Night of the Witch is a NY Times Bestseller!
Plus, sneak peek at the sequel title!
I’d like to start with a somber note. Please join me in a moment of silence or prayer for the people in Gaza who are undergoing horrific violence. War and genocide is not the answer. Nearly half the people in Gaza are children. If you can, please donate to humanitarian aid reliefs. I donated to Doctors Without Borders in memory of the victims of the hospital attack. Please also keep an eye out for a bookish charitable auction that is being organized. While it feels especially bleak to start a newsletter celebrating something joyous with such a dark reminder of reality, it felt worse to ignore the situation and pretend it didn’t exist.
I do, however, have some joyous news to share, and I want to couch that with my gratitude—thank you so much for all the support you’ve given to me, not just for my most recent book, but for my whole career. It was soul-fulfilling to meet so many of you while on book tour and hear your stories of how you’ve been reading my books since Across the Universe! Or that you followed my blog before I was even published! Sometimes, writing can feel like a lonely career of shouting into the void—how astounding it is to be heard!
Night of the Witch is a NY Times bestseller—two weeks in a row!
Hitting the list is always a privilege, and for it to happen twice in a row means that people didn’t just pick up the book when they first heard about it—they’re telling friends and spreading the word, and I’m so happy this story is being shared!
Sara and I wrote this book in a dark time, and it brought us so much joy to escape into medieval Germany. Even though there are dark themes in the book—witch trials and murder and magic abusers—it’s really about finding love and happiness despite the dark times, and using that love and joy to fight back.
Of course, you don’t have to take my word for it! NPR recently reviewed Night of the Witch and said: “it clipped along very satisfyingly, delivering on the witch vs. witch hunter trope that is the reason to read it in the first place.”
And Kirkus Reviews gave us a glowing review with the final verdict of: GET IT!
So, just in case you’ve got gotten it yet, here are some handy links for you:
Pop in your mailing address here and get some swag sent straight to you!
Signed copies from both me and Sara (be sure to say you want signed) are available at:
Amazon is still selling the book at a steep discount (and is also a part of a buy one, get one 50% off deal)
You can also grab the book at BN, where it’s a part of the Holiday Gift Guide
Join the Fable Book club to discuss the book and see reader annotations and notes from me and Sara as you read!
And the Title for Book 2 is…
It’s hard to believe that while Night of the Witch just came out, Sara and I already have the sequel done! We’ve still got a few rounds of edits to polish up on, but this book has a name! And that name is…
The Fate of Magic!!! I still can’t tell you much about this book, but I will say:
Fritzi and Otto are back, baby
Of course they’re still in love
Also Liesel sets things on fire, obviously
Another medieval Germany road trip
I get super nerdy about archaeological digs
Not every homecoming is a good homecoming
Oh dear, Dieter
Also, sorry Mom—I pitched Knight of the Witch like you wanted, but they thought this one may be better ;-)
You Have One Mission…
Don’t die!
That’s the theme of my latest choose-your-own-adventure story game. Each super short, super fun, super snarky episode follows “you,” a traveller sent by a mysterious being to different worlds with one goal each time: don’t die.
The first four episodes take you aboard a spaceship, where you quickly discover a breach in the hull is the result of sobotage. Can you find and stop the saboteur before you die?
This Friday is a double-episode drop, with a new setting—wilderness survival! But there are more than bears in these woods…
As I said, each episode is really snarky and funny. The stakes are high—a wrong choice is death!—but the mysterious being that both taunts you and puts you in these situations will reboot you. After it mocks you, of course. If you’re a fan of Douglass Adams’s Starship Titanic, thought Quantam Leap would be better with more snark, or just want to test to see if you can outwit me, join the game now! It’s super easy—you can read on your web browser or Apple device, and it’s still free!
Coming Soon: A New Wordsmith Workshop Retreat!
Wordsmith Workshops is going to a brand new city—one we’ve never been to before—for a workshop retreat that’s all about the vibes. If you want to develop your atmospheric writing and, say, eat some beignets beside a river in the South, make sure you’re following us on social media or subscribed to our newsletter.
What’s Happening on Patreon
We’re gearing up for the final chapters of House of Hex right now! In the latest episode, Emmi faced off against the King of the Fae. To plan this episode, I did pages of notes to develop a true Dungeons and Dragons style battle:
As this story wraps up, I’m going to be working on getting the ebook and paperback out in time for Christmas, and then launching the next serial novel—so if you’d like to get in on reading a book as it’s written from the very beginning, you may want to join up soon! Swag mailings—with an art card and two stickers—is also coming out to Patreons next week.
What I’m working on now…
House of Hex, a YA fantasy with witches and witch bottles, sequel to Museum of Magic. Available on Patreon and Kindle Vella, ending soon.
Planning stages for the next YA on Patreon
Working on proposals for a new YA fantasy
New adult science fiction project: with my agent. Going on sub soon!
The Fate of Magic: with our editor.
Don’t Die: A choose-your-path story game with one goal. Don’t die.
Adult fantasy novel: at around 70,000 words, on hold for other projects.
Side gigs!
Weekly posts and videos about writing at Patreon
SNHU as an online adjunct in the MFA writing program
Accepting critique and coaching jobs with Wordsmith Workshops—in addition to doing Word Lab! Also, we’re starting live and in person retreats again!
Actively doing in-person school, library, and book fair events—book me for panels, signings, and workshops for both adults and teens on writing! If you’d like to get an idea of some of the programming I do, I describe it a bit here.
Beth, this is HUGE! Congratulations x2! I could not be happier for you and Sara!