to be smaller and apologise for the space they take up if they must exist in a larger body?

Hm.

HMMM.

For a lot of people, even people who would otherwise embrace everybody’s right to bodily autonomy, it’s horribly likely that fat-positivity and body liberation might feel big and scary and too much to whole-heartedly embrace. Even if you don’t expect other people to change their bodies, you can still buy into the idea that you should be apologising for your own.

If that’s the case for you, I get it. I’ve been there. For me, a starting point was, “Well, I can think whatever I’m gonna think about my body, but I’m going to chill the fuck out about other people’s.” It is just a generally good idea to be cool about other people’s right to exist in the bodies they exist in! Bonus, it made me so much happier! I highly recommend it!

And after a while, you can try and practice the same grace towards yourself.

Honestly, this is something I still struggle with sometimes. But you know what helps? Making adorable hot pink dresses for my fat body. Writing about fat heroines. Reading about fat heroines.

Vive la libération!

Share That Healey Girl

1

This makes more sense in northern climes, I think, when you’d want to do a bit more clustering together, but what do I know, my birthday is in August.

2

It’s so pretty and so hard to sew, MY CURSE.

3

I really had no excuse for this, because my mother is an incredible seamstress.

4

I made these clothes! I do not want to spend twenty minutes praying I can successfully scrub the tomato sauce out of them!

5

I’ve been fully guilty of this myself. Divesting yourself of body shame is a long and annoyingly difficult process. BOO, AWFUL SOCIETY NORMS.

This is part of the Business of Writing series, for paid subscribers, where I talk about how I’m, you know, doing this. It includes honest reflection and real numbers, and if you’d like to know more about those, go ahead and subscribe!

Past Goals

In April, I told you my writing goals for 2023, my first year of being a real hybrid author with multiple independent titles. They were:

Long term (5 years)

Support myself entirely from writing related income

Income from backlist is 30% of income

Short term (1 year)

Write and publish three 80k Olympus Inc novels

Write a 30k Movie Magic novella draft (Savory & Supernatural)

Contribute to Garibaldi (co-written cozy mystery)

Edit and publish a Movie Magic novella (Bespoke & Bespelled)

Sustain a weekly Substack newsletter/Add paid subscription option

Make $10k gross writing-related income (including grants, craft teaching, speaking, etc)

So how did I do?

Pretty damn well. The long term goals are way off completion, of course. My backlist income last year was just over one percent of my total income. I imagine (and hope!) that percentage will change dramatically this year, as more readers discover the Movie Magic and Olympus Inc series.

But I really nailed those short term goals:

Write and publish three 80k Olympus Inc novels? Yep.

Write a 30k Movie Magic novella draft (Savory & Supernatural)? Yep.

Contribute to Garibaldi (co-written cozy mystery)? Nope. (My one unsuccessful goal - this was my lowest production priority, so as time dwindled and my wrists got worse, it fell off the list altogether)

Edit and publish a Movie Magic novella (Bespoke & Bespelled)? Yep, with bonus being picked up by 8th Note Press!

Sustain a weekly Substack newsletter/Add paid subscription option? Not quite weekly, but mostly yes!

Make $10k (NZD) gross writing-related income (including grants, craft teaching, speaking, etc) $15 519 and very happy about it!

Last year was the year of writing - get those books written, figure out how to format and publish them, get them out to readers. Just as vital was me figuring out my processes and discovering what does and doesn’t work for me.

Does work: setting aside days that are only for writing, skipping a scene that isn’t working and writing the next interesting thing, asking for help instead of floundering around in my own ignorance.

Doesn’t work: Writing while teaching full time (I knew this, but it was startling how quickly it was confirmed when I took on that one-term position!), writing without a calendar of events (looking at YOU, Hera), resisting my urge to learn interesting things about my characters’ hobbies.

This year?

Read more

Book News:

Bespoke & Bespelled is getting some lovely reviews1 from NetGalley readers, which makes me really happy!

Hera Takes Charge is OUT! If you’ve read it, a) thank you! and b) please consider leaving a review, on Goodreads.com, Storygraph, or the retailer where you bought it.

While you’re at it, leave one for Persephone or Aphrodite as well!

With Hera Takes Charge, I have concluded the Olympian Arc of the Olympus Inc. series. Does that mean I’m done with the world of Olympus Publishing? HECK NO. I love this myth-inspired world of contemporary glamour, and I’m not leaving it just yet.

