Today’s newsletter is short and sweet and coming at you fast because these sales won’t last. Sorry, the rhyme just came out. Someone take this keyboard away from me.

The Witches of Honey Suckle House ebook is on sale across retailers for $1.99 through tomorrow, June 26.

Buy Witches of Honeysuckle House

The Other March Sisters ebook is on sale today only (June 25) for $3.99 only on Amazon.

Buy The Other March Sisters

And if you’re craving more, In the Shadow Garden is currently on Kindle Unlimited!

Happy reading!

Until next time…

If you made it all the way to the end of this post, hello! Thank you for reading. If you want to hear from me more often, I’m always on Instagram and Threads, I repost (some of) my content to TikTok, one day I’ll migrate to BlueSky, I share all my plant and herb content on Pinterest (which may change because AI), and I’m on YouTube thanks to help from my husband and life partner, Nick! I’ve also launched a substack with the inimitable S.C. Godfrey called Three Things for Writers that provides practical advice for writers (mostly marketing and branding, but not always) in bite-sized chunks.

Wishing you healing wherever you may need it.

xo

Liz

Subscribe now

If you’re looking for more info on my books, you can find them all here on my website. I also created a bunch of free herb profiles as a part of my work as an herbalist. You can find those here!

Alright, let’s get to it. ✍🏻

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Hello friends! Happy Pride! Happy Tuesday! Happy Venus and Jupiter conjunct in Cancer1 day for those who celebrate!

Here’s what you’ll find in this newsletter:

• A giveaway of a signed copy of Witches of Honeysuckle House by yours truly as well as a signed copy of The Witch of Tin Mountain by Paulette Kennedy

• I’m launching another substack with S.C. Godfrey called Three Things for Writers!

• Summer solstice tarot spread

• Life and writing updates

Pride Giveaway

June is one of my favorite month’s of the year. Not only is it Gemini season, but it’s Pride! To celebrate, Paulette Kennedy and I are giving away two queer witchy books written by two queer witches.

Witches of Honeysuckle House: Haunted by a curse that kills someone close to their family every thirteen years, two sisters must come together to break the spell and save that which they hold most dear. This enchanting novel explores the fraught lines between family and the secrets they keep.

The Witch of Tin Mountain: Blood and power bind three generations of women in the Ozark Mountains. So does an evil that’s followed them across the decades. In Depression-era Arkansas, something wicked has come to a haunted mountain town in a novel of uncanny suspense.

Enter to win at lizparkerwrites.com/giveaway! Last day to enter is 6/30/26. Giveaway is US only!

Enter to Win

Three Things for Writers Substack

Some of you may know that I’ve had my own social media business since 2016 (it’ll be ten years in November!), and I have 18 years of social media experience. One thing I can tell you: there is a lot of wrong and unhelpful information out there about what works on social media and how to make it work for you.

This is something I talk about regularly with Sierra (S.C.) Godfrey. We debuted together in 2022 with our books In the Shadow Garden (mine) and A Very Typical Family (hers). Since then, we’ve spent a lot of time talking about publishing and marketing and the things we wish we knew before we sold those novels.

So, in the spirit of sharing our knowledge, we’re launching a substack titled Three Things for Writers later this month. In every post we’ll share three things about a specific topic. If that sounds like something you’d be interested in, you can subscribe here!

Check it out!

Summer Solstice Tarot!

The summer solstice is coming up later this month. This is one of my favorite times of year for ritual and spellwork. It’s a great time to work with fire. To light a candle and think about all the seeds you planted earlier this year and how they are blooming.

Here’s a quick, four-card tarot spread I like to do on the solstice:

• 1: What seeds have I planted?

• 2: How are they growing?

• 3: What will I harvest?

• 4: Who will I grow into in the process?

Life Updates & Closing Thoughts

May and the first part of June have been full of milestones for me! Frankie turned 15. I turned 38. My marriage turned 17. I watched all of Twin Peaks.

I’ve been hard at work on what I hope will be my next novel. I started toying with this idea a little over a year ago and it has evolved and changed and been set aside while I worked on other projects then been picked back up. My agent shared it with my then editor (who loved it) but she left my publisher who then passed on the book. So I’ve been reworking it and figuring it out all over again.

Just last week it finally started to feel like a book in my head. I’ve had the premise and the cast of characters and the general idea of the story for three months now, but something finally clicked into place, and I think it’s going to be moving along much more quickly now.

While I still don’t have much I can share about the project, it’s probably the closest thing I’ve written to true cozy fantasy. There’s a m/f bisexual romance. It has huge themes of found family. And (as of right now) there’s a crow. Here’s a Pinterest board if you want a little more.

If you want to help this book get sold once I have it ready for my agent, the very best thing you can do is share, post about, ask your local bookstore to stock, review (on Amazon and Goodreads especially), and buy my latest novel Witches of Honeysuckle House. Include it in your round-up posts and lists. Ask your library to add it to their shelves.

Publishers look closely at the most recent book sales when deciding to take a chance on an author they haven’t worked with before, so the better that book does, the better chance my next book will make its way into the world.

Until next time…

If you made it all the way to the end of this post, hello! Thank you for reading. If you want to hear from me more often, I’m always on Instagram and Threads, I repost (some of) my content to TikTok, one day I’ll migrate to BlueSky, I share all my plant and herb content on Pinterest (which may change because AI), and I’m also on YouTube thanks to help from my husband and life partner, Nick!

Wishing you healing wherever you may need it.

xo

Liz

Subscribe now

If you’re looking for more info on my books, you can find them all here on my website. I also created a bunch of free herb profiles as a part of my work as an herbalist. You can find those here!

Alright, let’s get to it. ✍🏻

Subscribe now

Hello, friends! It’s been a minute. Lest you think I finally took a nap beneath a tree, let the moss grow over me, and became one with the forest, I thought it was about time for a newsletter update.

In this newsletter you’ll find:

• Musings on my career, Uranus in Gemini, and vague comments about what I’ve been working on!

• Witches of Honeysuckle House is headed to Germany!

• A quick herb profile on Lemon Balm!

Uranus is in Gemini & Other Career Updates

I know what you’re thinking: Déjà vu. Didn’t I just tell you Uranus was in Gemini last year? Yes. Yes I did. And you can read all about it here, including what that means, broader implications, and a horoscope based on your rising sign.

So why am I talking about it again? Uranus dipped into Gemini last year from July 7 through November 7, before it retrograded back into Taurus for one last hurrah. It officially moved back into Gemini on April 25, 2026.

As many of you know, I’m a Virgo rising. This means Gemini is in my tenth house—which, in astrology, basically means the part of my life that’s all about career and my public-facing self. The me that you see. Liz the author.

Uranus brings chaos and distruption. And let me tell you, it’s already turned the tables on where I was expecting my career to be this year.

I had hoped I would have another book under contract. That I would’ve been able to tell you all about it. Alas, my publisher passed on my option book. This is starting to become a trend for me. 😅

For those of you who don’t know publishing speak, let me explain. When you sign a contract with a publisher, there’s typically a clause that gives your publisher an “option” on your next work. This means: They get to see it first and they have a certain period of time in which they get to make an offer on it before you can try to sell it to anyone else. The publisher for Witches of Honeysuckle House had an unusually long amount of time in their option clause (three months after publication date). My agent did try to negotiate around this, but ultimately, they wouldn’t budge, and I wanted Witches of Honeysuckle House out in the world.

My editor left the publishing house two weeks before Witches of Honeysuckle House came out—leaving me without a true in-house champion for my work. Their passing on the option wasn’t unexpected for this reason. That being said: I did just find out that I earned out on this book! Meaning, we sold enough copies to cover the initial advance on royalties. This is my first book to earn out, so I received my first ever royalty payment this month!

Back to my next book: The proposal really isn’t ready to go on broad submission. Were I working with my previous editor on this, we’d be developing some of the story together. But since my agent now needs to take it out to a whole new set of editors—many of whom have probably never read my work—that proposal needs work.

More than that, I need at least a first draft of the book to really put the depth into the characters and the story that the proposal needs for it to go on a wide submission to new publishing houses. So there won’t be any updates on this one for a while, just me and my clicky keyboard typing away. But here’s the Pinterest board if that interests you.

In addition to that, I’ve been working on other secret projects that, for the time being, must remain secret. But let me just tell you…if they come to fruition, my career is going to look quite a bit different than I thought it would even a year ago.

Witches of Honeysuckle House is Headed to Germany!

In exciting and not vauge news, we sold translation rights for Witches of Honeysuckle House to KiWi Space in Germany! It comes out on October 1 of this year. Not only is the book being translated into German, but they’re printing a special edition with sprayed edges!!! A dream come true!!! And can we talk about how beautiful this cover is (and they even put Ink on it!!!!)?

Lemon Balm Herb Profile

Since you’ve made it this far in my May newsletter, let me leave you with one of my favorite herbs for summer: Lemon balm.

If you’ve read In the Shadow Garden, you know that lemon balm is dear to my heart and part of the namesake for Lavender & Lemon Balm, the tea shop owned by the Haywood witches.

Magically, lemon balm is a plant of happiness, abundance, and love. In In the Shadow Garden, Irene Haywood has a tea leaf reading that portends a visitor coming to town who will bring her love and sorrow, which is part of why I chose this herb for the name of the shop.

Beyond the magic, lemon balm is a delicious cooling herb that makes a perfect addition to your summer iced teas. Here are a few of its benefits:

• Helps with inattention and hyperactivity, making it useful for those with ADHD

• Calms anxiety and eases depression

• Powerful ally for hyperthyroid disease and Graves disease

• Eases stomach cramps and nervous indigestion

• Anti-viral and a fever reducer, making it good for fighting colds and the flu

• Helps prevent and relieve herpes breakouts

• Eases both stress and tension headaches

• Can help counteract insomnia

• Improves the ability of acetylcholine, an important neurotransmitter that declines as we age

To make lemon balm tea, pour 1 quart of boiling water over 1-2 tbsp of dried lemon balm leaves, and let it steep for 15 minutes! If you’re using fresh leaves, you’ll want to simmer for 15 minutes to break down the cell walls. Drink it hot or pour over ice. It combines really well with oatstraw for a delicious tea and a deep, restful sleep.

Always check with your doctor before consuming lemon balm during pregnancy. And please note that lemon balm can aggravate hypothyroid disease—so be sure to check with your doctor before using it if that applies to you!

Until next time…

If you made it all the way to the end of this post, hello! Thank you for reading. If you want to hear from me more often, I’m always on Instagram, frequently on Threads, slowly migrating to BlueSky, I post most of my videos to TikTok and YouTube, and I share all my plant and herb content on Pinterest!

With love and a little bit of magic,

xo

Liz

If you’re looking for more info on my books, you can find them all here on my website. I also created a bunch of free herb profiles as a part of my work as an herbalist. You can find those here!

Alright, let’s get to it. ✍🏻

Subscribe now

Back in February I presented a workshop at Romantasy Con in Los Angeles, detailing my process for writing healing fiction. I had no idea how it would go—if it would resonate, if anyone would actually show up (despite it being ticketed and all the tickets being sold out). The reception was better than I could’ve imagined. I had so many people come up to me afterwards to tell me how much it meant to them, how they’ve wanted to use writing to help them heal but didn’t know where to start, how my vulnerabilty itself was a healing experience.

So, in the spirit of helping people heal and helping people write, I’ve put that presentation into an essay of sorts.

Here’s a quick snapshot of what you’ll find in this post:

• Finding grounding resources

• Identifying your wound

• Determining characters & POV

• Figuring out the plot

• Building your setting

• Creating magic systems

Let me start by saying that I am not a therapist. I’m a person with complex PTSD who has spent a lot of time in therapy in different modalities, and I use writing as a part of my healing process.

Writing is a way for me to alchemize my trauma and pain into something new that, hopefully, can help bring healing to the people who read it. Because of that, it’s going to get a little vulnerable in here. I can’t talk about my process of writing healing fiction without explaining the traumas I wanted to heal through my books.

If you’ve made it this far, then you probably have something in you that you’re wanting to heal. First, I’m so sorry. Whatever it is that has you on a path toward healing, I’m proud of you for wanting to use writing as a part of that process.

Finding grounding resources

With any healing practice, it’s important to start from a safe place. With writing, I like to do this by creating a list of resources—something I learned in trauma therapy. Before we process a memory, my therapist starts by reading out my list of resources and reminding me that they’re with me throughout the entire session.

When you’re writing healing fiction, not only can you use resources to create a safe space at the start of every writing session, they can also become a part of the story you’re trying to tell.

Create a list of as many things you can think of that make you feel safe, grounded, and at peace.

• People (both the living and those who have passed on)

• Places

• Plants and animals

• Colors

• Inanimate objects

• Activities

This might include your partner, your pet, one or both of your parents, aunts or uncles, grandparents, a best friend. Gardening, your favorite houseplant, your favorite book, a warm cup of tea, a cozy blanket, humming birds, butterflies, honeybees. Or maybe it’s a special bookstore, the library, your favorite coffee shop. You get the idea.

When you’re finished, take the top 10 to 20 resources and write them down separately—print them out or save them in their own document. Before you sit down to write, look over the list to help yourself feel resourced. Do this every time you work on this project.

Identifying your wound

If you’re seeking to write healing fiction, then there is very likely something specific you are looking to heal in yourself. But what is it? And how can you turn it into a story that you can safely explore?

With healing fiction, your wound is your story engine. Think of it as one part plot and one part your main character’s growth arc.

Start by asking yourself three questions:

What is the wound you’re trying to heal? Is it a relationship? Is it something that happened to you? Is it something someone did to you? Is it a loss, a deep grief?

What did it make you believe about yourself / the world / other people? In trauma processing, my therapist calls this the “negative belief about self.”

What would help you heal that wound? Is it an apology? Is it forgiveness? Is it revenge? Is it a friendship? Is it a romantic relationship? This can help you determine exactly what sort of book you’re writing. One thing to keep in mind: What would help us heal isn’t always an option and is often out of our control. That’s okay. Write it down anyway, because when you’re writing a book, you get to determine the outcome.

Now you might find when you’re doing this work that there is more than one thing that can bring you healing. That’s great. Write that down, too, because it gives you more to work with when figuring out the story you want to tell.

Here are a few examples, taken from my own life and the books I’ve written as a part of my healing journey.

