The Hunting Moon is in stores!
#ChooseWithSooz updates
Still on tourâplus, DenNerds meetup!
Witchlight sneak peek đ
1. The Hunting Moon is in stores!
Itâs wild to think I have one more book out this week. Thatâs eleven, yâall. ELEVEN.
Also, I got to do an event with one of my most favorite authors of ALL TIME, Megan Whalen Turner.1 That is just wild to my brain. It canât comprehend that not only am I an author, but I got to hang out and share a stage with one of my writing heroes.
Itâs been an amazing week.
I was so, so worried last year before the release of The Luminaries. It was the first time I was launching a new series in 6 years, and the pressure felt unmanageably huge. I do not look back at fall of 2022 with happiness, but only terror. Poor Sooz.
Fortunately, the good(?) thing about having your daughter almost die and then learn she has chronic illness that requires daily management is that you stop giving a single solitary turd about the success of your book!
Like, Iâm over here trying to keep my daughter alive! Sure, I want my books to âperform to expectations,â but alsoâŚI am literally trying to keep my daughter alive. And meet deadlines to keep us housed and pay her medical bills.
Perspective, right?
All of this is to say that I am so, so grateful to you all for supporting me through this really tough yearâand for buying my book to support me when I canât go all-in on promo like I used to.
And I think that because I havenât been clutching the âsuccessâ of this book so tightly and stressing under the weight of âperformance expectations,â Iâve had the emotional space to actually ENJOY my release to the fullest.
Tour has been an absolute BLAST so far. Release day was a total delightâeven with a few (inevitable) nasty reviews thrown my way đâand Iâm just having the greatest time this week.
So thank you for being a part of that. Youâre amazing, and I owe you all so much.
2. Latest #ChooseWithSooz Updates
Because of release week, I had to do some other videos to start. So Iâve shared those and the #UghJay polls below!
#ChooseWithSooz Part 34 (vote today!)
3. Still on tourâcome see me!
I will be at YALLFest today and tomorrow, then at Brave + Kind in Atlanta on Monday! With the amazing Mark Oshiro!
And we have a set time + location for our DenNerds Meetup at YALLFest! Check that below!
Hereâs the schedule!
FRIDAY, NOVEMBER 10: YALLFest
Fierce Friday
2:30 PM, Charleston Museum â Courtyard
SATURDAY, NOVEMBER 11: YALLFest
đ¨DenNerds Meetup!! Donât miss! đ¨
9:00AM Kudu Coffee
Fall in Love with Books
12:00 PM, Charleston Museum â Courtyard
The Where (Crafting Setting): Writers on Writing
1:00 PM, American Theater â Ballroom
Gotta Have a POV: Telling Stories from Multiple Viewpoints
3:00 PM, American Theater â Cinema
SIGNING
4:00 PM, American Theater
MONDAY, NOVEMBER 13: Brave + Kind Bookshop
Brave + Kind NaNoWriMo Writers Meet Up
6:00 PM, Learn more here!SIGNING with Mark Oshiro
7:00 PM, Get your ticket here!
4. Witchlight Sneak Peek
I realize Iâm meant to be promoting The Hunting Moon, but Iâm so deep in Witchlight modeâŚI canât help but want to share a snippet!
Plus, what better way to thank you for your support than to give you a sneak peek of whatâs to come?!
So hereâs a meaty chunk of the first chapter from Iseult. While Iâve self-edited this, I havenât yet had developmental edits with my Tor Teen editor, so all parts are subject to change!
Iseult det Midenzi knelt over the dying man. He had been fine two days ago, his wife said, but now he had these shadowy lines across his body. Please, are you the one who heals the Cleaved? Please, can you help him?
Iseult couldnât help him.
She had tried. Since dawn, when the woman had first found her at the imperial hunting lodge, Iseult had tried to weave this manâs Threads back into life as she had done with the Hell-Bards. Living, living, breath and living. Threads that heal, Threads thatâs thrive. But she hadnât been able to. His Threads wouldnât respond.
It made no sense. She should be able to control these Threads. She should be able to heal this slowly cleaving man. Yet it was as if, by destroying Corlant, the very nature of cleaving had changed. Gone was the quick, vicious death that bubbled up from the core and burned a person from the inside out, magic turned molten and cruel. Now it was this agonizing thing that crept over a person for days, slowly sucking the life from them.
It was horrible to witness, and Iseult hated that she could do nothing. That none of her tools as a Weaverwitch could stop what the Moon Mother had decided must be.
