Overdue update, and epilogues

Greeting all you lovely folks. I have been trying to get the mental energy to organize everything for an update for you, and it’s been difficult. I have taken a bit of time off my podcasts and streams — unannounced, I know — and have retreated into a rabbit hole. I had one of those situations where there was a misunderstanding and both parties were wrong, but the end result is I have a rather short deadline on my next book, so I’m going to be head down for a while.

I do have some podcasts coming out this week, and supporters here and on Patreon will get the episodes early, with no ads, with annotated transcripts!

Important dates!

• July 25: I turned 50. I’ve never felt so weird saying my age before now. I’m 50 but so is hip-hop. I don’t know where that argument will get me, but I’m going to make it as often as I can. It was a low key day because of some unexpected travel on my husband’s part, but we’re going to be taking a trip next month to celebrate, so I’m really looking forward to that.
• August 3: Escape Pod released episode 900! We didn’t do a big fanfare thing, but it still is a big deal. I can’t believe we’ve made it this far, and gotten Hugo nominations to boot! (Did I mention Escape Pod is nominated for the Best Semiprozine Hugo? Cause it is!)
• August 6: My affiliate-versary! Three years ago I got through the three requirements that Twitch has in order to become an affiliate, which grants me the ability to store my videos for a few weeks and for people to support my stream monetarily. I always either forget or miss the milestone for other reasons, so I wanted to report it here. I’ll be doing a stream this week to celebrate.
• August 9: I Should Be Writing turns EIGHTEEN. My little podcast can vote, yall! I can’t believe so many old school listeners are still hanging around. You really mean the world to me.
• August 9: ALSO! Spotify and Patreon* have made friends and if you’re a Patreon supporter, you can now listen to exclusive I Should Be Writing and Ditch Digger episodes on Spotify! That’s ad-free, early, and expanded episodes!
  I've used Patreon for nine years, and it's been my primary vehicle for building my community and letting me talk directly to my audience. Now that you can simplify your listening through Spotify, it's easier than ever to get all my exclusive content, like extended episodes, bloopers, and more!
• August 11: Kick in the pants workshop
• August 26: Kick in the pants workshop
• August 27: I will be teaching at Rambo Academy - the topic, Don’t Shoot Yourself In the Foot, how to avoid common pitfalls in your writing career.
• September 3: I’ll be doing a book event at Pandemonium Books and Games in Boston!
• November 7: Chaos Terminal launches, and live event at Flyleaf Books in Chapel Hill! You can preorder the book now, and if you do so from Flyleaf, you can get it signed by me! (affiliate)
• There are several other events in November around the book launch that I will inform you of when I know.

Other news: Chaos Terminal is getting love from Library Journal and SheReads!

What I’m playing: I got a Steamdeck as a birthday present to myself, and have been having fun with it. It has its downsides: it’s definitely not a console for dainty hands. It’s huge and heavy. Also the games it works with are programmed for the computer, so it’s hard to find out what button/stick does what. Right now I changed my buttons on Wandering Village to be more like Nintendo than Playstation (on Switch, the button in the 3 o’clock position is the action button and on PS it’s the 6 o'clock) position. But the instructions on the screen still say to press X or Y, and I have to remember that x is y and y is x and up is down… Anyway, other than that, I can carry around Frostpunk and Wandering Village and, even better, when I see a new game that’s out, I don’t have to be sad if it’s PC only. On the Switch, I’m enjoying Pikmin 4.

I really really really really want to play Baldurs Gate, but I’m trying to keep it as a “finish the book reward.”

I really want it.

What I’m watching: I just wrote out a long paragraph about the shows I love, and then remembered the writer’s strike. They’re asking folks to watch the shows they’re interested in, but review, stream, promote, etc. So I’m watching The Afterparty Season 2, Star Trek Strange New Worlds, new Nailed It!, and some other stuff I am sure I forgot about. And that’s all I’ll say.

What I’m reading: So many things. The Only One Left by Riley Sager. A home health aid who is accused (but not convicted) of mercy killing her own mother can get only one job- helping an old lady who, 50 years earlier, was accused of murdering the hell out of her whole family. She’s mostly paralyzed due to a stroke, but she can still type with her left hand. I enjoy Sager’s books but I can never tell if I should be expecting a supernatural aspect to it or not. I think my problem with the previous book about the house on the lake was the supernatural came in super late to the story. But those books are bestsellers and mine ... are not, so who am I to judge?

TANGENT-On Epilogues: since writing this I have finished the book, and am slightly torn. I saw some of the twists coming, but not others. It uses a trope I can’t stand and I thought we were done with. some things surprised me. I won’t spoil, but it’s giving me a lot to think about.

One of the big things is, it’s general advice to avoid prologues, but no one talks about epilogues. There are three books that come to mind that don’t make sense until you read the epilogues. And Then There Were None by Agatha Christie, The Only One Left, mentioned above, and Redshirts by John Scalzi.

ATTWN is one of the most brilliant books** ever. People are stranded on an island and one by one they begin to die. {spoilers redacted] The last chapter has two men from Scotland Yard saying “WTF happened on this island?” Then there is an epilogue for four months later, when someone found the confession of the killer floating in an honest to god bottle in the sea. This could be because there’s no one alive to answer any questions, not even the murderer, or because it doesn’t have either of her famous sleuths there to tell us how it went.

TANGENT TWO: I’d love to see a dramatization of ATTWN where Miss Marple visits the island along with the ten others, and she’s the only one left standing…

John Scalzi has said that when he turned in Redshirts, his editor told him to make it longer, so he tacked on three epilogues. I couldn’t believe it because I thought they fit in seamlessly.

Sager’s book has two epilogues, sort of. A letter and an obituary. The letter gets kind of repetitive, and feels like it’s written by the author instead of the character, answering real questions that beta readers threw at him when they couldn’t believe the book’s many twists: “I bet you’re wondering why I did X, aren’t you? I bet you’re wondering how I managed Y, right?” By the end, I honestly expected the letter to say “And why did I tell you this in a letter and not in person? Well, because plot.”

I’m going to have to think on this epilogue thing more. It feels like adverbs—a perfectly fine tool to use if you know how to do it well.

The Inugami Curse by Seishi Yokimizo. I wanted to delve into classic Japanese mysteries so this was my first one.*** The audiobook is narrated beautifully by Akria Matsumoto. A patriarch dies with no sons, but is survived by three daughters from three mistresses who do have sons. He leaves his entire fortune to the daughter of his best friend, but she has to marry one of his grandsons. There are considerable notes in the will of what will happen if certain people die, which just feels like grandad just handed his family a complex map to murder. And there are murders. Aside from the patriarchal structure, it’s a fascinating story with many twists and turns. And when will I remember that if a minor character is introduced, they will no doubt have a much bigger role in the story than just a spear carrier?

Evergreen content: You can subscribe to my podcasts and see the lists of my books at Murverse.com! Chaos Terminal is available for pre-order!

* this is a patreon-specific bonus, so Substack supporters will still get their episodes via the newsletter.

** It’s a brilliant book IF you can stomach some of Christie’s -isms. Even after the book lost its first TWO horrifically offensive titles, still managed to slip in some antisemitic tones.

*** (No, wait second. I read Decagon House Murders by Yukito Ayatsuji (Author) Ho-Ling Wong (Translator) before this. Mystery fans go out to a remote island where, shockingly, they start to die one by one like And Then There Were None.)