Focusing on the Wound: Witches of Honeysuckle House

When writing Witches of Honeysuckle House, there were a lot of different traumas I was working through—as is generally the case with C-PTSD. For the sake of this example, I’m going to focus on the initial genesis of the story, which was a very specific wound I wanted to explore:

I want to heal from my estranged relationship with my sister.

My estrangement made me believe I didn’t do enough to protect her from our childhood trauma.

Realizing I can’t control her choices would help me heal that wound.

or

A future where we are close and we have the same values would help me heal that wound.

This became the central foundation of the novel. We open on two sisters who experienced similar traumas but ended up having very different beliefs about their magic and their family’s curse. Those beliefs have resulted in the sisters being estranged. They both must learn that they can’t control each other and, ultimately, I sought to give them an outcome where they do have the same values, even if I may never see that outcome in my own life.

Focusing on the Negative Belief: In the Shadow Garden

You may have something you’re trying to heal that you don’t want to write about specifically and in detail, and that’s okay. If you don’t feel safe sticking close to your wound, then you can work around it by using what it made you believe rather than writing a story centered on the wound itself. That’s what I did with In the Shadow Garden.

I want to heal from my childhood sexual abuse.

My CSA and my mother’s response to it made me believe I can’t trust people and I can’t trust my own memories.

Finding a community of people I do trust who believe me would help me heal that wound.

While there is some physical child abuse in the book, on the surface, In the Shadow Garden has nothing to do with CSA. That’s because I wasn’t ready to write about this trauma directly, and honestly, I might never be. But I was seeking healing from the trauma of what happened to me and its aftermath—my mother telling me to keep the abuse quiet and choosing to stay married to the person who hurt me. By focusing on beliefs the wound gave me, I was able to find one of the most central themes of In the Shadow Garden: The impact of memory and the way memories (and gaslighting) can be used against a survivor when they finally come forward.

Maybe you don’t want to write about trauma at all.

While most of my work ties directly into healing from various aspects of my C-PTSD, I realize trauma isn’t the only thing you might be seeking healing from. You could be looking to explore a disorder like depression or anxiety or acceptance of a diagnosis like ADHD or the effects of burnout or seeking to work through grief.

I’m currently working on a project to help me with burnout recovery and my constant need for productivity, and while I can’t share exactly how this process is playing out because I am, in fact, still writing the book, here is a look at that wound:

I want to heal from burnout.

My burnout made me believe I’ll never feel joy again.

Getting to rest while having all my financial needs met would help me heal that wound.

Like I said earlier, the thing that might help you heal may—in fact—be impossible. As much as I would love a patron to step in and pay me to rest for the next three to five years, that’s not the world we live in. Still, I can use that to build a story.

Determining characters & point of view

Once you know what wound you’re working with and what you think would heal you, you can begin to explore what characters you want to include in your story. For this, you’ll want to start with a few questions about you and about the people involved with your wound. Again, we’re trying to heal with what we write, so think about what would bring you the most healing.

As you answer these questions, write down the types of people you want to include in the story who can help you explore the type of healing you’re looking for. That can be: a mother, father, sister, brother, significant other, a child, a grandparent, a mentor. You get the idea.

Ask yourself…

• What are the different parts of you that were hurt? (Ex: self esteem, belief in other people, your whimsy, your body image, etc.)

• Can you break these parts of yourself into different characters to give you the chance to heal each of them? Consider…

  • Do you want a character who is the age you were when you were hurt?

  • Do you want a character who is your age now?

• What relationships were a part of your wounding?

  • Did someone else hurt you? Do you want them on the page in some way, or would it be more healing for you for them to be left off the page completely?

  • Did you hurt yourself? Could you separate the part of you that did the hurting from the part of you that hurt?

  • Do you want to explore more than one point of view to better facilitate your healing?

Here’s what this looks like in practice: In Witches of Honeysuckle House, I spanned multiple years so I could explore characters at various ages of my trauma. I also had a character (Clara) who was 7 years old—the age I was when my parents divorced, which sort of separated my life into a before/after and really started me down the road of complex trauma. My goal with Clara was to heal my inner child at this specific age. I also wanted to explore various sister relationships with different outcomes to help me process through my own—as a result I ended up with two sets of sisters, each of whom has their own POV in the novel.

If you’re trying to heal from a trauma that was inflicted upon you, you might want to leave your abuser off the page completely, and that’s okay. You can do that and still have a story to tell. For example, let’s say you had an abusive parent, and having a healthy relationship with an older adult would help you heal. You can leave your abuser off the page and instead create a character who fills the role you wish your parent did in your main character’s life—allowing you to explore that sort of relationship in a safe environment rather than digging into the trauma itself.

Figuring out the plot

That brings me to my next point: Writing for healing doesn’t have to mean reliving your trauma. A lot of people giving writing advice encourage you to make your character endure and overcome the worst possible thing that could happen to them. Here’s the thing: With healing fiction, that’s not always the right choice. Yes, we want the plot to move forward, but our goal is to help you find healing on the page.

So instead of thinking about traumatizing your character, think about you, right now. What’s the worst thing that could happen to you now that the wound itself is over? Would exploring that help you heal? What did your wound make you believe? How can you use that either for the climax or your character’s growth arc or both?

Here are a few examples that I’ve explored in my work:

• Seeing the person who hurt you again: I worked with this directly in In the Shadow Garden when Kaden Bonner returns to Yarrow, Kentucky, and sees his mother for the first time in twenty-five years. I’ve been no-contact with my mother since 2010, but we lived in the same city for nine years after that. I was terrified I’d run into her somewhere and not know what to say or how to say it. That I’d find myself second-guessing everything afterwards and wishing I’d said something differently or done something differently. By exploring this situation on the page through Kaden, I gave myself the opportunity to work through this fear on my own terms while also finding a major part of his growth arc.

• Becoming like the person who hurt you: This is a central theme of Witches of Honeysuckle House. Both Florence and Evie are terrified that they will become like their abusive mother. That gave me the groundwork to build a story that would make becoming like her possible—where they would have to actively make the decision to not follow in her footsteps.

• Hurting someone else the same way you’ve been hurt: This, too, is a theme I explored in Witches of Honeysuckle House. I don’t want to spoil the book, but if you’ve read it, you’ll see this pretty clearly on the page with how the generational curse plays out every thirteen years.

Building your setting

Setting is a huge piece of healing fiction because place is so deeply connected to memory and healing, especially if your healing is associated with a trauma. Imagine what you needed in the moment that you’re trying to heal from—or what you need now—and build your setting around that.

Ask yourself:

• Do you want to redefine a place associated with your wound? (Ex: Your childhood home)

• Do you want to give yourself a safe space you never had?

And then use the list of resources you created before you started writing:

• Is there a place on that list that makes you feel safe?

• Is there something on that list that you could tie into setting? (Ex. Books, a cup of tea, a garden)

Creating magic systems

Not all healing fiction needs to be fantasy, but I find magic to be a powerful tool when working through pain on the page. With healing fiction you want to ask yourself: How can I build a magic system that will help facilitate healing?

Are there things on your list of resources that can be crafted into a magic system? When I was writing In the Shadow Garden, my own garden was one of the most sacred and safest places for me. It only seemed natural to then try to create a magic system—this idea of something beautiful growing from our pain—from that resource.

Maybe there’s magic you wish you had in the moment of your wounding that could’ve changed things for you. Things like stopping time, or truth-telling magic, or a way to express your anger. The magic of In the Shadow Garden includes insects that are drawn out by the witches’ feelings—when they are angry, cicadas appear. Expressing my anger in a healthy way has always been a challenge for me, so I created a bit of magic that could make that easier for my characters and help me heal this part of myself.

Is there something related to your wound and what it made you believe that might make writing about it easier for you? When I explored the wound for In the Shadow Garden, I mentioned the negative belief that I couldn’t trust my own memories. This gave me the idea to build a magic system based around giving up your worst memories.

Perhaps the simplest way to build a magic system in healing fiction is to look for an obvious metaphor based on your wound. Think about every day objects and concepts and how they relate to what it is you’re trying to heal and ways you can make those things magical. Here are a few examples:

• Generational trauma > curses

• Self image / self worth > mirrors

• Catastrophic thinking > fortune-telling

It’s time to tell your story.

Hopefully you’ve found a few pieces to get you started on your way to writing something that will help you heal. But please, please, please remember to take care of yourself as you start on this journey.

Give yourself time to write the hardest scenes. It’s okay for those to take days or weeks or even months. It’s okay to take time to recover after you finish writing them. There’s a scene in Witches of Honeysuckle House where Florence has a panic attack while trying to return to her childhood home. This scene took me two weeks to write, and I didn’t write for a full week after I finished it.

Remember: You’re not going to heal everything in one book. You may explore the same themes over and over again. (If you’ve read all of my books, you probably noticed my characters all deal with a mother wound.) But each of those stories has been another step in my journey toward healing, and, I hope, something that has helped my readers heal, too.

I can’t wait to read your stories one day and find healing in the pages.

Until next time…

If you made it all the way to the end of this post, hello! Thank you for reading. If you want to hear from me more often, I’m always on Instagram, frequently on Threads, slowly migrating to BlueSky, I post most of my videos to TikTok and YouTube, and I share all my plant and herb content on Pinterest!

Wishing you healing wherever you may need it.

xo

Liz

Subscribe now

Buy Witches of Honeysuckle House

I will be going out on submission with my next book in the coming month or so. It may go without saying, but an author’s previous book’s sales make a huge difference in whether or not an editor will buy their next book. So if you want more books from me…well. 😬

What exactly is that book, you may be wondering? I can’t tell you that. What I can tell you is that I’m working on something that I think actually qualifies as cozy fantasy—which will be a huge relief to all the readers who have stumbled across my work expecting cozy fantasy (not sure where said expectation came from) and then being shocked when, surprise, we’re healing from trauma!

Here’s a Pinterest board for vibes.

And that is basically the whole of today’s newsletter. If you have $1.99 to spare and don’t already have the eBook, please consider purchasing it.

Wishing you healing wherever you may need it.

xo

Liz

Subscribe now

If you’re looking for more info on my books, you can find them all here on my website. I also created a bunch of free herb profiles as a part of my work as an herbalist. You can find those here!

Alright, let’s get to it. ✍🏻

Subscribe now

Hello friends! It’s very strange shifting from weekly newsletters to monthly (or maybe twice-monthly) updates, but that’s the difference between having two books out in a year and not having two books out in a year, I suppose. That being said, I do have some updates for you!

Here’s what you’ll find in this newsletter:

• A giveaway for five trade paperback copies of The Other March Sisters. (Five copies, five winners)

• In the Shadow Garden eBook sale!

• A few books that came out in the past month or two that I think you should buy (links are affiliate links!)

The Other March Sisters Giveaway

While I may not have any new books out this year, The Other March Sisters will be out in paperback next week on February 24! My publisher sent me forty copies of this book—which, of course, makes me wonder what the print run was??? I should ask. The point is, this is way too many copies for my house—especially when I still have close to twenty hardcovers.

All of that to say: I am giving away five copies over on Instagram! And if you’re a newsletter subscriber, you’ll get a bonus entry. Just drop a 📧 in the comments on the post.

Enter the Giveaway

In the Shadow Garden eBook on sale

My debut novel, In the Shadow Garden, is on sale for the entire month of February in ebook format for just $2.99. So if you’re looking for a heartwarming witchy story with a bit of mystery, magic, healing, and a touch of romance, you should check it out!

For those of you who may not have a read it yet, it’s a story about a family of witches who heal their neighbors’ pain and feed it to their magical garden. There’s a rival family in town that makes a bourbon you can take a shot of once a year to forget your worst memory. Twenty-five years ago, the entire town forgot an entire summer. Someone died, someone disappeared, no one remembers what happened. Now the secrets of that summer are starting to come to light.

Purchase now!

New Books for Your TBR

Three of my closest friends had books come out in the past few weeks. You should buy them not only because my friends are amazing, but because the books themselves are amazing!

Magick Hoodoo Child by the inimitable Amber McBride and illustrated by Violeta Encarnación came out back in January. Not only is this picture book beautiful and heartwarming, it has four starred reviews. A story about a young girl’s magick-filled summer, it provides beautiful representation of hoodoo, rootwork, and conjure, and it includes grounding exercises for children at the end!

Lost Girls of Hollow Lake by Rebekah Faubion came out at the end of January. It’s a dark, YA speculative thriller with major Yellow Jackets vibes, and it’s maybe my favorite Rebekah novel of all time (and I’ve read almost all of her work).

Land of Dreams by Gian Sardar came out earlier this month. Set in 1930s Hollywood, this novel is a love letter to Los Angeles and the people who call it home. Gian’s evocative prose and perfectly paced storytelling bring the city and its history to life with mystery and a touch of romance in a very intimate and haunting look at the American dream.

Closing thoughts

Just a reminder that I’ll be at Romantasy Con Los Angeles in February. I’ll be there on Saturday, February 28, hosting a workshop writing healing fiction at 12:00 pm; it’s already full, which I’m very excited about! I’ll also be signing books in the ticketed author room at 2:00 that same day. Hope to see you there!

Until next time…

If you made it all the way to the end of this post, hello! Thank you for reading. If you want to hear from me more often, I’m always on Instagram and Threads, I repost (some of) my content to TikTok, one day I’ll migrate to BlueSky, I share all my plant and herb content on Pinterest (which may change because AI), and I’m also on YouTube thanks to help from my husband and life partner, Nick!

Wishing you healing wherever you may need it.

xo

Liz

Subscribe now

If you’re looking for more info on my books, you can find them all here on my website. I also created a bunch of free herb profiles as a part of my work as an herbalist. You can find those here!

Alright, let’s get to it. ✍🏻

Subscribe now

Hello friends, I had planned to do a whole post this weekend about goalsetting and dreaming big dreams and what I’m looking forward to in 2026, but wow has this been a rough start to the year. I almost decided not to send anything out at all, but I thought, maybe, you could use something encouraging in your inbox that doesn’t start with “breaking news” (though we need those emails, too).

I’m so angry at what’s happening in the U.S.—at the systems that have been in place since America’s founding and the violence committed on the soil in the centuries leading up to it that have made all of this possible. I was horrified but not surprised by ICE’s murder of Renée Nicole Good and heartbroken by people being kidnapped off the street I live on just yesterday, mere blocks from my front door. At the same time, I’m deeply encouraged by the amount of people who are speaking out and speaking up, who are helping their neighbors and making a record of what’s happening. And the revolution erupting in Iran is especially bringing me hope.