In fact, you can now pre-order Ask Cassandra, the first book in the Trojan Women arc!

Alison Cooley’s covers just keep getting better.

If you’ve read Hera, you’ve already met advice columnist Cassie Troiades. If you’ve read Penelope Pops the Question (and if not, why not? It’s a free gift for you!) you’ve already met Manny Pelopson. It is safe to say that he is not in a good place by the end of that book. I aim to get him to a better one.

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The Golden Weather

My living room gets a lot of light.

It’s one of the reasons I bought this house, the first home I’ve ever owned. I love daylight, especially in the middle of winter, when Ōtautahi can be grim and gloomy for days on end. I’m not, as such, a massive fan of being in sunlight (it’s easier to read inside and I don’t have to wear sunscreen) but I like seeing it.

However, right now, in the middle of a hot, dry summer, there are days I just don’t go into that room, even with all the curtains closed. It soaks up so much heat that stepping inside causes an instant sweat2. I hide in my bedroom and office instead, with the heat pump on cool mode.

The Canterbury nor’wester is notorious, a gusting hot wind that feels like a dragon huffing. It fans fires, strips topsoil, topples powerlines and sucks every drop out of the garden. The nor’wester is also bad for your brain; it’s been blamed for migraines, increased suicide and domestic violence rates. My friend Erin says that it “feels like static in your head” which I think is right on. When I was teaching full time, we all grimaced at nor’wester forecasts, knowing it meant hot classrooms, banging windows, students and teachers either listless with the heat or scratchy and ill-tempered from the incessant buffeting.

The wind does also create the Nor’West Arch, a very pretty cloud formation. It’s not that much consolation.

Deadlines

In the middle of these hot and golden days, I finished the first draft of Savory & Supernatural, the sequel to Bespoke & Bespelled.

Bespoke & Bespelled is a really special book to me; the first longform work I’d finished in five years, it convinced me my writing brain wasn’t exhausted, that writing was still there for me, if I could make the time for it. (And it was right! Last year, I wrote 282 000 words of completed fiction.) Because I was writing the book while I was teaching full time, it technically took two years to write, even though I was only actually writing for about four weeks of that time3.

Making writing my focus in 2023 made a huge difference. I started thinking about Savory & Supernatural while I was editing B&B last year, made a start on it in June, and then picked it up again in December. However, I wrote the majority of the draft in the first two weeks of this year, staring the deadline in the eye and daring it to mess me up.

I do not recommend this as a strategy, because in my experience the times when you have left yourself no buffer are exactly the times that you’re most likely to need it, but I’m happy to report the deadline blinked before I did.

It probably helped that even though this is a book that’s very interested in food and cooking, it was too hot to spend much time in the kitchen. Who knows, if we’d had a cold spell, I might have discovered the urgent necessity of making a series of increasingly elaborate cakes4. Instead, I ate out of my freezer, and channeled all that creative energy into making my words for the day.

Dead Time

I sent the draft to Allison, my lovely editor at 8th Note Press, and basically turned my brain off for four days. Oh, a dish or two might have been washed, some bedsheets changed, some long delayed sewing finished at last, but my major “tasks” were “schedule times for gaming group to meet up”, “have coffee and discuss an editing project with a friend”, and “road trip to Ashburton to admire looms”5.

Once upon a time, I might have tried to push through to the next thing on the to-do list. After all, I have newsletters to write, promo to prepare, and a business plan to make! And yup, I sure did (and do) but I needed to stop, and trust that I could do those things after some rest.

Instead, I napped. I played Frostpunk. I re-read most of astolat’s Game of Thrones fanfic collection6. Total dead time, with no internal pressure to produce.

Honouring the Dead

The one task I did make myself do during this period was attend a rally calling for a ceasefire in Gaza, where the IDF have killed over 25 000 people (and nearly 10 000 children) since the militant wings of Hamas brutally attacked civilian and military targets on October 7th7. This rally was specifically in honour of the 370+ Palestinian healthcare workers who have been killed.

In Hagley Park, the nor’wester pulled the flags into snapping horizontal lines during three minutes of silence for the doctors and nurses who have been treating the injured and dying without painkillers or antiseptics. We listened to a recording of the droning barrage they hear throughout their workday while the cricket players behind us called urgently for a referee decision. Gaza felt far away and very close.

