Jane Bailey

Updates from 2020

Tue, 01 Dec 2020 00:00:00 -0600

First things first: I have (so far) survived the pandemic! I did become ill quite early on, but I recovered. It’s been a hectic year for me; my day job ramped up production on something so big it started taking over my evenings and weekends, which is a big problem for a part-time writer who relies on those times to be able to get things done. I have taken a new position that will hopefully be much easier to deal with, and so hope to have time to complete some projects in the near future that have been on hold for a few months.

(Several months. Time feels like it has no meaning anymore, doesn’t it, friends?)

But I’m afraid that’s not the whole story. You see, 2020 has been generally such a draining year, my creativity has truly suffered for it. I’ve been struggling to put together simple outlines and come up with the sort of complex, innovative characters that I know you’ve come to expect from me. My Patreon has been dormant; my novels have not budged an inch in wordcount; I did not participate in any way in NaNoWriMo this year. Only my fanfiction has moved, and that only because it’s a joint project so I was able to lean on my fellow author in order to get words written.

In short, this has been a terrible year for creative works. Just terrible.

But fear not! I am writing to you from the edge of the silver lining, beginning to see the sun peak through the clouds. I am currently taking a vacation between jobs, and I’ve been able to complete one secret project and begin to shop it around for a traditional publisher. That means it’s time to get back to writing the novels I love, the ones you’ve come to expect from me. I promised I’d finish out the triology I started with Wolfbound, and I will – but first I want to write a sequel to The Hunt, because that’s where I feel I have something useful to say.

Please bear with me while I make some renovations around here. The main site layout isn’t changing, but I’ve updated my About page to reflect the fact that, in my real life, outside of this pen name, I am nonbinary. I have always seen Jane as a female persona, but as I begin to look more and more masculine in my outside life, I find I do not wish to play at being a cis woman any longer in any capacity. So I have changed my pronouns on this site to they/them, just like I use in everyday life. I hope you can understand the impulse to be more honest and forthcoming about my gender, even if it means I have to be left off some “women writer” lists in the future.

Stay safe, and above all, be well, my friends. And thank you for being here through this tough time!

Update on the steampunk novel

Sun, 05 May 2019 00:00:00 -0500

My goodness, it’s been quite some time, hasn’t it? I hope you’ve been well. I earnestly, honestly, hope you’ve found some solace, some joy, some comfort in the time we’ve been apart. The world can be a difficult, awful place, but sometimes hope is all we have to cling to.

I want to speak about my novel, the steampunk novel I’ve been working on for the better part of five years. I have tried before, many times, but each time I have stopped, have deleted the post. I cannot speak of the novel without speaking of myself, of the things that have been happening to me in the years since my last blog post. This post will be personal, and it will be political, and it will be long. But I owe it to myself and to all of you to speak. Better late than never, right my lovelies?

The novel

Let me begin by ripping off the bandage: I do not feel that the novel I have been writing, outlining, worldbuilding, is viable. I do not believe the novel I have been working on will see the light of day. Some novel might, and the worldbuilding is solid enough that I wish to use it in a future project, but the novel I have been working on is no longer one I can see myself publishing.

The problem is race.

As some of you may know, I am mixed; I consider myself Black, but I was raised primarily by my white parent, in schools primarily filled with white children, in a town primarily composed of white people. I was raised cut off from my Black roots, taught to act and think and feel as though I were White. I was taught many racist things about my own Black people, and I have been doing the hard work of un-learning them, of coming to know myself as a Black person. To many of my white readers, this won’t make much sense; if you’re asking yourself now what the difference is, what this matters, I encourage you to do some searching yourself. The myth of whiteness hurts white people, cuts us off from our true cultural heritage and substitutes White Supremacy in its place.

When I began outlining the novel, it was about a white woman. It was about feminism, it was about suffrage, but it was about a white woman coming of age in America in the 1800s. The plot would feel comfortable, familiar: a young white woman being pressured to marry a man she had no feelings for, rebelling against her parents, learning to stand on her own two feet and rebel against the patriarchy, taking on a leadership role in the effort to give women political power.

But it was set in America, and that means I had to grapple with the specter of Slavery.

I didn’t want to leave people in bondage, even fictional people. And so, as I crafted my alternate history, I freed the slaves sooner, shortly after the Haitian uprising. I decided to use the social upheaval of the ending of slavery as a backdrop for the novel. But the novel was still about a white woman. The plot didn’t make sense to be about a black woman, because there was no generational wealth being handed down among those in bondage. And that didn’t sit right with me. Why not? The more interesting story would be that of a newly freed slave, not of a young white woman.