I want to encourage you, if you haven’t already, to make sure you know your neighbors. To research and find mutual aid groups in your local community to see how you can help (and who to alert if you see ICE in your neighborhood). If you’re able to donate to those groups or to families who are being impacted directly, do. If you’re able to protest, do. If you see ICE, record them. If you’re a writer or an artist, create. Your art matters especially in times like these.

All of this is horrifying, and I don’t know when it will end or how it will end or what things will look like on the other side. But I do know we have each other.

We all need moments of calm between our moments of activism and resistance. Here are a few things that might help you find coziness and recharge—an oracle deck, some books, and a few cozy games:

Oracle Deck: My Friend Fire

This week I’ve found myself turning again and again to a new oracle deck titled My Friend Fire by the same artist who created my favorite tarot deck (The Gentle Tarot). I find oracle decks especially calming because there’s much less interpretation involved and there’s no fear of the tower or the three of swords (not that I typically fear these cards, but when the world around us is precarious, they can be challenging cards to face). I can’t recommend this oracle deck enough.

Cozy Books and Healing Fiction

Obviously you all know In the Shadow Garden and Witches of Honeysuckle House are healing fiction, but here are a few other cozy stories that have been helpful to me over the years if you’re looking for something to read right now. Note that when I call these cozy, I mean they make me feel cozy and have cozy vibes. Not that they are cozy in the sense that nothing bad at all happens in them.

• The Particular Sadness of Lemon Cake by Aimee Bender: A young girl discovers she can taste the emotions of the people who make her food. This book follows her journey in trying to survive in a world where feeling other people’s feelings is too much, especially in a family that would rather ignore them. This is my very favorite book. Content warnings for suicidal ideation.

• India Holton’s Dangerous Damsels Series: These fantastical historical romance books are such a delight and feel to me like the perfect cup of tea. Hilarious, whimsical, and unlike anything I’ve ever read.

• The Hearth Witch’s Guide to Magic and Murder by Kiri Callaghan: The first in a series, this novel is basically a queer, fantastical Sherlock Holmes-inspired story that takes place in fantasy London. I read this one in December and devoured it.

• A Witch’s Guide to Magical Innkeeping by Sangu Mandana: I’m certain you’ve heard of this book. If you haven’t read it yet and are looking for something to wrap you up in a cozy sweater after a day of protesting, this is it. Whimsical, heartwarming, and enough stakes to keep you turning the pages.

• The Leaving Room by Amber McBride: This young adult novel explores death in a way that takes your hand, holds you close, and makes you your favorite meal to make sure you make it safely to the other side. This soft look at mortality is especially comforting right now.

• Nettle & Bone by T. Kingfisher: This was my favorite book that I read in 2023 and though it’s “dark fantasy,” it’s very cozy. I like to describe it as being like Howl’s Moving Castle but if Sophie teamed up with the Witch of the Waste and went on a mission to kill the king. Also there is a dog.

• Braiding Sweetgrass by Robin Wall Kimmerer: This book of essays by an indigenous author and botanist has been incredibly grounding to me this week—reminding me of our connection to the earth and to each other and giving hope for a different future.

• Tea Magic by Chloé Zarka Grinsnir: Non-fiction and absolutely delightful. This short, cozy guide to tea magic is a wonderful way to add whimsy, magic, and protection to your every day cup of tea.

Cozy Games

Sometimes my brain says no to reading, and that’s okay. When that happens, I turn to cozy videos games. Here are a few I’ve been playing lately:

• The Tiny Bookshop: This little video game has been such a bright spot for me this week. You’re the owner of a mobile bookshop, and you’ve moved to a seaside town. You take your little bookstore (which you can decorate and paint to your heart’s content) all around town, building relationships with your new neighbors and bringing the people what they need: books. It’s available on Nintendo Switch and Steam.

• Coffee Talk: In this game, you run a coffee shop in fantasy Seattle where the earth is filled with humans and fantasy races (orcs, vampires, werewolves, mermaids, and more). You talk with your customers about their problems, including one particular customer who is trying to write a novel in a month (ambitious, I know). It’s available on Steam, Nintendo Switch, and PS5. Maybe even more places.

• Wanderstop: I finished this game over the holidays, and it was such a soft place to land. Themed around burnout recovery, a fighter finds herself at a magical teashop in the woods. Unable to muster the strength to leave, she serves tea to unexpected customers on quests of their own on her way to healing. Available on Steam, PS5 and Xbox.

• The Midnight Walk: This one is cozy horror, and it’s somehow both whimsical and terrifying, but in the softest way. You play a character who is bringing fire to a world where the sun has gone out by lighting one match at a time and befriending a little bowl of flame. It’s only available on Steam and PS5.

Other News

One last thing I wanted to share: I’ll be at LA 2026 Romantasy BookCon in February. I’ll be there on Saturday, February 28, hosting a workshop on healing through fiction and how you can use writing to heal at 12:00 pm. Registration for that will open on Sunday February 1. And I’ll be signing books in the ticketed author room at 2:00 pm that same day. Hope to see you there!

Romantasy BookCon Tickets

Until next time…

If you made it all the way to the end of this post, hello! Thank you for reading. If you want to hear from me more often, I’m always on Instagram and TikTok, frequently on Threads, slowly migrating to BlueSky, I share all my plant and herb content on Pinterest, and I’m now officially on YouTube thanks to help from my husband and life partner, Nick!

Wishing you healing wherever you may need it.

xo

Liz

Subscribe now

If you’re looking for more info on my books, you can find them all here on my website. I also created a bunch of free herb profiles as a part of my work as an herbalist. You can find those here!

Alright, let’s get to it. ✍🏻

Subscribe now

Happy Winter Solstice, my friends! To celebrate what is one of my absolute favorite days of the year, I’m sharing an In the Shadow Garden short story. Those of you who’ve been around for a while received this last year. But since there are 225 more of you today than there were this time last year, I thought I’d share it again.

If you haven’t already read In the Shadow Garden, you’ll want to read the book first because this definitely contains spoilers. You can get it here; plus it’s on Kindle Unlimited right now!

Additionally, I recently sent out signed bookplates for both In the Shadow Garden and Witches of Honeysuckle House to several independent bookstores (plus some of the shops I visited on tour still have copies!). So if you’re looking for a signed copy, check out these stores:

• Lost the Plot Books in Seattle, WA

• The Little Book in Des Moines, IA

• Grimsby Books in Grimsby, Ontario

• Charlie’s Queer Books in Seattle, WA

• The Crafty Bookstore in Bloomington, IN

• A Novel Idea Bookshop in Guthrie, OK

• Wild Sisters Book Co. in Sacramento, CA

• Between the Covers in Rigby, ID

• Dragon Fly Bookshop in Hilliard, OH

• Swallow Stories Bookshop in Lisle, IL

• Leather & Bound Book Bar in Garland, TX

• Blackbird Tea and Tales in Madras, OR

• Turtle & Bea Book Boutique in Edgewater, FL

• Mysterious Galaxy Books in San Diego, CA

And, as always, a quick reminder that if you’ve read Witches of Honeysuckle House (or any of my books!) and haven’t yet posted a review, there’s no time like the present!

This will be the last time y’all will hear from me in 2025; I hope the year has been as joyful as it could’ve been. Sending much love and a little bit of magic your way for 2026.

Buy my books!

Home for the Holidays: A Shadow Garden Story

The holidays had never been an easy time of year for Kaden Bonner. As someone who once had the ability to take a person’s memory, he had more than his fair share of Christmases he’d rather forget than be forced to relive every time he saw a decorated tree or string of lights. But this year, things were going to be different. This year, Kaden had a family of his own, a family he chose, a family he wanted to be with.

The fact that he had to keep reminding himself of those things felt like some sort of personal failure. He ought to be joyful. This was going to be the first holiday season with the love of his life and with his daughter. But the darkness of Christmases past still clung to him.

After the events of the summer earlier that year, he’d uprooted his life in Ohio and planted himself back firmly in Yarrow soil. Though the town had thought he’d take over his family’s estate and help run things at the distillery once it had passed into their hands, bourbon was not a part of Kaden’s past that he wanted to bring into his present. Besides, River Baker had more experience and time running things at the distillery than Kaden did. Instead, Kaden had rented a duplex a mile from downtown and filled a somewhat fortuitous opening the local high school had for an English teacher.

Kaden and Irene saw each other almost every day, and Kaden spent more nights at the Haywood dinner table than his own. The memories from the years they’d spent together had returned, but they still had a lifetime to catch up on. They’d broached the topic of moving in together early on when he was making plans for the fall, and while they both agreed it was in their future, the future wasn’t here yet.

For now, Kaden and Irene were dating. Tomorrow, he would join the Haywoods for their winter solstice celebration. But tonight, it would be just the two of them strolling around downtown Yarrow holding hands and drinking hot chocolate. It was not a time for Kaden to get lost thinking over all the holidays he’d spent alone, which were still better by far than the ones he’d spent with his family.

Kaden donned a coat and picked up a small box he’d tucked away in his desk a month ago after Addison had joined him on a day trip to Nashville. He flipped it open to reveal a yellow gold ring with a cushion cut aquamarine—Irene’s birthstone and a symbol of happiness and hope. He’d planned to offer it to her tonight, but he knew he couldn’t ask her today. Not with this sadness digging its roots into his heart. She’d see it straight away, and he only wanted her to see his joy.

With a heavy sigh, he closed the box and put it back in the drawer before he made the twenty-minute walk from his apartment to Lavender & Lemon Balm. A winter chill hung in the air. Just that morning the grass had been white and crisp with frost, and though it had yet to snow that December, the air was thick with the possibility of it. Kaden didn’t pause once along the way to take in his neighbors’ decorations or the ribbon-wrapped streetlamps or the Christmas tree in the town square. If he had, the sadness in his chest would’ve wrapped its arms around him too tightly for him to keep going, and he’d have turned back and spent the night in his duplex alone.

He did, however, let himself enjoy the store window his daughter—a word that, though he’d grown accustomed to these past few months, never ceased to bring him joy—and his niece had decorated. A garland of dried oranges hung from the frame, and they’d frosted the corners of the glass. Right across the center it said, “Happy Holidays! Come warm up with a cup of tea!”

The sun was just beginning to set as Kaden opened the door.

Addison was the first to notice him.

“Kaden!” she said from where she stood ringing up a customer at the register.

He raised a hand in greeting, and before Kaden knew it, she was right there in front of him, wrapping her arms around him. “Mom and I just put together a new holiday blend, you have to try it.”

“Already poured you a cup,” Quinn said from behind the counter. She, too, came out to greet him and pushed a mug into his hands before he could stop her. Light glinted off the opal on her third finger. Harper had surprised her with the ring at the end of the summer the same night Quinn had surprised Harper with a sapphire.

Kaden accepted the cup, and as he brought the porcelain to his lips, Irene stepped out from the back. She wore a monochromatic outfit. A dark brown turtleneck tucked into lighter brown, wide-leg corduroy pants with a thick belt and matching brown boots. Her red-orange curls hung loose down to her midback rather than in her usual braid. Their eyes met across the room, and her smile warmed him even more than the tea.

“What do you think?” Irene asked.

“Delicious, as always,” Kaden said.

Clem stepped out from behind Irene and said, “She meant the tea, not her outfit.”

Kaden flushed and took another long sip as both Addison and Quinn erupted in laughter.

“But my outfit is delicious,” Irene said, though she, too, had a bit of pink in her cheeks.

“The tea is, too,” Kaden said. “Cinnamon, orange, and ginger?”

“Plus rose, hibiscus, and linden,” Irene said. “But don’t fill up on tea. I was promised hot chocolate.” She ran across the room. Before she could throw her arms around Kaden, Addison took his mug and got out of her mother’s way.

Then, Irene was there, pressed up against him, her arms tight around his chest and her head nestled beneath his chin. He closed his eyes and breathed in her lavender smell—threaded with a hint of pine this time of year—and the dread in his chest loosened its hold. When she pulled back, she rose up on her toes and pressed her lips to his, her mouth soft and her breath sweet like the tea he’d just sipped. The kiss was over much too soon for Kaden, but he cherished every second of it.

Irene threaded her fingers through his and said, “Let’s go get that cocoa.”

“See you tomorrow for the solstice?” Addison asked.

“Wouldn’t miss it,” Kaden said.

Irene leaned her head against his arm and said, “It’ll be our first family solstice.”

“Isn’t that a little weird?” Quinn asked. “You and Irene were best friends growing up. I find it hard to believe Maura didn’t force you to make at least one orange garland.”

Kaden rubbed at the back of his neck as he thought over his teenaged years, but he shook his head. He wished he’d spent the holidays with Irene, then maybe he’d have a memory worth remembering. “Sylvia…” He started and trailed off.

Her name hung in the air for a few moments. Clem was the first to break the silence. “Enough said.”

#

Kaden and Irene strolled down Main Street hand in hand. It still surprised him how perfectly her palm fit in his, even gloved. Neighbors and tourists alike filled the street, coming for that taste of the holidays in a small town. While the distillery had been handed over to Yarrow, the bourbon still bore his family name, and many of the holiday treats advertised on sandwich boards outside the shops included a touch of Bonner bourbon—the traditional bourbon balls, chocolate bourbon pecan clusters, bourbon blondies, and even spiked apple cider and bourbon-flavored lattes.

Though Kaden no longer had to fear his family’s magic, he still found himself avoiding anything and everything that had even a touch of Bonner’s in it. But as he and Irene reached the town square and stopped in front of a stand full of seasonal treats, he found his eyes lingering on the bourbon rice crispy treats. They were his favorite when he was a kid.

“You want to split one?” Irene asked.

He loved it when Irene read his aura, even now as his curiosity mingled with the ache of his memories.

“I’m thinking about it,” he said.

“I think it might help,” she said softly as she pressed her shoulder into his.

“How’s that?” He turned to face her.

“You’re blooming with gladiolas and daffodils, but there are leaves falling all around you,” she said as she slipped her hand from his, pulled off her mitten, and brushed his hair back from his face. “Memory and fondness mixed with sadness.”

“The holidays are hard,” he said, his throat thick with the words.

“Another reminder of what you didn’t have,” Irene said.

He nodded then leaned forward, pressing his forehead to hers. “It’s just a rice crispy treat,” Kaden said. “This shouldn’t be so hard.”

