Hello book-reading friends!

Thank you for your support last week. I'm still struggling against being sad and overwhelmed by how much AI book-factories are overwhelming the market, plus the general state of the world.... BUT, I have a cover reveal and a puppy story for you, so I will forge ahead!

First of all...

One quick test to see if you're looking at a bot-generated books:

If you're browsing Amazon, Hoopla, etc, here's a suggestion to see if an unfamiliar authors is a human or a bot factory. Open a new tab in your browser and do a web search with the author's name, including "author" or "books" if it's a common name.

(I used to say "do a Google search" but I have switched away from Google because of their intrusive AI use. I now use Duck Duck Go, which is much like Google used to be, but more clear with their privacy and policies.)

Real humans will have a web presence. You'll see web results with their Instagram or other social pages, a web site, links to interviews or articles that mention them. You might get a mention of when their college basketball team won a tournament or when they were in the corner of a newspaper photograph about the mayor.

The bot-factory pen names will have nothing but lists of their books. The big companies are getting around the "tells" from a few months ago by using a ton of pen names, but since these are not people or even people using pen names, they don't have any other presence.

That's all it takes — you don't have to click any links — but if you want to, click or preview the Instagram page to see the bio. Many human authors are putting this symbol right up front: "🚫AI".

This isn't foolproof and it doesn't tell you if a writer uses AI tools, but the results have been pretty stark. Again, I've been primarily looking at books that show up in my own list of also-boughts, so I know these are real consumers who are interested in my stories. If you want to read books generated by a marketing team at a huge corporation, that is your own choice, but from what I'm hearing, most people dislike being duped. So that's my suggestion for what's working recently.

Take care of yourselves...

My husband currently has the flu and I know of 3-8 other households who have come down with it this week. It seems to be a super early flu season this year. Take care of yourselves, and here's your reminder to schedule your vaccine appointment if you don't already have one!

If you need to retreat into a book...

One of you replied to my email with the excellent suggestion that the best way to recover from real-world difficulties is to retreat into a book, and I could not agree more. A couple that I have enjoyed are:
Cozy fantasy: Bubbies Book of Odd Little Tales and The Tea Shop at the Edge of the Woods (available wide)

Character-driven Regency romance: Miss Delancey's Tragicomedy and The Trick of It.

And my next book in The Bonnet Brigade series is coming out in just under a month!!! I've turned in my final-final, but really-final edits, and it's now off to proof-reading and out of my hands. Eeeek!!!

I've done a teaser with a blurry cover photo, but here's the cover in all its glory! I think it's BEAUTIFUL and I'm so excited to share it with you!!!

The official blurb isn't out yet and the pre-order link isn't up, so I'll share more with you when it comes. But here's some sneak tidbits just for you all....

• This book follows Celia and Peter after their rushed marriage in The Bonnet Brigade. It can be read as a stand-alone, but even better to sink into the same story for two whole books!

• My editor and I called the first one "Celia's book" and this one "Peter's book." Finally, Peter can't keep running faster than his secrets.

• The friendship between Peter and Leavenworth drives this story. If you wanted more Leavenworth... here he is.

• Do you love house and setting as character? This is set in a ramshackle mansion in the wild and windy downs of north England. The house was always a main character, but after traveling around Durham, the history, language, and landscape lodged themselves in my heart and came out in the story.

• I adore the "he rescues her... but she rescues him" variation on the trope. I have it in both my romantic fairy tales. You know how Peter saved the day in the dark garden in The Bonnet Brigade... so you know whose turn it is in this story.

Read The Bonnet Brigade

It has come to my attention...WHOOSH!!!!

....that I am trying to fit too many sheep into my newsletter. Or maybe words.

Either way, that blur was Malin running past and dividing the next announcements into the next newsletter, so this one can fit through the newsletter-sized gates in your inboxes. Look out, here comes a straggler!

Click on the image to get some free historical romance and mysteries..... and listen, I'm bummed how many of these covers are AI, but there's some really good authors in there, like Emily EK Murdoch and Mary Lancaster.

Coming soon (woof woof)

The story about baby Sálie and her bossy brother ("That's me!" —Malin) and the update on naming the estate. I still need your help!

Happy reading,

Christy & the Shelties

"Hey! Are you gonna buy my mom's books? They're really yummy!"