June-ish News & Book Spotlight: The Warm Hands of Ghosts

Hi friends! Welcome to the first actual edition of my short and sweet author newsletter, which I’m now thinking might be more like once every few months because I’m trying to live in reality…

First up: the news

Gotcha! No news right now, just a lot of potential emails that could arrive at any time. Such is publishing!

Next up: something of mine

I was recently reminded that I had a true crime/horror phase… If you’re looking for a short read to pass the time while you’re waiting for your water to boil, I’ve got two pieces available for free, commissioned and published by Truly*Adventurous:

• American Ghosts — Newlyweds move into a house with a secret, violent past rooted in American trauma. The untold story of one of the only purported cases of a supernatural entity being responsible for murder. This one leans more horror, and it’s kind of a wild ride. MK Ultra, anyone?

• Bad Faith at Second Mesa — A pair of opportunistic thieves steal sacred items from the Hopi tribe, and spend 20 years believing they’ve been cursed. A tale of cultural theft and rebuilding in its wake, this one leans more thriller and was actually featured by Longreads!

Finally: my most recent book obsession

I read Katherine Arden’s The Bear and the Nightingale in 2017, and while somehow I never did get around to the next two books in that series, it stayed with me for the lyrical, dreamy writing and dark fairytale vibes.

The Warm Hands of Ghosts (Del Rey, 2024) delivers all that and more — only here, the fairytale is the story about World War I that many North Americans tell ourselves, where it’s just a pale precursor to the Second World War, and Arden bursts that fable almost at once. Brutally.

Following Laura, a Canadian combat nurse, and Freddie, her soldier brother, through the ruined French countryside as Laura searches for the missing Freddie, The Warm Hands of Ghosts is bleak yet gorgeous. For Freddie isn’t just captured, and isn’t just a deserter — his captor (and, in a horribly relatable way, his salvation) is a fey, eldritch figure who might be the Devil himself, come to France to savor the grief and agony of humankind. Love is complicated here, as is memory and courage and everything that sustains us in violent times.

I read this one via audiobook, and both narrators do a fantastic job. Highly recommended. Oh, and bonus, it also features some very tender and compelling relationships, one of which is queer.

Until next time!