“You don’t have to give up the good things from your past just because they’re tied up with your family,” Irene said.

“I don’t want my family’s old traditions,” he said.

“So let’s make our own,” Irene said. “Hot chocolate and rice crispy treats and a walk under the Christmas lights the night before solstice.”

“I like the sound of that.”

Irene pulled back and stepped up to the stand. “One bourbon rice crispy treat,” she said as she pulled her wallet from her pocket.

But the man on the other side of the register, shook his head. “This one’s on me.”

Kaden had grown used to this sort of thing since he’d been back in Yarrow. The Haywoods had helped so many people through their pain over the years, that more times than not when he went out with Irene, they offered their thanks in these small ways.

The man slid the bar into a paper bag and handed it over. “Happy holidays.”

As Kaden smiled softly, the man’s eyes met his.

“Thank you for breaking the hold your family had on our town,” he said.

Kaden stared at him, stunned. His family had tangled their roots in Yarrow’s soil for too long, and though Kaden had helped undo their damage, he felt he deserved no thanks, no recognition for what he’d done.

Irene squeezed Kaden’s arm.

He nodded and gave the man a smile then stepped away quickly rather than telling the man how he felt. Irene leaned in close to him and said, “You’re a hero here, whether you want to believe it or not.”

She opened the small paper bag and held out the rice crispy treat for him. “Go ahead,” she said, “you first.”

The bite landed on his tongue in a mix of marshmallow and the vanilla and caramel notes of his family recipe. Though the sweet corn finish carried a certain sadness, with his eyes on Irene, Kaden found something new and bright and beautiful there, too.

#

“Why don’t you come over a little early today,” Irene said from where she sat on his counter sipping a cup of tea the next morning. Sometime during the past six months she’d started keeping his kitchen stocked with her wake-up blend for the nights she stayed over. “We can have lunch before everyone else gets there.”

Kaden was supposed to get to the Haywoods at four that afternoon, but even after his night with Irene—as beautiful as it was—he still couldn’t shake the way this time of year made him feel. Though he knew she understood it, he didn’t want those dead leaves hanging around in his aura and bringing down the mood.

He nodded slowly, uncertain how he was going to shake this feeling by noon.

“It’s okay to be sad,” she said.

“That doesn’t mean I want to be,” Kaden said.

“I could…” She trailed off, and Kaden shook his head. Irene had offered to heal his broken heart more times than either of them cared to count over the past few months, but Kaden didn’t want her to have to feel the pain his family had caused him—not even for a moment.

He drained his tea, leaving just enough at the bottom to swirl the leaves, then he tipped it onto his saucer and handed it over for her to read it. It had become another one of their rituals after he’d moved back to Yarrow.

She brushed her fingers against his as she took the mug, and if love were enough to mend a broken heart, what Kaden saw in her eyes would’ve patched every crack and hole his family had left inside him.

“There’s lines here along the top of the cup, which suggest a journey,” she said. “They lead to a mirror crossed with sprig of rosemary.”

“Rosemary has to do with memory.” Kaden had heard Irene and Addison talk about it enough that summer, that he’d never forget it.

“Yes, but with the mirror, the leaves suggest a revelation of a truth through a memory. Then here at the bottom is a heart.” Irene’s eyes flitted to his, and Kaden’s lips tilted up. It had appeared in his leaves more than once. “And an apple tree, which is a sign of positive change.”

“You left out the butterfly,” Kaden said.

There, beside the heart, was the butterfly that had been in almost every one of his readings since he’d moved back. They both knew it pointed to Irene.

“I do like seeing myself in your leaves,” she said.

“And what’s in yours?”

She tipped her cup onto the saucer, and when she flipped it back over, there was only one thing at the bottom: a pine tree.

“You have Christmas in your tea leaves?” Kaden asked.

She laughed brightly. “A pine tree is a sign of continuous happiness.” As she said the words, a butterfly made its way through some unknown opening and landed on her shoulder.

#

Kaden wasn’t going let himself ruin Irene’s happiness, especially on the winter solstice, but he didn’t know if it was possible to shake the way this time of year made him feel. Yes, he and Irene had started making their own traditions, but it didn’t change the ache he felt now. Maybe, he thought, if he could face his despair head on, it would finally loose its hold on him. Then he could give her the winter solstice she deserved and the ring he’d bought for her.

That was how he found himself standing in front of the Bonner estate with a pumpkin spice latte in hand. He stared up at the old Victorian home. It had been months since he’d last been here, when he and the Haywoods took the bottles from his mother’s tasting room and poured them into the shadow garden’s soil. Though the gloom had left Yarrow after the town took over the distillery, a shadow hung over the empty house.

He knew there was nothing to fear behind its walls. His mother and his brother were locked up. His father lay rotting in the Yarrow cemetery. The only thing Kaden would find on the other side of that door were memories. But few things cut the way a memory did. Kaden would know.

With a deep breath, he turned his key and opened the door. He stood there for a few moments, staring into the vacant house. It still had all of his mother’s things, but he doubted she would ever walk its halls again. He took one step forward, then another.

He could still remember this place during the holidays. Silver and gold. Garland and bows and decorated trees in every room. No expense spared. Kaden went straight for the family room where Sylvia used to stack presents under the tree—everything Kaden could possibly want but never the love he needed.

At the back of the room stood an old China cabinet. His mother used to hide presents in the bottom drawer just so Nate and Kaden would come looking for them. Kaden crossed over to it and rested a hand on the antique wood. Sadness washed over him and with it a soft sort of nostalgia. This, at least, was something worth remembering.

He knelt down in front of the old drawer, just like he used to do as a kid, and gave it a gentle tug. As he pulled it open, something inside rolled to the front and clinked against the wood. Kaden stared down at a wrapped gift that looked a lot like a bottle. He almost closed the drawer, almost walked away, but before he could, he saw a tag hanging from the package that read: For Kaden. Love, Mom.

He carefully lowered his hand into the drawer as if he was afraid the gift might bite. He ripped the tag from the package and turned it over in his hands. There was no telling how long it had been there, when his mother planned to give it to him. With a steadying breath, he tore open the paper to reveal a bottle of bourbon. A label had been carefully stuck to the front with his mother’s neat scrawl.

Kaden and Irene

December 21, 1995

He pressed his fingertip to the date. He would’ve only been twenty-one when this was taken from him, a year and a half before that fateful summer.

He’d come here to confront his past, and this bottle was a chance to do just that. But if the label was to be believed, the bourbon didn’t only hold his memories. He tapped his fingers against the glass, then picked up his phone. Irene answered after the first ring.

“Hey, you,” she said

“Irene.” Kaden’s voice caught on her name.

“What’s wrong?” she asked.

His chest warmed at the words. It still took him by surprise how well she knew him. “I’m at my mom’s house.”

There was a rustling on the line, the jingling of keys. “I’ll be right there.”

“You don’t want to know what I’m doing here?” he asked.

“You really think I don’t know?” There was no judgment in her voice, only a softness that Kaden wanted to fall into. When he didn’t reply, she said, “See you soon.”

When Irene pulled up the drive, Kaden was sitting on the front steps, his forearms on his thighs and the bottle of bourbon in his hands. He hadn’t bothered to put his gloves on, and he could no longer feel his fingertips. Irene was out of the car almost as soon as she parked it. He moved over to make space for her on the stairs.

“You shouldn’t be out here in the cold,” she said as she took the bottle from him and set it down beside her. She took off her own gloves and placed her hands on either side of his.

“I couldn’t stay in there any longer.” He shook his head. “I shouldn’t have come here.”

“I would’ve joined you sooner if you told me,” she said.

“I didn’t want you to have to see me like this,” he said. “I wanted…” He trailed off, and when he didn’t finish his sentence, Irene kissed his hands.

“You wanted to get this place out of your system before you came over to celebrate the solstice,” Irene said.

“Something like that,” Kaden said.

“You know that’s exactly what the solstice is about, don’t you?” Irene asked. “To leave behind what no longer serves us and welcome in the new year.”

“I’d hoped to focus on the welcoming part,” he said.

“You don’t have to face your pain alone,” Irene said. “I know you don’t want to let me take it from you, but I can still be here with you in it.”

“That’s why I called.” He nodded toward the bottle she’d set on the steps.

She dropped his hands and picked it up, then turned the label to face them. Her eyes widened.

“I found it inside,” Kaden said. “Part of me wanted to leave it there, but if we have a memory from this time of year…”

Then maybe it all wasn’t for nothing. Maybe, just maybe, Kaden had celebrated a holiday worth remembering.

“Do you want to drink it?” Irene asked.

He did, and he didn’t.

“I’m afraid what we’ll find in there. If my mom thought she needed to make us forget…” he shook his head. “I want every moment I’ve ever had with you, and it hurts knowing that there was another one that we lost.”

“That she stole,” Irene said, a bite in her voice.

Kaden nodded.

“Then let’s reclaim it.” She pulled the cork from the bottle and handed it to him.

“You’re sure?” he asked.

“It’s a memory of us,” Irene said. “I can’t think of anything I’d want to have more.”

Kaden gave a firm nod, then he brought the bottle to his lips. As he swallowed, Irene took it from him and sipped the bourbon. Then, she set the bottle beside her, leaned toward him, and pressed her mouth to his. The feel of her lips was the last thing he felt before the world went black and he fell into the memory.

#

Kaden and Irene walked along the curving path behind his family home. They were supposed to be at the Haywoods soon for the solstice. Though Maura had invited him to join them almost every year since junior high, his mom always found a way to keep Kaden locked up at home.

He never understood it. The Bonners didn’t even celebrate the solstice, but every time Kaden tried to talk his mother into letting him go, his father laid down a heavy warning. The last thing Kaden wanted was for his father’s anger to fall on his brother, so he’d stayed home and made sure his mother felt like she was the brightest star in his life. But Nate was eighteen now, and that seemed to be enough to keep Christian Durant in check.

Irene had stopped by after dropping off the latest shadow garden shipment at Bakers. She’d wanted to make sure nothing came between Kaden and the Haywood winter solstice party. That was when it had started to snow. Instead of leaving right away, Kaden convinced her to walk the distillery grounds with him. Before they went out, his mother had insisted they have just a little bit of her spiked apple cider to keep them warm. Irene had protested, but Kaden’s mom always got her way.

And Sylvia was right about just how cold it was. It had been a record-breaking week of low temperatures in Yarrow, the ground near frozen. When the flakes began to fall, they stuck to everything. It didn’t snow often in Yarrow, and when it did, things didn’t stay bright for long. It took less than an hour for the gloom to dust everything in darkness. But that afternoon, the flakes came too fast for the gloom to cover them, and Kaden didn’t want to miss it.

That, and he wanted time alone with Irene.

As they made their way back toward his house, he kept stealing glances at her. She stared out at the falling snow, catching snowflakes on her tongue. Then, she threw her arms out wide and twirled.

“Can you imagine what the shadow garden must look like right now? We have to hurry in case it stops!” She reached for his hand and started pulling him up the path, but Kaden stood still. Even through their gloves he could feel the heat of her.

She paused, turned back, and glanced up at him. “Kaden?”

He couldn’t take his eyes off her. Snowflakes landed in her red hair and on the sleeves of her coat and the tip of her nose, and though Kaden had loved her for as long as he could remember, in that moment he knew it wasn’t only that he loved her, but that he was in love with her.

The realization took his breath away.

She tilted her head to the side, and her eyes widened. He wondered what she saw in his aura.

“Kaden…?” she said his name again, but this time there was a certain depth in her voice that wasn’t there before.

“Irene,” he said, his hand still in hers. He pulled her to him, so close that she had to tilt her head back to see him. He brought a gloved hand to her face and brushed a loose curl behind her ear. “I…”

Before he could finish the sentence, she stood up on her toes and pressed her lips to his. In his surprise, he almost let her go, but she wrapped her arms around his neck before he could. Then, Kaden sank into the kiss. Irene’s lips parted, and her tongue met Kaden’s tongue. She tasted sweet and heady like cinnamon and cloves and whatever else it was she put in the winter tea blend she’d been experimenting with that week, another recipe for the tea shop she hoped to one day open. Kaden brought his hands to either side of her face and kissed her longer and deeper. When he pulled back, the only sound was their heavy breathing and the gentle falling of snow.

“I love you,” he whispered against her mouth.

“I know,” she said. “I saw.” She kissed him again, and he held her tighter and never wanted to let her go. “I love you, too.”

When they finally broke apart, Irene placed her mittened hand in his. “Clem is going to be delighted.” Kaden arched an eyebrow. “You know she’s been wanting us to get together for years,” Irene said.

Kaden bit his lip and looked away. He had to tell Irene the truth—about himself, about his magic.

Irene paused. “We are…aren’t we? Together?”

“My family…”

“Maybe you’re right,” Irene said. “You know how my mom feels about your mom.” She started to pull away, but Kaden held her hand tighter.

“No,” Kaden said. “This isn’t about that.”

“Then what?” Irene asked.

He tilted his head back, unsure how to tell her the truth about his family, about their power. As hard as he tried to find the words, there was no easing into it.

“If we’re going to do this, there’s something you need to know. My family has their own magic,” he said. “They…we…I can make you forget your memories. I would never do that to you, not on purpose, but if you drink our bourbon, I could.”

Irene shook her head. “I don’t understand.”

But before Kaden could explain it, his mother’s voice came from the back porch.

“As touching as this was, I think it’s time for you to go, Irene.” Sylvia stood in a black winter coat that fell to her knees and a pair of black leather gloves. Snowflakes melted as soon as they touched the wool, and with her dark hair, Sylvia was the only touch of gloom on that winter night. “Kaden, come on inside.”

Kaden stared at his mother as he gripped Irene’s hand tighter. “I already told you I’m going to the Haywoods’ for the solstice.”

“No,” she said. “You’re going to come inside and watch It’s a Wonderful Life with me.”

“Mom—”

But she cut him short.

“Family secrets are meant to be just that, Kaden. Secrets,” Sylvia said. “You can forget about going to that solstice party, and you can both forget this little conversation you had.”

As smoke rose up from their lips it floated in the air, catching on the flakes so that when they landed at Irene and Kaden’s feet, it was dusted with darkness.

#

Kaden was the first to come back from the memory, his head reeling. He stared in horror as the reality of what his mother had done hit him. He wasn’t surprised, not in the slightest, but that didn’t change the betrayal, hurt, and anger that wound their way around his heart.

