Dezmond's August Bookshelf

Welcome to my first official newsletter!

There's already more of you here than I expected for my first newsletter, so thank you everyone for poking that subscribe button - and not clicking the unsubscribe link - to see what else I'm writing.

This month has been a TON of author prep, so I don't have piles of writing updates to share. But there were a couple progress updates I can talk about.

Active Stories

Which Stories Have I been Working On?

The Raven and the Wolf

A farmer's son and a duke's heir fell in love as children. Now, king and family demand they marry someone else.

I haven't done anything with my novel this month, but I do have a cover artist picked out. Her name is Sofía Sanz, and she's a professional artist from Spain. For a sample of what her style is like, she's published Aquelarre Omega and El ser amado. I absolutely adore her style, and she works across genres, so I'm hoping to be able to have her do the covers for all my other books, too.

If you haven't already been to my subscriber website, you can read the first two chapters of The Raven and the Wolf here.

Shape of Us

Sometimes known as Kimberly, sometimes known as Nate, they've fallen for three completely different people and have no idea how to make it work. But they're trying.

I managed to get 5700 words written on this in July. That puts the book into chapter 52 and a total of 92k words. Ryan and Andrew just met and decided to pull a "we're going to do something you didn't expect" on me, which now means (since this is first-person POV from Kimberly / Nate) I need to write an entire side scene for two of them to figure out what they're doing off-screen. It might end up being bonus content for readers after the novel is published.

The Chaos Covenant: V'rastellan's Beginning

He never wanted to be a hero. He never asked to save the world. But some mysteries are impossible to ignore, and sometimes power is the only way to get revenge.

I haven't done any actual writing for V'rastellan, but I did spend four solid days converting the entire 12k page DND chat log into an outline of the series. The final verdict: 9 full novels and one novelette or novella to wrap up dangling plot threads.

Current working names of the novels:

V’rastellan’s Beginning

Zilenna’s Gambit

Coyeveilia’s Incursion

Zhaltik’s Stratagem

Ashaph’s Plot

Belkan’s Ultimatum

Xynil’s Retribution

Lorroki’s Truth

Vaer’ani’s Ascension

The Chaos Covenant

Side Projects

Unnamed Short Story

I've had an idea for a short story featuring a black unicorn brewing for a few weeks. I got it after wondering why white unicorns are always associated with purity and virgins, and thought "what if there were black unicorns that were misunderstood?"

With that concept, I did what I often like to do and picked a fairy tale to play off of. I considered the Ugly Duckling, but eventually landed on The Swan Princess. Which led me down the rabbit hole to Swan Lake and The Swan Maiden.

From there, I dropped them in one of my homebrew settings and ended up with shapeshifting unicorns who are children of the god of prophecy, and the black unicorns can see your death when they touch you.

I was stuck on what kind of story to write until I was listening to Josh Groban's song "Awake", and, out of the blue, the very first verse triggered an idea:

A beautiful and blinding morning
The world outside begins to breathe
See clouds arriving without warning
I need you here to shelter me

From just that last line, my mind said, "Ah ha! Injured unicorn on the run from someone trying to kill them!"

Hopefully, I'll have this short story written up for the next newsletter.

In other news:

I've also written six blog posts on my writing style and how readers can develop critical reading skills to understand why they might like some stories better than others. I've got enough content to keep my newsletter flowing for some time yet.

Monthly Blog Post

I decided to start off with a blog post introducing you to my writing style and why I write in first-person present tense.
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​First-Person Present POV: No, I'm Not Just Following A Trend​

I've become acutely aware that first-person present POV is THE POV of choice these days. I'm the kind of person who is allergic to bandwagons, and part of me wants to jump off this train before it goes any further. The problem with that is, I've hardwired my brain to write exclusively in first-person present...

Favorite Books of the Month

Do I recommend reading them? Not necessarily. Are they worth noting because they entertained me enough to not DNF on page three? Absolutely.

Winner of "This Shouldn't Be This Good": Mr. Jaguar by K.A. Merkan

Classic fake-dating setup. "Come with me to my work conference." Plot was flimsy at best. A little heavy on the similes, animal comparisons, and purplish things that really shouldn't have been purple. Also some weird conversational jumps that didn't make sense. The Misunderstanding(TM) could have been resolved with one person asking a question instead of assuming what the other person meant. And it took me a good three minutes to figure out why the book ended the way it did.

But the writing was actually good enough to keep me hooked for 90% and the characters had enough personality and chemistry to drive the story forward. Gave it a 3-star review on Amazon and Goodreads. For 99c erotica, it's closer to the top of the list.

Winner of "Best Worst Novel": Crave Me Bare (Naked Guy Flirt #401) by Ty Debauchee

I couldn't stop laughing. The introduction has nothing to do with the story. There is no plot to speak of. The narrator's only personality trait is "horny". And it is hands-down the winner of the most unique euphemisms ever used in smut scenes. This is the list I compiled, ranging from the names of body parts to fluids to other weird word choices:
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​Massive Meat

Safe Space

Hot Boi Batter

Magic Tongue

Granite Hard Cock

Love Tunnel

Boi Goo

Oral Pharynx

Love Wand

Rear Portal

Spooge

Great Divide

Monster Cock

Pleasure Hole

Precious Life Juice

Grand Canyon

Petrified Wood

Pleasure Crease

Joy Lube

Cum Gutter

Pleasure Pole

Erogenous Aura

Joy Juice

Abs Pack

Hostage Situation

Cum Buckets​
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Newsletters and Promos

Clicking through helps me a ton!

(I kinda overdid the swaps this month. There were a lot that weren't accepted in the first couple weeks, so I looked for more, and then they all came in the very last week. I promise I won't overload my newsletter with so many from now on!)

One night can change everything. Kitchen Table is an emotional and intimate MM romance about responsibility, vulnerability, and the unexpected connections that can change everything.

When love and art collide, hearts burn in secret flames. A surgeon, a painter, and a tangled web of passion that could shatter everything.

Will the Mouse become the infamous international advertising mascot that we all know and love? Or will he choose love, and blaze a new path where he can live life as himself, instead? A New Serial Novel, Set in a Multiverse We All Own

Third Time's the Charm Jamie’s reflection in the yoga studio’s mirror finally matches who she is. And when her cute blond dream woman flirts back during yoga class, Jamie’s ready to explore how flexible she can be.

In Conclusion

Thanks for reading my first newsletter! If you have any comments on it, questions about what I'm writing, or things you want me to talk about, feel free to reply to this email!
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Also, there was a group of you that mysteriously found me on July 25, when I only had a couple feelers out on Reddit. If you're one of them, mind giving me a ping for where you found me? I'd like to know what's grabbing so many people's attention!

– Dezmond
(They/He)
​Author Website | Subscriber Website​

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