I sat on the grass under a waving tree and wrote an email to Dr Shane Reti, the Minister of Health, requesting that he condemn IDF targeting of hospitals, ambulances, and his healthcare worker colleagues. I asked him to demand a ceasefire and immediate humanitarian aid in Gaza.

I came home to the open oven of my living room, and took my laptop to my bedroom to start drafting this newsletter. If all I can do is bear witness, that is what I can do.

My brain is coming back online. Here is the work I can do and the stories I can make.

Hello, 2024. What’s next?

1

Yes, I read all the reviews, and have throughout my fifteen year writing career. No, I will never call out a reviewer, although I reserve the right to ALLCAPS message my friends in the group chat. Honestly, there’s no better way to drill into your head that reading is a subjective experience than reading all the reviews.

2

If you’re from a place where houses are habitually built with inbuilt air conditioning or heating systems, this may seem bizarre. Just know that not only do the vast majority of New Zealand homes not have central air or heat, but until very recently, they weren’t really built for any kind of temperature extreme. Compulsory insulation for new builds was only introduced in 1978; in 2023 the standards were updated to more accurately reflect actual need. Now ask about our horrible mold issues!

3

Novellas go faster than novels, even accounting for the reduced word count - because I also have a smaller cast and fewer narrative and structural balls to juggle, and that means they require less time spent on thinking.

4

I watched Masterchef: Dessert Masters, and now all I want to do is make an entremet.

5

We also stopped at the Chertsey Book Barn on the way home. Gotta go to the Book Barn.

6

Do recommend.

7

Please note that I am not open to discussing the various arguments justifying either of these actions. I don’t have the political knowledge, historical background, or personal experience to rationally engage in debate, and there are much better people than me to listen to, but also, I just fundamentally don’t care about anyone’s justification for killing kids.

Book stuff:

Bespoke & Bespelled has been re-released by 8th Note Press with a gorgeous new Liz Casal cover! Don’t forget that newsletter subscribers get the (appropriately Christmas-themed) prequel story, Taylor Made.

Persephone in Bloom is available in paperback and the ebook is FREE until Jan 4!

WHAT A COINCIDENCE Hera Takes Charge is coming out Jan 4. Pre-order now!

Buildings

In mid-December, I went to my hometown, Oamaru, to speak at a fundraiser for my alma mater, Waitaki Girls’ High School. Waitaki Girls’ were raising money for refurbishing the Music and Drama Suite, in which I spent many happy hours as a dramatic teen.

Oamaru is a setting in Bespoke & Bespelled for the same reason it’s a setting in a lot of historical films1 - it has a glorious selection of Victorian-style buildings constructed from the area’s famous limestone (locally called whitestone or Oamaru stone) in the Victorian Precinct.

I was given a walking tour of the precinct by local icon Helen Stead, one of the first women on the Oamaru Borough Council. Helen is 84 years old, and still dedicated to conserving and showcasing our history. She was getting phone calls and setting up meetings during our coffee break. This woman works.

Oamaru’s much more recent claim to architectural fame is Riverstone Castle, which is a genuine castle, with a real moat and a lake, completed just a couple of years ago. The formidable Dot Smith wanted to live in a castle.

So she built one.

This is so stupefyingly awesome that meeting Dot was a little intimidating. What are you going to say? “You have a beautiful home”? Uh, yes, of course she does, it’s a castle.

Also, Dot has a tiara collection and she will pick one out for you and take a picture. In the photo below I was trying to smile like a human person, but instead I feel this has serious evil queen vibes, which may be even better?

Bookstores

On the way back to Ōtautahi, I stopped off at Mystique Bookstore in Waimate! Dark romance author Elliot Rose opened Mystique earlier this year. It’s the only specialist romance bookstore in the South Island and it’s gorgeous, full of spicy books and lovely furniture.

Boss Babes

I didn’t realise this when I started, but the theme of the trip was awesome women doing awesome things.

There they were, everywhere I turned: Sarah, the Waitaki Girls’ principal; Dagmar, who organised the event; Helen, who runs the beautiful Inc. Design Store showcasing New Zealand designers and creatives.

Preserving history. Building castles. Selling books.

Damn, ladies.

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1

The fictional Queen’s Horde series in Bespoke & Bespelled is the earliest idea of that book’s creation - I conceptualised a Victorian zombie series maybe twelve years ago, but have always had other things I wanted to write more. Recycling!