Beside him, Irene gasped. They glassy look in her eyes faded.

Before Kaden could apologize for what his mother had done, Irene reached for his hand. “You loved me first,” she said, her voice breathy.

Before Nate asked Irene out, before Irene said yes, Kaden had fallen in love with her. He’d told her how he felt.

“My mother took that from us.”

Kaden wasn’t sure whether to laugh or cry as his hand hovered over the ring box in his jacket pocket. He shook his head. His mother had stolen that moment from them both, another path to a different future, then she’d bottled it up and kept it from him. Had she ever actually planned to give it to him? Or was the gift some way for her to feel better about what she’d done? Worse, Kaden wondered how many other memories she’d hidden, tucked away in drawers and cabinets. Would he ever find them all?

“We have it back now,” Irene said.

“And what good does that do us?” Kaden asked. “It’s just another reminder of what she’s taken.”

Irene leaned close to him and pressed her lips against his cheek. “I know,” she said. “And it isn’t fair.”

“She’s still trying to control me,” he said. “Even now.”

Irene shook her head. “She can’t control you ever again.”

“This isn’t how I wanted today to go,” Kaden said.

“I’m glad it did,” Irene said. “We have a holiday memory now, something worth celebrating. The first time we confessed our love was on the winter solstice.”

Kaden’s chest and throat grew warm at her words, and he started to cry. Tears were nothing new for him this time of year, but for the first time in decades, they were born of happiness and love, not grief and loss. He laughed softly and brushed the back of his hand over his eyes.

“And after tonight, we’ll have even more memories,” but as he said the words, a pang of sadness hit him square in the chest.

Irene saw the change come over him.

“You don’t have to bear it alone,” she said.

“I don’t want you to feel this,” Kaden said.

“I already do,” she said. “Not the way you’re feeling it, but seeing you in pain…it hurts me, too. I’m here for you. I’m always going to be here for you.”

He took a deep breath before he took Irene’s hand and said, “If you’re still open to it, I think I’d like to take you up on your offer.”

#

Cars lined the driveway at the Haywood house, so Irene had to park her truck close to the road. Kaden gripped her hand tightly as they made their way up the drive. He had helped Addison wrap string lights around the columns and hung them from the porch roof the day after Thanksgiving. Though the sun wouldn’t set for another hour, the sky had grown dark with heavy clouds. The small bulbs cast the front yard in a warm and welcoming glow, and it made Kaden feel like he was coming home.

When they rounded the side of the house, the shadow garden came into view. Though the latest frost had taken out much of the herb and vegetable garden out front, here everything was in bloom. Darkened pumpkins and winter squash joined stalks of shadowy beans and peas. Inky carrots and radishes stuck up just above the soil, ready to be plucked for tomorrow’s harvest, and black gladiolas and delphinium waved in the breeze.

As Kaden and Irene stepped off the path and onto shadow garden soil, a strawberry vine unfurled and made its way toward them. The strawberries had taken a liking to Kaden after that first night he’d stumbled into the garden, and now they greeted him every time he came to visit.

“This spot should do,” Irene said.

She sat down on the dirt, and Kaden followed. Though the garden was dark with life, the soil was cold and hard, and the chill seeped through Kaden’s jeans. Across from him, Irene pulled off her mittens. She rubbed her hands together at the sudden cold then held them out for Kaden. He still hadn’t bothered to put his own gloves on, and her warm touch was a welcome relief.

“How much of the pain do you want me to take?” she asked.

In truth, Kaden wanted it all gone, but he knew that would be more like razing a field than weeding a flower bed. “Let’s just start with the holidays,” he said, as if the pain of them wasn’t an overgrown thicket all its own.

“Just that?” Irene said with a twinkle in her eye.

“Are you sure it won’t be too much for you?” Kaden asked.

She gripped his hands tighter and leaned forward. “I’ll happily take it if it means easing your suffering, Kaden.”

Tears sprang up in his eyes, and he nodded. “Thank you.”

She kissed him softly in response. Then whispered, “Close your eyes.”

He felt Irene’s magic slowly at first, like the sun on a hot summer day, soaking into his chest then his heart, into places he’d tried so long to keep in shadow. Then, a gentle movement, like the sifting of soil, and the ache from that afternoon’s discovery—from yet another of his mother’s betrayals—started to lift. But it didn’t go easy. Like a mature dandelion, it led to a much larger taproot, that heavier dread that had settled into Kaden the morning of that season’s first frost. He felt the warmth of Irene’s magic in his heart like hands digging deeper and deeper as though she were carefully brushing away the dirt and tugging the pain loose. He gasped as it came free.

His dread, though not gone completely, felt more like a memory of the dread than the dread itself. It was as if, in opening himself to this woman he loved, the past could finally stay in the past, where it belonged.

His eyelids fluttered open to find tears streaming down Irene’s face.

“Irene—”

Before he could apologize, she read his intentions on his face or in his aura and shook her head. “You’ve done nothing wrong.”

She brought her fingertips to the hard ground. The roots beneath it rustled, making a space for her hands, which she then plunged into the soil. Then, a set of three dark leaves sprouted and unfurled from the earth. Then another and another and another until there a new strawberry vine was born from his pain.

Irene pulled her hands from the dirt and gently brushed the soil free. “You look lighter,” she said.

“I feel lighter,” Kaden replied. “Thank you.” His words were a whisper.

Irene leaned forward, brought her hands to either side of his face, and kissed him softly. As she did, something cold landed on Kaden’s cheek. Then his bare hands. They pulled back and looked up to find it had started to snow.

Irene let out a deep, full-throated laugh, and the joy of it warmed Kaden almost as much as her magic had. She held out a hand to catch a snowflake in her palm, so much like she had when Kaden had first told her he loved her.

“How’s this for a holiday memory?” she asked as she stood and offered Kaden both of her hands to help him to his feet.

All around them, snow fell in flakes larger than Kaden had ever seen. Within a matter of moments, a light dusting of white coated the soil and ebony leaves. Black blossoms tilted up as if to drink it in.

A delighted shout came from the house behind them.

“It’s snowing!” Addison said.

Kaden turned back to find the Haywoods spilling out of the back door. Addison tugged River onto the patio. Quinn and Harper were only a few steps behind. All of them spun in circles, arms flung wide. Then Clemm and Taylor joined them, followed by Maura and Elena Baker.

As they made their way into the garden and the snow started to pile up around them, Kaden reached for the small box in his pocket. He ran his fingers over the edges, his heart a mixture of happiness and nerves. Before he could stop himself, he dropped to one knee in front of Irene.

She stared down at him, eyes going wide. Snowflakes fluttered around her, landing in her braid and along her coat, and her smile was bright enough to light him up well past the longest night of the year.

“Irene,” Kaden breathed her name. “Will you marry me?”

A small white butterfly landed on her shoulder. A blue one settled beside it, before taking flight again and coming to land on Kaden’s forearm.

“Yes,” she said. “Of course, yes. Yes, I will.” After he slid the ring onto her finger, she pulled him to his feet and threw her arms around him. He bent his head to kiss her, and the force of her lips and her love had Kaden’s knees going weak.

Behind them, their family erupted in cheers.

Kaden and Irene broke the kiss to find the whole group running toward them, all except Maura who took slow, careful steps, with a steaming mug in each hand. Addison was the first to reach them. She threw her arms around both of them and held them tight.

“Welcome to the family, Kaden,” Addison said with a laugh. Then she reached for her mom’s hand and they both examined the aquamarine.

“This is beautiful,” Irene said.

“It should be,” Addison said. “I helped him pick it out.”

“You knew?” Irene asked.

“We both did,” River said with a grin.

“And you didn’t tell me?” Maura said as she handed a mug of hot mulled wine to Kaden.

“We all know how you are with secrets,” Irene said.

Maura rolled her eyes then gave her daughter the second mug.

“If it makes a difference, they didn’t tell us either,” Quinn said.

“This means we’re going to have two weddings in one year!” Taylor said.

Quinn wrapped an arm around Harper’s waist and pulled her close.

“I get to be a mother of a bride and a matron of honor,” Clemm said with a grin. “I am going to be your matron of honor, aren’t I?”

“I feel like I should be the maid of honor,” Addison said.

“A little too old for the flower girl?” Maura said, and now it was Addison’s turn to roll her eyes.

“Let’s leave the wedding planning for later,” Irene said. “We have a solstice to celebrate.”

And celebrate they did. Kaden followed the Haywoods back inside, where bowls of dried oranges and cranberries sat, ready to be strung together. Beside the mulled wine on the stove top sat a simmer pot with orange, cloves, cinnamon, and star anise. A yule log burned in the fireplace, filling the house with warmth and light. And for the first time in a long time, Kaden finally felt like he was home for the holidays.

Until next time…

If you made it all the way to the end of this post, hello! Thank you for reading. If you want to hear from me more often, I’m always on Instagram and TikTok, frequently on Threads, slowly migrating to BlueSky, I share all my plant and herb content on Pinterest, and I’m now officially on YouTube thanks to help from my husband and life partner, Nick!

Wishing you healing wherever you may need it.

xo

Liz

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If you’re looking for more info on my books, you can find them all here on my website. I also created a bunch of free herb profiles as a part of my work as an herbalist. You can find those here!

Alright, let’s get to it. ✍🏻

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The winter solstice is a week from today, and a week from today Witches of Honeysuckle House will have been out in the world for a full three months. What is time?

In this newsletter I’ll be…

• Reflecting back on 2025

• At the very end I’ve included a little spell / ritual that you can use on the solstice next Sunday, if that’s your thing.

Oh, and! If you weren’t able to preorder Witches of Honeysuckle House and missed the 40-page prologue, I’m participating in a Behind the Book sale hosted by Megan Collins on Instagram, benefiting two young women in Gaza that will run from Monday 12/15 through Friday 12/19.

Visit Megan’s Instagram tomorrow for more details, but the basic rundown is you can make a donation in whatever amount you are able to username megancollinswriter on Venmo or PayPal, using the memo “[your email] + [author whose material you want],” and she’ll send you the prologue!

And, as a reminder, if you’ve read Witches of Honeysuckle House but haven’t posted a review on Goodreads and Amazon, please consider posting today! It makes a huge difference for authors.

Purchase Witches of Honeysuckle House

Reflecting on 2025

Let me start by saying that I am so grateful for this year—for the new friends I’ve made, the new readers I’ve met, for every single person who has posted about my books or reviewed them or DM’d me telling me how much my stories meant to them. I write to heal myself and, hopefully, to heal others. So knowing that my novels have made an impact means everything to me.

2025 has felt five years long, not one. Of course, politics and the state of the world are a huge part of this, but even in my personal life I’ve had a lot happen.

I started this year with one book out in the world, and I’m ending it with three. I did two book tours, and as a result I visited New York, Massachusetts, Virginia, Sacramento, and San Diego and got to do events with some of my very best friends. I road my first Amtrak and saw one of my books in a store window for the first time.

I got new author headshots and launched this substack. I got to over 20k followers on TikTok and over 10k on Instagram. I published my first op ed and my first guest article. I did my first-ever influencer book box and was on seven different podcasts.

I had my first full year on Wellbutrin, helping manage both ADHD and a mood disorder, and I completed my third year of EMDR trauma therapy, which has changed me in ways I can’t even begin to describe.

I celebrated 16 years of marriage.

I started an herbal medicine garden in LA thanks to one of my dear friends offering me a garden bed in her yard. I’ve deepended my friendships in LA, made new ones, and have found which communities are for me and which ones aren’t. On December 19, I’ll have been here for three years.

I got to spend almost a whole week with one of my best friends being cozy and drinking tea and eating sweet treats.

I was on the Kelly Clarkson Show and signed books at four different LA area bookstores, all of which helped Witches of Honeysuckle House make it into the top 1,250 books on Amazon and hit the SoCal indie best seller list. I came up with two very different book ideas that I hope will sell and one day you’ll get to read them (you can find Pinterest boards for them here and here).

To everyone who helped make all of these things possible, thank you. This year really has been a dream (even if I am very, very tired at the end of it). I’m looking forward to getting some time to rest and recharge and write next year. I certainly won’t be doing as much media or as many events, but I’ll still be around, don’t worry.

Winter Solstice Spell

The winter solstice is perhaps my favorite time of the year. It’s the shortest day, the longest night. And it’s a perfect time for reflecting, clearing away old energy, and welcoming in a new year. While a lot of witches view Halloween (or Samhain for those who celebrate it as such) as the new year, I align more with the traditional calendar, and the solstice fits in perfectly with that.

What you need for this spell:

• A white pillar candle to be used in this spell and to aid in spell work throughout 2026

• A small green spell candle for growth and new beginnings

• A pinch of oregano for clearing out energy from 2025

• Three cloves for new beginnings and success

• A pinch of chamomile for self love and abundance

• A cinnamon stick for success and abundance

• An orange peel (or dried orange) for creativity

• And a bay leaf for calling in what you want in 2026

• A journal and pen

Set up the pillar candle beside the green spell candle. Place the orange, cinnamon, and bay leaf at the base of the green candle. Sprinkle the herbs in a circle around the candles. First, light the pillar candle. Then, light the green candle with the flame from the white.

As the green candle burns, reflect on 2025 in a journal. What brought you joy, what brought you heartache. What lessons did you learn. What people, things, moments are you grateful for. What energy do you want to leave behind.

Then, write down what you hope 2026 will bring.

Once the green candle has finished burning, blow out the white candle, and the spell is complete. Bury the herbs outside like seeds that will grow in the new year.

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Until next time…

If you made it all the way to the end of this post, hello! Thank you for reading. If you want to hear from me more often, I’m always on Instagram and TikTok, frequently on Threads, slowly migrating to BlueSky, I share all my plant and herb content on Pinterest, and I’m now officially on YouTube thanks to help from my husband and life partner, Nick!

Wishing you healing wherever you may need it.

xo
Liz

Subscribe now

If you’re looking for more info on my books, you can find them all here on my website. I also created a bunch of free herb profiles as a part of my work as an herbalist. You can find those here!

Alright, let’s get to it. ✍🏻

Subscribe now

This week will be one month since Witches of Honeysuckle House has been in the world. There have been so many beautiful posts, wonderful reviews, and heartfelt DM’s from people this book has touched, and most of them have made me cry. Plus, we hit number 13 on the SoCal regional indie bestseller list!

