August 2026
The Voices in My Head Won't Shut Up (And Other Author Confessions)
Right. Let's start with the actual news, because I promise I haven't forgotten how to write a normal update.
I Knew You When releases on 24th August. That's it. That's the sentence I've been waiting five years to write, and it still doesn't feel entirely real typing it out. Killian and Vanessa are finally, actually, properly coming to meet you all, and I could not be more excited if I tried. I've loved these two for so long that handing them over feels a bit like sending your firstborn off to university, if your firstborn also had a tattoo studio and a decade of emotional baggage.
I'll be celebrating in person too. Chapters and Chai in Stockton-on-Tees on 5th September, tea, cake, and me signing books at a table looking only moderately terrified. Then it's straight up to Jupiter Cloud in Lincoln on 16th September, my first time at that one, so if you're anywhere nearby, please come and say hello, I will absolutely need the moral support.
Now. Onto the bit where I sound completely unhinged.
I need to talk about what it's actually like writing this series, because honestly, nobody warned me it would feel like running a very badly managed call centre inside my own skull.
Right now I'm supposed to be writing Book Two, Keyne and Cass's story. Just them. One story at a time, that's the plan, that's always the plan.
Except Jet keeps barging in.
He will not stop. I'll be mid-scene with Keyne brooding beautifully in a corner somewhere, and suddenly Jet's there going "yeah but ANYWAY, back to ME" and trying to tell me his entire backstory three books early, completely unbothered that it's not his turn yet.
Meanwhile Killian and Vanessa, who I thought I'd finished with, keep quietly reappearing like they've got unfinished business. Nothing dramatic. Just a little knock on the door of my brain every few days going "so, about that second book we might need..."
Cass, bless her, never stops talking. Ever. Not even in my head where I'm meant to be the one in charge. She's just narrating her own life at me constantly, full commentary, and I am simply along for the ride at this point.
And then there's Conor. Quiet as anything. Barely says a word right now, just sort of exists in the background being broody and artistic, which honestly might be worse, because at least when the loud ones talk I know what they want.
I genuinely wish I could type faster. Not for the deadline. For them. Because apparently I've got an entire cast of people living in my head, all wanting their moment, all fighting for airtime, and I'm just one woman with two hands and a laptop trying to give everyone their turn without anyone feeling left out.
I sound completely mad, don't I.
But if you're a writer too, you already know exactly what I mean. And if you're not, well, now you know what's actually happening every time I go quiet and stare at a wall for twenty minutes. I'm not ignoring you. I'm just in a meeting. With people who don't exist. Who won't stop talking.
Anyway. Killian and Vanessa first. Then Cass and Keyne finish their story properly. Then, apparently, whatever Jet's been shouting about this whole time.
One at a time, everyone. I promise you'll all get your turn.
Right, before I go, one more thing.
I have a holiday booked for the end of September, and I need it. Genuinely need it. After all this, the launch, the signings, the voices in my head refusing to queue properly, I am owed a sunbed and a cocktail with an unreasonable amount of fruit in it.
Except knowing me, this won't be a quiet, peaceful, solo escape. I've got a horrible feeling I'm going to end up dragging a fairly large chunk of the St-Ink crew along with me. Because apparently even on holiday, I can't seem to leave any of them behind.
Send help. Or better yet, send sun cream, because it sounds like I'm going to need enough for several people who don't technically exist.
L.J. x
July 2026
Signings, Stockists and Feeling Very Real Right Now
Right. Where do I even start with this one.
I Knew You When is finished. Properly finished. Formatted, polished, ready to go finished. I have been living with Killian and Vanessa for five years and watching them become an actual book that other people are going to hold in their hands is doing something strange to my chest that I don't have better words for than very real.
And it is getting real in other ways too, because I have started saying yes to things I never quite believed I would be invited to. I have a little list of dates building up now, and I still catch myself looking at it like it belongs to someone else.
