On Boiled Potatoes
And a cover reveal, but mostly boiled potatoes.
Hello and welcome back to my newsletter!
Let’s get straight to the potatoes. No preamble, all content because that’s who I am.
A LENGTHY DISCUSSION OF MY THOUGHTS ON MY OWN NEWSLETTER.
So anyway, about the boiled potatoes . . . I like Substack a lot better than my old newsletter platform. It has a sexy NPR vibe to it that is really working for me. All of my smart friends are on here, thinking smart things and having a discourse. Also, it’s easier to use and you might get paid instead of going broke paying for a newsletter service you only use 3 times a year, speaking of which I got a bill for $700 website/newsletter services recently. I hope you all enjoyed those.
I went to dinner with my parents right after hitting send on my last newsletter. Just to give you a picture of the evening, I was basically leaving when I should be arriving. My husband was backing out of going with me at the last minute. Then, on the way out the door I realized that the corgi puppy was missing. I commenced running through the neighborhood in a panic until I realized she was taking a nap in her crate. By the time I finally arrived at dinner, I was an hour late, minus a husband, and frazzled. I probably only talked about myself while I was there. On my way home, I got a notification that someone had subscribed to my newsletter for $80 a year, which I didn’t even know was a thing because I was chasing a dog that wasn’t actually missing instead of completing my substack set-up. Anyway, it was my dad, a man who had heard all of my news and bought me dinner. <3
But anyway, you can get 5 days in AirBnB in Puerto Rico for less than my $700 newsletter/website bill. Expect photos of me on a beach in the next newsletter.
Enough with the boiled potatoes. Let’s move on.
HOW MANY PROJECTS CAN SAM DO AT ONCE? I’m testing that theory at the moment. In the past few days, I’ve worked on three book projects. I finished the final proofread for Errands & Espionage, coming in August. I wrote a first chapter for a project that is nothing but a sparkle in his daddy’s eye. This project features a cranky old lady, and boy do I like writing that POV. Finally, I’m revising a vampire book that is due on Easter. I’m not going to say Jesus was a vampire, but still. He was buried and came to life again on Easter, which seems like the perfect deadline for a vampire novel. Expect an announcement for that project soon, hopefully before the announcement that I’ve been canceled. At least my MIL doesn’t subscribe to this newsletter. She read a page of one of my books once and said, “I can see where Silas gets his creativity.” That’s all she ever needs to know.
Cover reveals aren’t a thing anymore so, I’m just going to unceremoniously drop the E&E cover here. Ten points to whoever can guess what show I was watching when I wrote the physical description of the main character. Along those lines, I drafted the proposal for a YA once while San Andreas was playing in the background. A year later, I noticed that half the characters in the project had names from San Andreas. That’s how subconscious works. You don’t think you’re obsessed with the Rock, but you are.
BOOK REC! Yesterday after I finished my old lady chapter, I rewarded myself with an audible of Jesse Q Sutanto’s Vera Wong’s Unsolicited Advice for Murderers. Jesse Sutanto the queen of naming books, and Vera Wong is brilliant. It’s a satisfying mystery and a deep character study. I’m loving every minute of it.
SIRI, WHO AM I? is on sale through March for $1.99, which is basically free. I promise it’s better than my newsletter.
It’s 2024 and I know I’m pushing the limits of the human attention span, but let’s get to the potatoes.
Here’s a highly rated recipe for boiled potatoes. Do you need a recipe for that? Boil water, add potatoes, cook until soft. Serve with butter, sour cream, salt and pepper, talk about them at length.
Until next time,
Sam