âIseult,â Safi whispered, dropping to a kneel beside her. âYouâre exhausted. You need to stop.â
âI c-canât.â Her hands trembled as she wove them throughâagainâthe manâs Threads. Here were the ones that bound him to his wife and his three daughters. Here were the ones that bound him to his work as a carpenter. And here were the Severed Threads eating him alive. Why couldnât Iseult heal them?
She could touch them, braiding them through her fingers like strands of burning silk. They seared against her scarred hands, as Severed Threads always did, except now they wouldnât respond to any of the usual tactics. Which meant now she was going to have to turn to this manâs wife and say, âIâm sorry. Iâm so, so sorry.â
It was the third person in as many days Iseult hadnât been able to healâand the fourth person in a week whoâd had no magic but had begun cleaving all the same. Why?
âCome,â Safi repeated, and this time, she gripped Iseultâs elbow, gentle but unrelenting, and forced her to rise. Iseult didnât fight her Threadsister; there was no point, and Safi was right: she was exhausted.
âI will come back tomorrow,â Iseult told the wife, an empty promise because returning tomorrow wouldnât save this man. But at least it gave the woman hope. At least it made her feel like someone cared enough to do something. âKeep him warm and make him drink as much water as you can.â
âThank you,â the woman replied. The lines around her mouth and eyes were stark with exhaustion and fear. And with love too, for the Threads that bind leave deep marks.
Yet as the woman offered Iseult a sack of coarse flour, Iseult spotted the one thing sheâd been so relieved to not yet see: faint lines within the womanâs weathered hands. They followed her veins, and were it not for Iseultâs magicâher constant connection to Threads and the corruption that can work inside themâshe would never have noticed. But she did see, she did recognize, and her heart broke for the second time that day.
It was spreading. This slow, incurable cleaving was spreading, and Iseult did not know what to do.
âTh-thank you,â she murmured to the woman before her weak grasp on stasis could give her away. Then she hurried with Safi away from the womanâs waddle-walled hovel.
They mounted their horses, a chestnut and a gray, and set off into the gray afternoon. The day had passed while Iseult bowed over that carpenter. A wasted day with no one saved or healed.
Her throat ached. Her tongue felt fat behind her teeth.
âThe w-wife is cleaving too,â she said once they had left the small village behind. Snow dusted the road, hiding potholes along the edges. Knowing Safi, she would send Hell-Bards tomorrow to fix those holes because, even if she kept saying she was not empress, Safi couldnât seem to quite let the responsibilities go.
It had been four weeks since she had taken full control as Empress of Cartorra. They were calling it a military coup in Praga, and already domnas and doms gathered to oppose her. Little good it would do them. Many of the Hell-Bard forces backed her, and although they were no longer bound to a Loom or impervious to magic, they were still the most elite soldiers in all the Witchlands.
What had surprised Iseult, thoughâsomething she hadnât expected in her short time after Pragaâwas that Emperor Henrick was putting up no fight. He was resigned to his fate, and whenever Iseult saw him, his Threads were saturated with stark blue relief.
And Iseult saw him often because Safi consulted him often. He knew more about the Cartorran Empire than anyone, save perhaps Safiâs uncle Eron fon Hasstrel, and Henrick willingly answered all questions when Safi plied them at him in the imperial hunting lodge.
Thousands arrived each day to the lodge, Hell-Bards and soldiers summoned from the capital, servants and nobility Safi âs magic told her could be trusted, and of course, the necessary craftsman that would follow wherever large crowds went.
Including the carpenter whom Iseult was going to have to watch slowly die, along with his wife who would soon be joining him.
And there you have it, my dear, dear readers. ANOTHER BOOK OUT IN THE WORLD! Thirteen years in publishing, and Iâm still hereâwhich means my goal for longevity is going strong so far.
I wrap up my tour next Tuesday, then the pre-order campaign live workshop is on November 18! See you then, dear readers!
đ - Sooz
Please read her books. Seriously. Especially if you enjoy the Witchlands. The Thief is more middle grade, but book 2, Queen of Attolia, is fully YAâŚand the romance. THE ROMANCE.
I am very proud of this reel, haha. I saw the trending track âLuminaryâ and just HAD to make something. And I love how it turned out. đ
I am soooo glad that tour is going well, and very jealous that I wasnât able to see you and MWT who you turned me into and I adore and it would have been so satisfying to get to see you two chat!I am delighted I got to see you at Neshaminy, and THT FREAKINF SNIPPET SOOZ đđđ
Eleven books! I can't believe it. (That explains why I look around my shelves, and there's Sooz books scattered around.) AND MORE TO COME.
That Witchlight snippet đ