*Blows away cobwebs* I’m here! We had a total of…one entry for 2022. Would you look at that? Let’s aim for two in 2023, yes?

Anyway, hi, hello, I’m back! A lot has happened in the past year+ in my life, which involved mostly being sick, but also two international trips to see my parents, several out-of-town trips with my friends, and making “friends” with my doctors because of the first thing I mentioned. It’s been…interesting, to say the least.

So this post is just a check-in/random things for now, but hopefully *crosses my fingers* there will be some writing news things sometime this year (for entry # 2, lol).

BUT FIRST! I’m relaunching my author newsletter, finally. This is on a different newsletter platform, so if you were a former subscriber there, please subscribe again if you want to receive stuff from me! The first email goes out on 17 May. 🙂

Reading

I’ve been on a surprisingly good reading kick the past weeks, but maybe the long wait times at check-ups made me do that. I’ve yet to update my reading thread on Twitter (if the platform doesn’t die first, lol) with a lot of these books, but here are some that I really liked:

• Clean Sweep and Sweep in Peace (Innkeeper Chronicles 1 and 2)  by Ilona Andrews
• Almond by Sohn Won-pyung
• Beach Read by Emily Henry
• Human Acts by Han Kang

I’m currently rereading the Interim Goddess of Love trilogy by Mina V. Esguerra and maybe continue with Innkeeper Chronicles.

Writing

As the great AJ McLean of Backstreet Boys once said, “Oh my god, we’re back again!” I have been writing, and I thank #RomanceClass once again for inspiring me at the last #AprilFeelsDay. I will talk more about this in the newsletter very soon!

On another writing note, I have a short chat fic up on TypeKita, a new app where you can read and create short fiction in chat format. Check out Special Delivery, featuring Ruth and Ian from Fake It Till We Make It, a short story in my book, You Could be the One. And their very makalat friends, btw. 😉

Listening

BTS just released The Planet, a new OST for the animated movie, Bastions. It has all seven of them singing in one track!!! (Sidenote, in case you haven’t heard, BTS has been on a group “break” for almost a year now so they could pursue solo things and also so they could enlist in the military as required by the South Korean government. 2 members out of 7 are already in, and they all plan to be back by 2025.) It’s so funny because I listen to them every day anyway, so I was used to hearing all their voices in a song, but hearing The Planet almost made me cry because they were together again! My gosh, I love them so, so, so much.

Watching

I started Crash Course in Romance last week, and it was cute! I plan to watch the second episode today and go through the rest on my work break next month (maybe more on this work break when I’m actually on break, hehe).

Loving

A lot of things, to be honest, but maybe what I loved the most in the past few weeks were meeting and connecting with friends. Like yesterday, I went out to see some of my SFC friends, some of whom I haven’t seen in years. I meant to go home before 5 pm, but somehow, they ended up at our house to have dinner. How did we end up with this non-plan? Anyway, it was very nice to catch up! My social quota is full now, so I will need like two weeks to recover.

I also really, really love my therapist. 🙂

Thinking

About what I’m writing! I missed being so immersed in a fictional world and thinking about them almost 24/7. At first, I was afraid to jinx all of the good juju and energy because what if I lose steam and hate working on it along the way? But I have decided to lean into this rekindled joy and gave myself permission to quit if it becomes more of a struggle. Let’s take it one day, one word at a time. Because as the great philosopher Min Yoongi/Suga of BTS/Agust D once said: “I hope you don’t forget that giving up decisively also counts as courage.”

We stop here for now, and again, you can subscribe to the new newsletter here so you can get the first email on 17 May. Thank you~