I re-imagined the novel as a split perspective: the comfortable, familiar coming-of-age story would share time with the more difficult stories of a black woman, of an Indian veteran. Both these protagonists would be disillusioned with Capitalism, with the Imperialist machine, with the world that used them for their bodies and abandoned them once it was no longer politically expedient to use them. I began writing; each time I wrote a segment of Evangeline’s story, I found myself bored, listless. I could not write the fluffy, familiar piece, the piece about a white woman learning to come to terms with her society. It’s been done before, so many times.

So I decided to drop her story. I would focus on the more interesting plot lines. But I find myself adrift. I wish to write something like this, at some point in the future. But I am struggling to begin when I cannot envision the ending.

The Darkness

I write novels with happy endings. While things get dark, perhaps darker than many would like, I need that happy ending to soothe away the darkness inside myself, and I refuse to withhold it from my readers. But the problems my protagonists are grappling with are problems I myself grapple with: how do you find happiness in a world that hates you for who and what you are? How do you come together and fight back when the machine is so much bigger and stronger than you are? How do you unlearn things you’ve been taught since you were small, and still come out some semblance of the same person you were?

But beyond that, beyond the technical struggles, I’ve been struggling in other ways.

I have always been prone to bouts of depression. I am a self-harm survivor, an eating disorder survivor, a suicide survivor. When I am in my black moods, when I struggle to see the light at the end of the tunnel, sometimes I can write, but nothing I feel comfortable putting out there as mine. Often I cannot write at all.

In 2017, in the wake of the US Presidential Election, I entered a dark mood that did not lift. I was able to do the editing I needed to complete on HeartBeats, and I thought that with time and self-care I would be able to begin on FrostBurn in short order, so I said nothing, focused on my mental health, and waited for the storm to pass.

In 2018, I lost the ability to put out the short pieces I had been doing on my Patreon. I simply could not force myself to focus long enough to write a piece I felt happy with. I had no motivation. It was taking me over an hour to get out of bed in the morning; I simply set my alarm for earlier so I got to work on time, without a word to those around me. I spent most of my weekends listlessly sitting on the couch, watching television. I went to therapy every other week like clockwork, but while I learned a lot about myself, while I did much growing and digging, the motivation didn’t return.

A couple months ago I spoke to a psychiatrist about antidepressants. She prescribed me medication to control my anxiety – as it turns out, you’re not meant to be anxious all the time, constantly fretting over one thing or another. Anxiety unchecked can cause depression, as it saps your energy just holding back the mental demons long enough to get anything done, leaving you feeling empty and exhausted at the end of the day. Anxiety also interrupts your sleep, making it hard to get that energy back overnight.

I’m not back to my usual self yet, but I can feel the changes already. We’re still working to find the exact mix of drugs that will help me tame the anxiety without leaving me sapped of motivation – as it turns out, anxiety may have been the reason I was able to force myself to publish things before, when I was depressed but still struggling to move forward. It feels like learning to walk all over again: I have to understand who I am, how I prefer to function, when what I thought was myself was actually mental illness.

There’s more to this story. But I’m not ready to speak of most of it yet. So instead, I will say that I hope to be able to write again soon. My Patreon charges by the piece, not by the month, so if you sign up now, you won’t be charged until I’m able to produce again. I’ve been working on collaborative fanfiction while I’ve been recovering, which has been a wonderful way to exercise my writing muscles and keep in shape, though I haven’t felt right charging my patrons for that work. And I’ve been aiding other writers, editing work my husband has been producing. I envision a reinvention in the near future; the future I am beginning to understand for myself looks very different than the future I envisioned some three years ago when I launched this site and my Patreon. I refuse to not publish FrostBurn, because my audience deserves an ending to the story that began with Wolfbound, but the future may not hold many novels. It may hold video projects and short stories and things stranger and more wonderful than I can go into right now. Please be patient with me while I figure this out.

I love you, readers. Thank you for your support during this time. Please take care of yourselves.

HeartBeats available for preorder!

Mon, 13 Feb 2017 00:00:00 -0600

Happy valentine’s day! I hope you spend it with someone you love – even if that means yourself, because you should love yourself, you’re awesome :)

In fact, you’re so awesome I got you a present: the sequal to Wolfbound is finally up for preorder! You can find it here.

Happy reading!

Writing with Fibromyalgia

Fri, 13 Jan 2017 00:00:00 -0600

I don’t think I’ve talked about it here before, but I have fibromyalgia, a chronic pain and fatigue disorder.