In today’s newsletter you’ll find:

• Witches of Honeysuckle House eBook sale

• Updates from my last tour stop in Crozet

• A photo of the regional bestseller list because I’m still so thrilled it happened

• My recent interview with Tagg Magazine

Purchase Witches of Honeysuckle House

Witches of Honeysuckle House eBook sale!

That’s right! Witches of Honeysuckle House is on sale for $1.99 across eBook platforms (Amazon, Bookshop, Kobo, Barnes & Noble—pretty much wherever you get your eBooks). I will be purchasing it for myself because publishers don’t give you an eBook copy and I do like to see what people underline on Kindle because I’m nosy like that.

Updates from Crozet

I did my final launch event for Witches of Honeysuckle House at Bluebird & Co. in Crozet with my bestie, Amber McBride. I got to see fall colors in full force for the first time in six years. When I tell you I literally cried as the plane was landing because I could see the trees from the sky. When I also tell you I forgot red trees existed somehow? In my mind fall had become all yellows and oranges, and it was that too, but I got to see some of the most stunning red trees. Not only did I get to meet new readers, see one of the cutest bookstores in central Virginia, and celebrate The Leaving Room (a National Book Award finalist!!!), we had the coziest, most fall time.

No. 13 Bestseller in SoCal!!!

Y’all, I am so grateful for the support of my SoCal indies for making this possible. Being the person that I am, I pulled all of the regional lists for this week, and even though I didn’t have the hard sales numbers, I’m fairly certain the book was in the top 50 nationally, which is so wild to me. I cried. Thank you to everyone who bought it and helped make it a success.

Interview with Tagg Magazine

I also did an interview with Tagg Magazine that is maybe one of my favorite pieces of press to come out of the launch of Witches of Honeysuckle House. Not only do we talk about queerness and magic and healing, but the writer—Bailey DeSimone—flawlessly interchanged my pronouns throughout the piece, making this one of the most gender-affirming articles about myself that I’ve ever read, and I’m a little bit in my feelings about it.

Purchase Witches of Honeysuckle House

Until next time…

If you made it all the way to the end of this post, hello! Thank you for reading. If you want to hear from me more often, I’m always on Instagram and TikTok, frequently on Threads, slowly migrating to BlueSky, I share all my plant and herb content on Pinterest, and I’m now officially on YouTube thanks to help from my husband and life partner, Nick!

Wishing you healing wherever you may need it.

xo

Liz

Subscribe now

If you’re looking for more info on my books, you can find them all here on my website. I also created a bunch of free herb profiles as a part of my work as an herbalist. You can find those here!

Subscribe now

We’re almost two weeks out from Witches of Honeysuckle House being out in the world! Did we hit a list? No. Is the book on backorder at a lot of bookstores and on Bookshop.org because so many people bought it? Yes!!! If you’re looking for the paperback and still want to support independent bookstores, I know these ones have it (and they sell their books online, not just in store, so you should be able to order it):

• Vroman’s (many of them are signed!)

• Wild Sisters Book Co. (these are probably signed, but you may want to call!)

• Mysterious Galaxy (these are most likely signed, but you may want to check!)

• Village Well (some may be signed??)

• The Ripped Bodice (likely signed)

And don’t forget, I’ll be at Bluebird & Co in Crozet, Virginia, on November 7 at 5:30 pm with the one and only Amber McBride talking about our books!

In this newsletter I’m sharing a recent piece I wrote for Writer’s Digest about healing fiction and why I write it. I hope you enjoy it!

The following piece first appeared in Writer’s Digest on October 23, 2025.

Writing Healing Fiction: Storytelling and Its Power to Heal

It started with a short story in an upper-level creative writing class—the first time I’d actually written fiction beyond the tales I used to tell myself to escape the realities of an abusive childhood that left me with complex-PTSD and a no-contact relationship with my mother.

I had no idea where to start, so I wrote about a dream I had. There was a waterfall and a bear and a complete lack of narrative. Four other students read it during a workshop, and it did not go well. Reading had always been a transformative experience for me, and that’s what I’d hoped that moment could bring to them. It didn’t. And, honestly, I don’t blame them.

It was bad.

I scrapped it, and the night before the assignment was due, I started from scratch.

I realized that if I wanted my writing to mean something, to do something, it had to make my readers feel something, and I couldn’t do that without feeling something myself. In one of my other classes—one focused on memoirs—we were reading a book titled Writing as a Way of Healing, by Louise DeSalvo. The book, published in 1999, showed the power of writing to help people heal from their trauma. It focused on how DeSalvo worked with her students to write their way to healing, and how writing allowed DeSalvo and other prominent writers (Virginia Woolf, Henry Miller, Audre Lorde, and others) heal themselves. I read it in the context of a creative nonfiction class, but I thought: If fiction could be an escape, couldn’t it also be a way to heal?

When I was working on that first short story back in college, I was in the middle of trying to define my relationship with my emotionally abusive mother. We had a tenuous bond at the time. It had only been a few years since I’d told her about the sexual abuse I’d endured at the hands of her husband when I was nine years old. Rather than leaving him, she pushed a reconciliation narrative that I had no interest in participating in. I was only still in contact with her because she was paying my way through college, and I wasn’t ready to come to terms with the idea of living a life without a mother.

So I decided to write a story from the perspective of a woman like her. I imagined the moment when this character came to terms with everything she’d done to destroy her relationship with her daughter, the moment where she went from lying to herself that she was right in all of her choices to finally, finally recognizing just how wrong she had been. In the story, she didn’t fix anything. She didn’t take steps to undo the damage or make amends or even apologize—that wasn’t the point. It ended with her recognizing the consequences of her decisions and what those decisions had cost her, because that’s what I needed at the time, even though I never got it in real life.

When I read the story to the class, my professor (and several students) cried. I’d done it; I’d taken a piece of fiction that healed me with each word on paper and created something that crossed into the invisible space between author and reader. I went no-contact with my mother a few years later, in part because I knew a different future had been possible, even though she never chose it.

With my latest novel, Witches of Honeysuckle House, I once again took my own heartaches and alchemized them into something new, this time through a story of sisterhood, shared trauma, and what it means to not be able to go home—three heartaches that have followed me into my adult life.

In the novel, there is a scene where one of the characters, Florence Caldwell, finally realizes she has complex PTSD, and that it’s this disorder that has kept her from returning to her childhood home even though her abuser is dead and gone. This moment of realization for her is so deeply tied to my own, and my hope is that readers will recognize themselves in Florence and start on their own healing journey or take the next step in whatever healing they’ve already begun:

What had happened to her wasn’t one moment of darkness, one act that separated Florence’s life between before and after. It came in minutes and hours and days. One moment, her mother would tell her the world was a better place because she was in it, the next that her family would be better off without her—if only the curse had taken Florence instead of her father or her grandmother. It was the shift from a tender brushing of Florence’s hair to a sharp tug, making Florence’s eyes sting. It was a warm cup of chamomile to help Florence sleep, offered with love in her mother’s eyes, then the hot water pouring down her throat as Linda pushed the cup into her face after her first sip.

Of course it was trauma.

“I never realized it was PTSD. I thought . . .” She shook her head, not sure what she thought. That the memories were too much. That she wasn’t strong enough. That she was broken beyond repair, and somehow she was to blame. But if it was trauma, then it wasn’t her fault at all.

People tell you to write what you know. For me, there are two things I know so deeply that they’re a part of who I’ve been and who I’m becoming: trauma and the path to healing. Writing is a part of that journey for me. But I don’t only write to escape—to cope with the aftereffects of my childhood—but to face the pain head on and achieve real change not just for myself, but for my readers. To explore a different outcome, the possibility of hope. And that examination of an alternative future is the essence of healing fiction.

Buy Witches of Honeysuckle House

Until next time…

If you made it all the way to the end of this post, hello! Thank you for reading. If you want to hear from me more often, I’m always on Instagram and TikTok, frequently on Threads, slowly migrating to BlueSky, I share all my plant and herb content on Pinterest, and I’m now officially on YouTube thanks to help from my husband and life partner, Nick!

Wishing you healing wherever you may need it.

xo

Liz

Subscribe now

If you’re looking for more info on my books, you can find them all here on my website. I also created a bunch of free herb profiles as a part of my work as an herbalist. You can find those here!

Alright, let’s get to it. ✍🏻

Subscribe now

We did it, folks. Witches of Honeysuckle House is out in the world—people are reading it, many are loving it, I’m emotional over every single thing. Thank you so much for your support. You made this week, and this launch, mean the world to me.

In this newsletter you’ll find me reflecting on:

• My launch events

• What it was like being on the Kelly Clarkson Show

• What’s next

Before I get into all that, let me say I am absolutely blown away that 59 of you preordered signed copies through Wild Sisters Book Co., and another 39 of you preordered elsewhere and submitted my form for preorder goodies. I could not believe the stack of books that was waiting for me when I got to Sacramento. So if you haven’t received yours yet, it’s because there were a lot to sign, which means a lot for an independent bookstore to ship. Y’all are amazing and I’m never, ever going to forget walking in to find so many books.

If you’ve had a chance to read the book and haven’t done so yet, please post reviews to Goodreads and Amazon so more people can find the book. And, if you have time, please like the top 5-star reviews so I can push one 3-star review down from being the first thing people see because it’s bruising my ego. Here are a few: review 1, review 2, review 3. Thank yoooooou.

Buy Witches of Honeysuckle House

My launch events

Thank you to everyone who came out to support the book (and me!) during my launch events, and thank you so, so much to Wild Sisters Book Co., Vroman’s, and Mysterious Galaxy for hosting me!

My event in Sacramento at Wild Sisters sold out (20 tickets), but only five of those who RSVP’d actually attended, making it delightfully intimate. I did tarot readings for almost everyone in attendance, and, of course, Claire and I talked about the book. Unfortunately, Sierra wasn’t feeling well and wasn’t able to join us, but one day we’re going to make an event happen together!

At Vroman’s, I got to celebrate the book with my LA friends and family. I had so much fun chatting with Rebekah and seeing some of the people I love the most in this city looking back at us (and laughing along with us), plus a couple of new people. I met Jessika Grewe Glover, a fellow LA author, in person. And a man I didn’t know saw the event, sat down, found my query guide on my website, bought the book, and came up afterwards to chat! This was my very first book event in LA where I wasn’t the conversation partner, making this one extra special to me.

Mysterious Galaxy was everything I hoped for and more. I wish they were in LA, because I’d shop there All. The. Time. We had such a wonderful crowd for the event, including multiple people with C-PTSD (I’m so sorry, friends), which made for some very engaging and (I hope) healing conversations. During the lightning round Rebekah made me choose between The Particular Sadness of Lemon Cake and Garden Spells. I was deeply distressed by the whole thing. Multiple people bought Witches of Honeysuckle House and my backlist titles, which had me in tears.

What it was like being on the Kelly Clarkson Show

Y’all, I am never going to get over seeing Kelly Clarkson holding my book in her hands. I was beside myself when my publicist heard back from Kelly’s team with the news that they wanted me back on the show! (You can watch my first appearance here).

I recorded the segment in my home office with a ring light, a Blue Yeti mic, and my iPhone continuity camera. That meant that while recording, I actually couldn’t see Kelly on screen, so it wasn’t until the segment aired that I saw her with my book and cried about it. It also meant I could pretend I was recording a TikTok during the interview and keep my cool.

If you’re reading this and you found me for the first time through Kelly’s show, let me know in the comments!

What’s next

I have one more event coming up in Crozet, Virginia, at Bluebird & Co. on November 7 at 5:30 pm with my bestie, Amber McBride, where we’ll be celebrating both Witches of Honeysuckle House and National Book Award Finalist The Leaving Room, and then I will be going back to being a hermit.

I have two projects in the works right now—neither of which have sold yet, and neither of which I can talk about in much depth for that very reason. What I will say: One is witchy and light (lighter, perhaps, than Witches of Honeysuckle House and In the Shadow Garden, but full of found family themes and healing, per usual). The other is horror. 😅 And since we’re all friends here, you can find my Pinterest boards for them here and here.

Closing thoughts

My goal with launching this book was to relaunch my career, to break out, and maybe (just maybe) hit a bestseller list (we’ll know on Wednesday if we did it, folks). During this time, I was on national television, I sold a lot of books (don’t have the final numbers yet, but much more than I did my first week with In the Shadow Garden), I crossed over 10k followers on Instagram, and—most importantly—I’ve met so many new readers. To me, that’s a success. But the big moment will be selling my next book, taking that next step forward. So hopefully we’ll see that soon!

Until next time…

If you made it all the way to the end of this post, hello! Thank you for reading. If you want to hear from me more often, I’m always on Instagram and TikTok, frequently on Threads, slowly migrating to BlueSky, I share all my plant and herb content on Pinterest, and I’m now officially on YouTube thanks to help from my husband and life partner, Nick!

Wishing you healing wherever you may need it.

xo

Liz

Buy Witches of Honeysuckle House Now

The day is finally here. Witches of Honeysuckle House is out in the world—this little book that I wrote when I wasn’t sure if I would be able to sell another. This story I pulled from the depths of my heart to heal from my broken relationships with women who are no longer a part of my life. This novel that I hope brings you healing as well.

There is so much to this book. It has love. It has heartache. It has loss. It has hope. There’s a living house and a magical bookstore and a kitten. It’s a story of friendship and family. It’s a look at the places we call home. It’s a reclamation of the things that might seek to destroy us. And it’s an exploration of the impacts of generational trauma—a window into how healing that trauma in ourselves can create a better world for those who come after us.

I have an article being published today in Writer’s Digest about writing healing fiction. I’m boarding a plane for Sacramento to celebrate the book launch this evening. I’ll be on the Kelly Clarkson Show tomorrow. All things I can’t believe are happening and that I’m beyond grateful for.

Knowing that you all finally have this book in your hands brings me so much joy. Thank you for buying. Thank you for reading. Thank you for making all of this worth it.

With love and a little bit of magic,

Liz

Get the Book Now

If you’re looking for more info on my books, you can find them all here on my website. I also created a bunch of free herb profiles as a part of my work as an herbalist. You can find those here!

Alright, let’s get to it. ✍🏻

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It’s two days until Witches of Honeysuckle House will be out in the world (on October 21^st!!!)! I literally cannot believe it. I have so many exciting things going on this week and so many exciting things that have led up to this moment, so I wanted to put them all in one place for you.

