Even fantasy heroines get excited about new jobs

I saw a great TikTok recently where @dnlfoxx pretends to be an evil supervillain’s charming gay assistant. I love the juxtaposition of something dreadfully serious like an evil madman designing a rocket that will destroy the sun and the behind-the-scenes support staff who pick up the cape from the dry cleaners in time for the United Nations ransom demand video. 

The man working at the fish hatchery isn’t thinking how absurd it is to be a fluffer for trout but about how to get a promotion when the fish and wildlife department approves the budget for a new director. The woman working in the crematorium isn’t thinking about how she is literally burning people for a paycheck, she’s wondering who’s going to cover her shift when she goes on maternity leave. No matter how strange our day job, it usually feels normal to us.

Characters in novels often don’t have jobs, unless their job is important to the plot, such as “police detective” or “charming B&B owner.” But in real life, our jobs matter. A job is to life what sex is to a marital relationship. If it’s going well, it’s 20% of our attention. If it’s not going well, it’s 80%. If you’ve ever been unemployed or underemployed, you know the constant worry about where you're going get money can be as distracting as hunger. 

I read from Vampire’s Dayrunner at a convention once. It was the scene where Kit and Mr. Hall are finding that the wards around Holzhausen’s house have been tampered with. Someone in the audience commented on the hilarity of being the Vampire Guild Leader’s personal assistant. This baffled me at the time, because I had been thinking of it from Kit’s point of view. When Kit got her job as Dayrunner to Holzhausen, I wasn’t thinking of the humor potential of being an evil supervillian’s personal assistant, I was thinking of the thrill I had when I was a young woman and got my first REAL JOB. I’d had jobs before, but the job I got teaching English in Japan was a REAL JOB that I thought might lead to an actual adult career. I wore professional clothes. I had a salary and benefits. I took the train to monthly business meetings. And most amazing of all, I was finally earning enough money to support myself. It seemed just as magical as having a crow familiar or seeing a cadborosaurus in the river.

You don’t have to have read Witch’s Jewel or Dryad’s Blade for Vampire’s Dayrunner to make sense. I despise cliffhangers, so I promise that every book I write will be a complete story from beginning to end. Vampire’s Dayrunner isn’t the beginning of Kit’s story, but it’s the beginning of one of her stories. It’s when she starts to become financially stable, she becomes seriously involved in vampire politics, and she first kills someone. The story of her working for the Vampire Guild begins with Vampire's Dayrunner and ends with Vampire's Pawn, but I promise that her new stories of becoming a more powerful witch as she hones her craft in rural Washington State will be just as action-packed. And I hope that there are aspects of her life that resonate with your own.

Fate Bound

Angels that walked away from Heaven. A werewolf of English nobility, forced to leave his life of privilege behind. An Amazon and leprechaun policing the supernatural in a mundane world. A child shall bind their fates. (Review copy)

Midnight Kiss

There are three rules all witches should follow: Never reveal your wicked nature to a human. Never cast magic against your own. And never, absolutely never, fall in love with a vampire. I ignored them all. Now hell’s broken loose, and the people I love are in danger. I will fight, broom and cauldron, to save them. (Kindle Unlimited, Hardcover)

All New SF&F

Strange & Surreal Stories

Gratuitous Cat Photo

Hades waits expectantly for me to throw a cat toy so he can play fetch.