Here is where you can find me in person:
Chapters & Chai, Stockton-on-Tees — Saturday 5th September, 11am til 2pm. A gorgeous bookshop and tearoom, and I will be signing copies of It's Time over a proper cuppa. If you are anywhere near Stockton, come and say hello.
Jupiter Cloud, Lincoln — Wednesday 16th September. More details to follow, but I am thrilled to be part of it.
Christmas Book Bonanza, Manchester — Saturday 5th December, 12pm til 4pm. A festive pop-up market full of romance authors, so if you are looking for a book-shaped gift this Christmas, this is the place.
Authors Invade England, Exeter — 23rd and 24th July 2027. A whole weekend of it. I am already slightly terrified and enormously excited in equal measure.
I also want to say a proper thank you to the bookshops who have taken a chance on me and put my books on their shelves. The Book Dragon in Stockton-on-Tees, run by the wonderful Michelle, who also happens to be the one organising Chapters & Chai. The Book Corner in Saltburn-by-the-Sea. And the Seagull Trust Bookshop all the way up in Falkirk. Every single one of these is a bookshop that didn't have to say yes, and did anyway. That means more than I can properly put into words.
A good author friend once told me that it doesn't matter how brilliant your book is if nobody ever sees it. Which, brilliant, thank you, very reassuring, I have added it to the pile of things I lie awake thinking about at 2am.
But she wasn't wrong. So I am doing my absolute best to market myself and my books on what I can only describe as a marketing budget of roughly 15 pence and a prayer. There is no glamorous strategy here. There is me, a laptop, and an awful lot of consistency, because consistency is free and apparently that is the whole secret. I am choosing to believe that showing up again and again eventually counts for something, because it has to, because the alternative is that I have been doing all of this for nothing, and I have simply decided that is not an option.
If you had told me a year ago that I would have actual signing dates in my diary and actual shops stocking my actual book, I don't think I would have believed you. I still spend most days waiting for someone to tell me there has been some sort of mistake.
There hasn't been. I checked.
Right. Back to the desk for me, there is a cover reveal coming very soon and I cannot wait to show you.
L.J. Newton 💙
July 2026
Mondays. Love Them or Loathe Them?
Right then. Mondays.
Some people hear that word and immediately want to go back to bed. Some people genuinely, unironically, love a Monday. I am one of those people and I will not apologise for it.
There is something about a Monday morning that gets me. Like someone has flipped a switch and suddenly I have a list, a purpose and enough energy to actually do something about it. By Wednesday I am coasting. By Friday I am running purely on coffee and the vague memory of having had a plan. But Monday? Monday I am unstoppable.
This is significant for me because I live with fibromyalgia, ME/CFS and ADHD. My energy is not exactly predictable at the best of times. Some days getting dressed feels like an achievement and I have learned to celebrate that rather than fight it. But on a good Monday? On a good Monday I could run the world.
I write when I can. That is the honest truth of it. Not when the conditions are perfect, not when I have a dedicated writing room and three uninterrupted hours and a scented candle burning. When I can. Sometimes that is ten minutes with a notebook on the sofa. Sometimes it is a full day at my desk with the garden outside the window and a mug of coffee going cold beside me because I forgot about it.
And English winters are terrible. There. I said it. The constant grey. The rain that never fully stops, just pauses occasionally to build anticipation. The dark at four in the afternoon like someone has pulled a curtain across the whole country and gone to bed early. It is miserable. It really is.
But here is the thing about a terrible English winter. There is absolutely no guilt whatsoever about staying inside with a book or a manuscript and a very large coffee. Winter is actually brilliant for writing. I will not be taking questions.
This week I have been editing my next book. I cannot say too much yet but it is the start of a series and I am genuinely, properly excited about it.
I have also been submitting It's Time to publishers which is equal parts thrilling and absolutely terrifying. Violet and Matty deserve their readers. I am doing my best to find them.
Right. That is enough from me. How is your Monday going?
L.J. Newton 💙