In this newsletter you’ll find:

• When I’m going to be on The Kelly Clarkson Show!!!!!!!!!

• A Q&A I did with The Nerd Daily and an op-ed I wrote for Common Dreams

• Recent and upcoming podcast appearances

• In-person events

Oh, and it’s not too late to preorder!

Preorder Witches of Honeysuckle House

I’m going to be on The Kelly Clarkson Show!!!

Some of you may remember that Kelly Clarkson had me on her show back in 2022 to celebrate In the Shadow Garden. When I found out they wanted me back, I cried actual tears. I’m so excited for so many people to get to hear about Witches of Honeysuckle House, and I have to tell y’all—there’s nothing quite like the feeling of seeing your book in the Kelly Clarkson’s hands. I did not actually see this happen when recording this time because I used my iphone continuity camera with my macbook, so I was looking into the lens the whole time. Which means I’m definitely going to cry when I watch the show.

I’ll be on the show (at the very end) on Wednesday, October 22! Here’s where/when to watch based on your market. For those of you without cable TV (like me lmao…I’ll be doing a free trial of YouTube TV), the episode should be on Peacock on Thursday, October 23!

Just a quick note: If you had a chance to read the book early and are able to post a review before Wednesday, please do! After my first appearance I got an influx of one-star reviews because In the Shadow Garden has gay characters in it. In a surprise to no one, this book is queer, too, so I’m expecting similar backlash on some level. But hopefully the book will find the right people!

Articles featuring Witches of Honeysuckle House

If you want to know a little more about me as a writer and writing this book in particular, I did a Q&A with The Nerd Daily, in which I talk about the inspiration for the book, what characters I most enjoyed writing, the challenges of writing this book, and more.

On a more serious note, I wrote an op ed for Common Dreams about how promoting good genes and limiting access to birth control and abortion are tied together by the threads of white supremacy and the patriarchy, digging into America’s history with abortion.

Podcast appearances

I have had so much fun talking with podcast hosts this fall about Witches of Honeysuckle House, so if you need to add anything to your listening list, I have a few for you!

• Heartracers by author Sierra Godfrey and bookstore owner Claire Bone. We talk PR boxes and Witches of Honeysuckle House and laugh a lot.

• Big Blend Radio. We talk about the book, about witchcraft, and herbalism.

• Poisoned Pen Podcast. I join fellow Alcove authors Taylor Hartley, K Valentin, and Hollie Nelson to talk about our fall books.

• On the Shelf. We talk Witches of Honeysuckle House, books, bookstores, and more!

• Bookaholic. This one will also be airing later this month. We talk witchcraft, troubled family relationships, and found family.

• The Well-Read Podcast: I believe this episode will be going live this week; we talk everything Witches of Honeysuckle House.

In-person events

I’ll be doing four in-person events for the Witches of Honeysuckle House launch, and I hope to see you at one of them!

October 21 | Sacramento, CA | 6 pm
Wild Sisters Book Co.
in conversation with SC Godfrey

​October 24 | Los Angeles, CA | 7 pm
Vroman’s Bookstore
in conversation with Rebekah Faubion​​​

​​October 26 | San Diego, CA | 2 pm
Mysterious Galaxy
in conversation with Rebekah Faubion

November 7 | Crozet, VA | 5:30 pm
Bluebird & Co.
in conversation with Amber McBride

Closing thoughts

The lead up to the launch of this book has meant so much to me, and I can’t wait to see what this week brings. If you’ve already had a chance to read an early copy of Witches of Honeysuckle House, please post your reviews to Amazon on Tuesday as soon as you are able—this makes a huge difference with algorithmic visibility! And if you are planning on purchasing the book and are able to, please consider buying your copy this week (even if you’re not able to read it right away). I’m not sure what the chances are of hitting a bestseller list but every single sale during launch week counts!!

Until next time…

If you made it all the way to the end of this post, hello! Thank you for reading. If you want to hear from me more often, I’m always on Instagram and TikTok, frequently on Threads, slowly migrating to BlueSky, I share all my plant and herb content on Pinterest, and I’m now officially on YouTube thanks to help from my husband and life partner, Nick!

Wishing you healing wherever you may need it.

xo

Liz

Preorder Witches of Honeysuckle House

Y’all, if you’ve been around here for a while, you know how much I love Amber’s novel We Are All So Good At Smiling. It’s one of my favorite books that I have ever read. I am so happy to report that I love The Leaving Room just as much. It’s no wonder it’s received four starred reviews (so far!) and is a finalist for the National Book Award!

It takes place in the space between life and death—in a room children pass through on their way to the other side. The Keeper of the room, Gospel, tries to ease the souls on their way. But when she starts to break the rules, she finds a door to another leaving room and another Keeper, Melodee.

Purchase The Leaving Room

If the cover alone isn’t enough to make you buy this book, let me tell you: it’s haunting and beautiful and lush and everything I love about Amber’s writing.

I can’t wait to celebrate it with her later this month in Crozet. Until then, go out and buy yourself a copy!

Subscribe now

Until next time…

If you made it all the way to the end of this post, hello! Thank you for reading. If you want to hear from me more often, I’m always on Instagram and TikTok, frequently on Threads, slowly migrating to BlueSky, I share all my plant and herb content on Pinterest, and I’m now officially on YouTube thanks to help from my husband and life partner, Nick!

Wishing you healing wherever you may need it.

xo

Liz

Preorder Witches of Honeysuckle House

If you’re looking for more info on my books, you can find them all here on my website. I also created a bunch of free herb profiles as a part of my work as an herbalist. You can find those here!

Alright, let’s get to it. ✍🏻

Subscribe now

My friends, Witches of Honeysuckle House comes out a week from Tuesday. What is time?

In this newsletter you’ll find:

• Me reminding you to submit proof of preorder before October 13

• A little tarot reading I did for the book

Submit proof of preorder before time runs out!

If you have preordered or are planning to preorder, please remember that Monday October 13 is the last day you can submit proof of preorder if you want these goodies:

• A signed bookplate for your copy

• Three custom tarot cards that are featured in the novel

• A postcard with a tarot spread that I designed on it

• An electronic unpublished 40 page prologue to the novel

After that time, you can only get the physical goodies by preordering through Wild Sisters Book Co., and you will not be able to sign up for the prologue.

Submit Proof of Preorder Here!

Let’s do a little tarot reading

With my book launch quickly approaching, I decided to do a three-card tarot pull looking ahead to the launch, with three questions:

• What do I need to keep in mind going into the launch of Witches of Honeysuckle House?

• What is supporting me?

• How will Witches of Honeysuckle House impact my career?

What do I need to keep in mind going the launch of Witches of Honeysuckle House? The King of Pentacles Reversed

While this card could be about a specific person, since it’s a face card, I think it’s more of a reminder to not overdo it with putting my energy into this book launch. As a reversal, there can be a warning here to keep an eye on my resources. Part of that is money (as I mentioned in a previous newsletter, I’m putting my own money into the launch of this book by hiring a publicist and running ads on social media), but I think the warning here is pointing to my other resources: my time, my energy. When I’m focused on something, I get focused—in a way that can lead to burn out.

However, if we’re viewing the reversal as a magnification of the upright meaning of the card, there is permission here to be free with my money and use it how I see fit (this is the interpretation my husband thinks the cards are pointing to, and with the next card I pulled, I think he may be right!).

What is supporting me? The Nine of Pentacles

The nine of pentacles represents success. It represents material and financial security. It says, you’ve put in the work and now you get to reap the rewards. Seeing this in the spread as something supporting me during the launch of this book actually made me tear up a little bit. The work itself—both the book and the effort I’ve put into promoting it (and the hard work of the people who have been helping me with that!)—are supporting this launch.

How will Witches of Honeysuckle House impact my career? The Eight of Wands

Y’all, this card has me very excited. The eight of wands is a card of quick action, forward momentum, and progress. If you’ve been following along, you know that I want this book to break me out and open new doors for me in my career as an author. This card says something is about to turn on that will lead to sudden (but also steady!) growth.

The guidebook for The Gentle Tarot (the deck I used for this reading) says, “The active energies within and around me are drawing conclusions near…Like a bubble rising underwater, this is the moment where it reaches the surface and pops! You have what you need to declare yourself to the world. If there has been effort steadily bringing you to this point, things are set in motion to really take off now. Conclusions birth new chapters. You are ready.”

Closing thoughts

I just wanted to thank you all again for your support of and excitement about this book. I can’t wait for it to be in the world and in your hands and to see what comes next!

Until next time…

If you made it all the way to the end of this post, hello! Thank you for reading. If you want to hear from me more often, I’m always on Instagram and TikTok, frequently on Threads, slowly migrating to BlueSky, I share all my plant and herb content on Pinterest, and I’m now officially on YouTube thanks to help from my husband and life partner, Nick!

Wishing you healing wherever you may need it.

xo

Liz

Preorder Witches of Honeysuckle House

If you’re looking for more info on my books, you can find them all here on my website. I also created a bunch of free herb profiles as a part of my work as an herbalist. You can find those here!

Alright, let’s get to it. ✍🏻

Subscribe now

As of Tuesday, it will be TWO WEEKS until Witches of Honeysuckle House hits bookstores on October 21. I’m in the final stretch of promoting and doing all those last few things that will (hopefully) make this book break me out. I had three interviews this week (I’ll be sure to post links when those are live!), I ordered some cute envelopes to send out preorder goodies, and that sassy reel I made is still doing the rounds on Instagram.

Don’t forget, October 13 is the last day to submit proof of preorder if you want the goodies, including:

• A signed bookplate for your copy (unless you preorder through Wild Sisters Book Co., in which case you’ll get a signed book)

• Three custom tarot cards that are featured in the novel

• A postcard with a tarot spread that I designed on it

• An electronic unpublished 40 page prologue to the novel

Submit Proof of Preorder Here

In this newsletter you’ll find:

• Me talking about sending postcards to queer-owned and queer-friendly bookstores (and some of those stores actually emailing me back!!!!)

• A link to a spreadsheet with 108 queer-owned bookstores that you can support

Preorder Witches of Honeysuckle House

So I sent out a bunch of postcards

One of my friends, Amber McBride, was addressing and sending out postcards for her upcoming novel The Leaving Room (which, by the way, is absolutely amazing—a must-preorder book that comes out on October 14), which was brilliant and not something I’d ever even thought about!

Back in June, I talked at length about being a queer author writing queer books. In the witchy book space, there just aren’t a ton of queer stories—especially with the more serious-leaning witchy books (like mine). So, thanks to Amber’s brilliance, I decided to pull together a list of queer-owned bookstores and tell them about Witches of Honeysuckle House in hopes that they would feature it in their October displays once it comes out!

One of the things I included on the postcard was a note to the bookstores offering to send them signed bookplates if they stock the book. I ended up sending it out to 108 queer-owned bookstores and another 17 queer-friendly bookstores. Much to my surprise, I have actually had two bookstores get back to me so far:

• The Lavender Bookshop in Marietta, Georgia (queer-owned)

• Carmichael’s Bookstore in Louisville, Kentucky (queer-friendly)

So, if you’re in either of those cities, you can stop in for a book with a signed bookplate once it comes out on October 21! And if you’re a bookstore owner who would like signed bookplates, please email me here!

List of 108 Queer-Owned Bookstores

How does one build a list of queer-owned bookstores? With the internet, of course.

I did some googling and found about 80 queer-owned bookstores on various lists online; then I put up a post on threads asking for any I had missed. I’ve pulled together that full list in case you’re looking for queer-owned stores to support! (Or if you’re a queer author like me!)

Access the List Here

If you notice any queer-owned bookstores that are missing, please leave a comment on this post, and I’ll be sure to add them!

Until next time…

If you made it all the way to the end of this post, hello! Thank you for reading. If you want to hear from me more often, I’m always on Instagram and TikTok, frequently on Threads, slowly migrating to BlueSky, I share all my plant and herb content on Pinterest, and I’m now officially on YouTube thanks to help from my husband and life partner, Nick!

Wishing you healing wherever you may need it.

xo

Liz

If you’re looking for more info on my books, you can find them all here on my website. I also created a bunch of free herb profiles as a part of my work as an herbalist. You can find those here!

Alright, let’s get to it. ✍🏻

Subscribe now

Somehow, we are less than a month out from Witches of Honeysuckle House hitting bookstores on October 21, and we are not at all calm over here. Yesterday I sent out 125 postcards to queer-owned and queer-friendly bookstores. Next week I have three different interviews about the book. The good (read: calming) news, I finally figured out how to use the smart lights in my office (and make them flicker like candles!!) and have officially turned it into a cozy haven.

Oh, and I made my audio book narrator cry.

In this newsletter, I’ll be:

• Giving you a behind-the-scenes look at the early editorial process of my novel

• Sharing a sneak-peak of 40 pages my editor had me cut that you can read if you submit proof of preorder here

Preorder Witches of Honeysuckle House

Early edits on Witches of Honeysuckle House

My agent sold Witches of Honeysuckle House on proposal. We went out with a pitch, a synopsis, and a 40-page writing sample. Before the editor who bought the book made her offer, she wanted to jump on a short call to see how open I was to changes.

We got on a video chat with her, and she basically told me she thought the book needed to start at the end of the sample chapters in my proposal—and that I should cut those pages completely.

Here’s the thing: Those chapters weren’t where I had originally started the book. The very first iteration of Witches of Honeysuckle House began with the same opening paragraph of the final book, and the same opening line: A witch’s house is a living, breathing thing.

You might remember that I queried Witches of Honeysuckle House after leaving my agent in 2023. During that process, there was an agent who was interested in the book, but she didn’t feel like it would break me out in the state I had sent it to her, so she asked if I’d be willing to rework it some.

Part of that reworking included wanting to know a little more background on Florence and Evie (the sisters in the present-day timeline of the book) and how their estrangement came to be. I added an entire section to the novel showing the events of 2012—the year their mother died. This section became the new opening of the book.

When my editor suggested those pages that I had worked so hard on needed to go, I didn’t blink an eye. Did I love them? Yes. Did I think they were essential to the story I was telling? Not really. They had elements that were—backstory I could fold in more seamlessly throughout. Could a version of this book exist with them still on the page? Sure, if 112,000 word books were more common in my genre. 😅

So, I cut 14,500 words. (And eventually another 5,500 for a total of 20,000!)

