Dark Fantasy, History, and Second Chances
This blog explores stories that begin after coming of age—where magic, monsters, history, and second chances collide. Expect dark fantasy, flawed heroines, and reflections on power, identity, and survival.
Old Abe Sold Out! The Cobweb Palace is no more!
An auctioneer showed up at the Cobweb Palace on Meiggs Wharf and started accepting bids. The San Francisco Chronicle covered it the next day. Thirty-seven years of Abe Werner’s life went on the block: the curiosities, the caged animals, the paintings. A statesman...
Dry Years Make Hungry Things Brave: Drought, Tomatoes, and Book 3
If you've ever eaten a tomato still warm off the vine, you know why I kept trying. Grocery store tomatoes are usually sad, tasteless, mealy, styrofoam colored red. Garden tomatoes are special: tart, sweet, bursting with umami and juice. So even with Colorado in...
One of the most dangerous women in Necromancers and Navy Grog began with one of the saddest stories in my family.
Necromancers and Navy Grog launches on May 15, 2026 which means I am officially in the final stretch of prelaunch chaos: checking links, refreshing pages I have no business refreshing, and pretending I am not emotionally invested in every tiny detail. Naturally, this...
There are more things than are dreamt of in your philosophy, Harold – The Magic System
There is a secret government agency in the world of Bad Magic. It has a budget, a filing system, and very strong opinions about which kinds of magic are worth taking seriously. It's wrong with impressive consistency. The Bureau of Magical Investigation was formed by...
What is Historical Fantasy of the American West?
So is Bad Magic and Whiskey a Western? Short answer: no. Longer answer: also no. BUT there are guns, horses, railroads, ghosts, livestock and at least one extremely bad idea involving magic. When people hear that Bad Magic and Whiskey is set in late 19th-century New...
The Trail Remembers
It started, oddly enough, with will-o’-wisps. They’re usually explained as malicious tricksters: mischievous spirits, fair folk, or restless dead who lure travelers off safe paths and into danger. I always wanted to see them, and when I went backpacking in the...
Real Monsters: John Chivington, Sand Creek, and the Long Shadow of Narrative Control
When I was working on my books (The Phantasm Prism and Bad Magic and Whiskey) I researched a lot. I was looking for cool historical nuggets where truth is stranger, and usually darker, than fiction. I like to start with broad strokes: I poke at old newspapers, follow...
Elizabeth Van Lew and the Power of Second Acts
My FAVORITE thing when I write historical fantasy set in the late 19th-century American, is starting with real people and real systems of power. The characters and institutions in Bad Magic and Whiskey are inspired by history as much as by magic. But then I run it off...
Why I wrote my first book
I got serious about my first book at the end of 2022, right after I was laid off from a job I had for 17 years. Oh my hairy Gods what was I even doing at a job for that long? Total dissonance with my idea of identity. I was a rebel, I was punk rock. I was not a senior manager at a tech company – except I was. For a long time. WTF ?