But, Liz, can we read the pages?

Funny you should ask. Yes, you can read the pages.

I’ve turned these 40 pages into a prologue of sorts. I’m formatting it as a little ebook and will be sending it out to everyone who submits proof of preorder for Witches of Honeysuckle House by October 13. I definitely recommend reading the book as is before diving into the prologue. I did cut them, after all, and the book is better for it.

Here’s a little sneak peek:

When Florence Caldwell woke up that morning, she knew that someone was going to die. It wasn’t a feeling or a premonition or an ominous tarot card reading. It was simply the way things were—a fact as inked into the town of Burdock Creek’s history as the magic the Caldwells had brought with them when Florence’s great-grandmother had made the town her home almost a century ago.

It was October thirteenth, thirteen years to the day since Florence’s father died. Florence and her sister Evie had agreed that on that day of all days neither of them would go back to their childhood home. Neither of them would step foot on the land or ascend the front steps or cross over the threshold.

And, so, they thought, neither of them would die

Preorder Witches of Honeysuckle House

Closing thoughts

My point in this post? To tell you that, yes, sometimes you need to cut things from your books (a lot of things). But that doesn’t mean you shouldn’t keep them, because you never know when they might just make the perfect preorder incentive.

Submit Proof of Preorder

Until next time…

If you made it all the way to the end of this post, hello! Thank you for reading. If you want to hear from me more often, I’m always on Instagram and TikTok, frequently on Threads, slowly migrating to BlueSky, I share all my plant and herb content on Pinterest, and I’m now officially on YouTube thanks to help from my husband and life partner, Nick!

Wishing you healing wherever you may need it.

xo

Liz

If you’re looking for more info on my books, you can find them all here on my website. I also created a bunch of free herb profiles as a part of my work as an herbalist. You can find those here!

Alright, let’s get to it. ✍🏻

Subscribe now

Hello friends! We’re one month out from Witches of Honeysuckle House hitting bookstores on October 21. I’ve been busy promoting the book basically since July, and today I have some podcast links to share plus a few other updates!

In this newsletter you’ll find:

• Witch Week!

• Catch me at Fall into Books Festival

• Podcast appearances

  Preorder Witches of Honeysuckle House

First, Witch Week started over on Instagram today! This is an annual celebration of witchy books with giveaways, buddy reads, and more (keep an eye out for a giveaway of Witches of Honeysuckle House coming early next week!).

Witches of Honeysuckle House is one of the buddy reads—so if you’re a bookstagrammer and have been wanting the chance to read the novel early, be sure to head over to the post and comment that you want to join the buddy read!

Check Out Witch Week Here

This Saturday, September 20 (tomorrow!), I’ll be in Anaheim, California, at the Fall into Books Festival! I know I’m sending this email very last minute, but it’s not too late to get tickets! Here’s where you can find me:

• 11:00 | Tell me a story I’ve heard before: retellings panel | Terrace rooms A-B

• 12:00 | We’re here and we’re queer panel | Terrace rooms C-D

• 1:30 - 4:30 | Signing table 909

Lastly, I’m on a few podcasts right now talking all about Witches of Honeysuckle House (with even more to come!).

So if you need a little listening material:

• The Poisoned Pen Podcast

• Big Blend Radio

• Heartracers

Until next time…

If you made it all the way to the end of this post, hello! Thank you for reading. If you want to hear from me more often, I'm always on Instagram and TikTok, frequently on Threads, slowly migrating to BlueSky, I share all my plant and herb content on Pinterest, and I’m now officially on YouTube thanks to help from my husband and life partner, Nick!

Wishing you healing wherever you may need it.

xo

Liz

Preorder Witches of Honeysuckle House

If you’re looking for more info on my books, you can find them all here on my website. I also created a bunch of free herb profiles as a part of my work as an herbalist. You can find those here!

Alright, let’s get to it. ✍🏻

Subscribe now

My debut novel, In the Shadow Garden, was published on September 13, 2022, which means it turns three years old this weekend! To celebrate, I’m doing a giveaway and talking about my publishing journey.

In this newsletter you’ll find:

• Info on the giveaway + how to enter

• A deep dive on my publishing journey

  • My first time querying

  • The path to publishing

  • Leaving my agent

  • From agentless to another book deal

Before we get into that, I received my final copies of Witches of Honeysuckle House (here’s a video of me opening them) and shared a behind-the-scenes look at the development of the tarot cards my cousin designed and painted over on my Instagram. Remember, if you preorder and submit proof of purchase for Witches of Honeysuckle House by 10/13/25, I’ll send you a set of the three cards (along with a few other goodies)!

Preorder Witches of Honeysuckle House

In the Shadow Garden birthday giveaway

I can’t believe it’s been three years since my debut was published. It feels like it was yesterday and also somehow fifteen years ago.

To celebrate In the Shadow Garden’s third birthday, one lucky winner will get:

• A signed copy of In the Shadow Garden

• A signed copy of Witches of Honeysuckle House (either hardcover or trade paperback, winner’s choice)

• And a molting cicada plushie from Tyler Thrasher Art (I checked his website, and I don’t think he sells these anymore! I had purchased an extra one for a future giveaway, so it looks like maybe this is one of the few ways to get one other than retailers who bought from him in bulk).

Enter the Giveaway

To enter to win, go over to my Instagram and follow the instructions on the giveaway post there! If you comment on this post, you’ll also get a bonus entry, just be sure to include your Instagram username in your comment so I can give you credit.

Onto my publishing journey

Next month (on October 21), I will have three books out in the world—two books solely written by me, and one I co-authored. It can be easy to look at an author and think their debut is their first book, but for most of us—that is very much not the case. It took me twelve years, seven finished books, and 255 rejections before I sold my first novel, In the Shadow Garden. It took me another three years, sixty-eight more rejections, and a new agent before selling Witches of Honeysuckle House.

Here's the thing: Not a single one of those books was wasted. Fifteen years of writing has allowed me to find my voice. It’s given me the confidence to stick by the stories I want to tell and how I want to tell them. And it’s taught me to advocate for myself and do everything I can to get my books in the hands of as many people as possible.

My first time querying

I started my first novel in 2009. It was high fantasy, it was terrible, and it will never see the light of day. And that’s just fine. In writing that book, I learned how to conceive of a novel-length story.

Rather than rewriting it and trying to make it work, I saved it on an external hard drive (in the days before Google drive) and started something completely new—this time a YA dystopian novel with dragons. I finished that book and started querying it in 2012. I ended up with 38 rejections, but in the process, I received six requests to read pages (three partials and three fulls) and even had an agent who asked if I’d be interested in revising the book. Where my first novel taught me how to write a story, this one showed me that I could conceive of something compelling enough that agents—the first round of gatekeepers in the world of traditional publishing—wanted to read it.

I didn’t revise the book because I was already in the middle of another project, and I’d grown so much as a writer between books, that going back to that second book just didn’t make sense. Instead, I finished my third novel (a YA historical fantasy) and started querying that.

After 81 rejections, I had eight agents request to read the book and four of them offered representation. I signed with one and thought: This is it. I’m going to be published!

The path to publication

I was wrong. 😅

My then-agent sent that book out to 37 editors total, and while we had some early interest—it never went beyond that. It didn’t make it to acquisitions, and it didn’t sell. But I did learn that there were editors who liked my voice and my writing even if this particular story wasn’t for them.

So, as writers do, I wrote another book. My fourth novel—if you’re counting—was a YA historical fantasy that edged on horror. Again, many editors loved the voice but didn’t bite on actually acquiring the book. I received 29 rejections before it died on submission. This time around I learned something new about myself: I liked writing haunting stories.

My fifth novel was a YA speculative thriller that I wrote to heal myself from my religious trauma. This was the first book where I really set out to alchemize my pain and experiences into something new. Editors were so kind, but it was 2018 and publishing wasn’t ready to take on evangelical Christianity in the way that book did. I received 31 rejections before it, too, ended up in my Google drive collecting digital cobwebs.

At this point, I started to doubt myself. I wondered if I was the problem. If my agent was going to fire me as a client and my dream of getting published would be over before it even started (the anxiety of being an author is a lot). Much to my relief, my agent wanted to keep working with me. She told me sometimes this is just how publishing is, which is partially true, but if I had been a little more confident in myself at the time, I might’ve realized she may have also been a part of the problem. But querying had been so brutal, and I’d already done it twice. I really didn’t want to have to do it again.

That was when I started writing a young adult novel that would eventually become In the Shadow Garden. This book was different. At this point I’d written five whole books. I’d learned my strengths as an author—I had a literary voice, I wrote the sort of prose people wanted to sink into, my settings were lush and my characters were flawed. I just didn’t quite know where exactly those strengths fit. Then, I read Bone Gap by Laura Ruby and Garden Spells by Sarah Addison Allen, and I discovered a new type of book I hadn’t experienced before—one that existed in our world, but with magic. As if magic were simply a part of everyday life. I wanted more books like this, but I couldn’t find them. So I decided to write my own.

I knew this book I’d written was good; it was me. I’d found my voice in a way I hadn’t before. I sent it to my agent, and I have to tell you: she didn’t get it. The notes she sent back made no sense, almost as if she hadn’t read the book. I was upset. We got on the phone. She apologized and told me how much she loved the book, but I decided, if my agent didn’t manage to sell it, it was time to move on from working with her.

Then, we went on submission.

After twelve (that I know of) rejections from editors, my agent had a conversation with an editor who acquired adult fantasy. She was interested in the idea of the YA version of In the Shadow Garden (titled Somebody Else’s Sorrow), but she didn’t edit young adult. My agent asked if I’d consider rewriting it as an adult novel. I figured, why not? I’d already shelved five books at that point, and though Somebody Else’s Sorrow was still on submission, maybe I’d have better luck in the adult space.

So I rewrote it, and when I say I rewrote it, I mean I really and truly rewrote it from the ground up—a full, page one rewrite. While some of the characters were the same and the garden was still there, the plot changed dramatically, and both the bourbon magic and Sylvia Bonner emerged in this new version of the story. This book I’d rewritten was better than anything I’d done up until that point. We sent it to the editor. She passed. I was heartbroken. But also knew I had something, so we went on submission to adult editors.

We got another ten rejections, but an editor I didn’t know we had submitted to made an offer on the book in February of 2021. Twelve years after starting my first novel, I was going to finally be published.

Leaving my agent

While I was waiting for In the Shadow Garden to hit bookshelves, I played around with a few other ideas. In Janaury of 2022, I suggested to my agent that we send them to my editor, but she told me it was too soon, to just write another book. So, since she managed to get me a deal at a Big Five publisher (Hachette) with a five-figure advance, I did what she said.

Fast forward to the June before In the Shadow Garden was set to come out. I’d written 43,000 words and an in-depth outline of the idea I told my agent about back in January. I was also in the middle of writing Meg March’s story for The Other March Sisters.

There were less than four months until my book was coming out, so I decided to email my agent, once again, about submitting option material.

Seven days later I received a mass email from her that she was going to be offline for a month on vacation (something that happened often). I checked in—reminding her of the email I had sent her a week before. Six days later, she replied telling me my editor was planning her list for fall of 2023 and would love to see what I had. My agent attached notes on my materials but hadn’t had time to get through all of it before leaving for her vacation. Her notes once again suggested she hadn’t read the materials closely. I made the changes anyway so we could get everything to my editor before my agent went on holiday.

We sent the material (the first four chapters and an in-depth outline) and…it didn’t go how I’d hoped it would.

The book had plant magic and a murder mystery and witches. It felt like a spiritual successor to In the Shadow Garden to me, but that was just the problem. It was too close to my debut. My editor was kind but honest and told me, “Liz, some writers can write the same book over and over again and do well. But you’re smarter than that, and your readers are smarter than that.”

Her words have stuck with me ever since.

I brainstormed a few more pitches, one of which ended up becoming Witches of Honeysuckle House. We sent my editor the proposal (sample pages and synopsis) in January of 2023. We didn’t hear back until April, and when we did, it wasn’t the news I wanted. In the Shadow Garden hadn’t sold enough of its initial print run to be in the black—meaning the publisher had lost money on it (even though at that point it had sold roughly 4,000 copies with print, ebook, and audio sales combined). They couldn’t move forward with another book.

I left my agent the next day.

From agentless to another book deal

I won’t go into all the details as to why I left my agent, but the delays on her end around the option material were a significant part of it. When I left, we were in the middle of negotiating the contract for The Other March Sisters. She finished up that contract, and I took my option material with me to find another agent.

I spent the summer of 2023 querying agents with the synopsis and sample pages for Witches of Honeysuckle House (I put together a whole guide on that experience). I had interest, but none of the agents I emailed with felt they could sell the book on proposal. So I wrote the whole book and queried again. Sixty-eight rejections later, in May of 2024, I signed with my current agent. We went on submission two weeks later and had an offer two weeks after that.

As you know, Witches of Honeysuckle House is coming out on October 21. I currently have option material for another book with my publisher, and—if we get enough preorders and early sales—I’m hoping they’ll offer on it. But I want more than enough; I want this book to be a bestseller. I’m tired of my work being sidelined—I want this book to break out, and I need your help to make that happen.

Concluding thoughts

Perseverance is a huge part of succeeding as a traditionally published author. My husband often reminds me that this is a marathon and that most people quit before they get good enough. Throughout the course of my career (so far) my work has been rejected 328 times by various agents and editors. But I keep going because I love telling stories and because I’m not a quitter. I’m determined to make it.

To everyone who has bought and read my books: thank you. Your support and your heartfelt reviews have meant so much to me. I hope we’ll be on this road together for a long time.

If you want to be a part of that journey, there are a lot of things you can do to help me succeed. Like and share this post. Subscribe to this Substack. Follow me on social media—then like and share and comment on my posts. And above all, please pre-order my book. If you want to get involved in my inner circle / unofficial street team send me a DM over on Instagram!

I can’t wait for you all to read Witches of Honeysuckle House. 🥹

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Until next time…

If you made it all the way to the end of this post, hello! Thank you for reading. This silly little post I made about Witches of Honeysuckle House is making the rounds over on Instagram. If you want to hear from me more often, I'm always on Instagram and TikTok, frequently on Threads, slowly migrating to BlueSky, I share all my plant and herb content on Pinterest, and I’m now officially on YouTube thanks to help from my husband and life partner, Nick!

Wishing you healing wherever you may need it.

xo

Liz

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