You know, it’s funny. When I look back at Wolfbound, my debut novel, I could see the signs all over it of exactly what was wrong with me. Eileen has fatigue, she has pain, but she has a tangible reason why: it dates back to a car accident she was involved in some years ago that has fully healed but never stopped hurting. In fact, when I did my “stealth” second edition, I adjusted a few details to make them ring more true to those of my readers who share my disease – details I embellished originally because I thought the facts I lived with would never sound realistic to readers. Eileen at least can point to a car accident; I had no idea why I was in pain, and I wrote my novel to help take my mind off it while I figured it out.

It’s hard. Many of you know I work full-time as well as writing; I want an active livestyle, but I have a body that just can’t comply. I spend a lot of time at home, relaxing with my favorite people and wishing I felt well enough to go out. I take each day as it comes, adjusting my schedule to suit my physical condition, and I keep learning about how I can manage my condition so I can maximize the good days.

I don’t write today just to complain. I am often tempted to stay silent about my struggles because I don’t want people to think I’m having a pity party or anything. But the truth is, there’s millions of people living with this condition every day, and it’s rarely talked about. Maybe some of you bought my book because Eileen’s life resonated with you, or maybe you discovered something true about yourself reading about her and you weren’t sure why. By speaking out, maybe I can help someone get the help they need.

New story starting in January!

Sun, 25 Dec 2016 00:00:00 -0600

Merry Christmas! I got you all a gift this year: a new web serial starting January 3rd. Updates will be scheduled weekly: Tuesdays at 8am eastern time. You can subscribe now with RSS to avoid missing a single episode.

Gaslight Gunslinger is a collection of short stories by Jane Bailey. It takes place in a steampunk version of the United States of America, circa 1890. This is an alternate history story, so you may find setting details to be a little different than your average Western…

2016 Election

Mon, 07 Nov 2016 00:00:00 -0600

I won’t go into politics here, campaigning for one side or the other, but I did want to say two quick things about the election for my American readers.

Number one: Please go vote. I know that for many people, getting to the polling place and casting your ballot causes a real hardship, but if it is at all feasible for you, please cast your vote this year. If you need help getting to the polls, please visit drive2vote.org for help. This election, more so than any other in my lifetime, is a definitive moment in American history, a moment where America has to choose between values that it holds dear and determine which is more dear. It is a difficult decision, and one that everyone has to make for themselves. It may be tempting to fail to choose at all, and instead remain home on election day. Please resist the temptation. America was built on the principle of representative democracy, and if you do not vote, you will not be represented in this monumental election.

Number two: Dear readers, please take care of yourselves. I know this year has been rough. There has been a lot of nasty rhetoric in all directions. At this point, no matter what your path through life has been, nor what your political affinity might be, you have probably been putting up with some terrible garbage for some time now. After tomorrow, the election will be over. We all should take some time to rest, to do whatever it is that brings your soul some peace and happiness, to restore ourselves spiritually and emotionally. Be kind to yourself, and be kind to each other.

And above all else, please be safe.

Nano 2016

Tue, 01 Nov 2016 00:00:00 -0500

Happy NaNoWriMo everyone!

This is the first year I won’t be participating. This was a hard decision for me. I love NaNo; I love the festival atmosphere, the feeling of togetherness, the comraderie. I love the message boards where you can get an instant answer to any question. I love the community, the comic strip, the fact that it helps so many people. But I don’t really love participating. The pressure to write daily, the constant sense of falling further and further behind, really doesn’t do it for me. I start to feel meloncholy, looking at how far I have to go rather than what I was able to achieve.

It’s no secret I have a dayjob. On top of that, I do costuming, conventions, and writing for TheDailyWTF. I don’t have time to write every day like I’d want to. And that’s okay! I get plenty done when I’m able to set aside 3-hour blocks two or three times a week. I could probably win NaNo doing that: writing a few thousand words every couple days instead of a steady amount daily. But I’ve chosen not to try.

I have a lot of exciting things coming up. HeartBeats has completed its second draft, and is ready for the final polishing round; I’ll be debuting the cover design soon. My next project is starting to really shape up nicely, and I’ll be ready to talk about that soon. I’m excited about what the future holds for me. I hope you are too!

And if you’re competing in NaNo this year, good luck! My heart is with you, even if my hands aren’t.

Audiobooks

Wed, 12 Oct 2016 00:00:00 -0500

Hello my lovelies! What have you been reading lately?

I’ve been getting into audio more and more this year. My husband and I sometimes carpool, and we have very different tastes in music. While working on costuming, instead of listening to my usual music, one day he suggested we listen to this thing called Nightvale. “It’s free, and it’s supposed to be really cool, everyone we know seems to like it.”

“Is it scary?” I asked, looking over the website.

“I don’t know. Not very, I think,” he added, citing one of our friends who doesn’t like horror and yet likes the show.

It was broad daylight, a sunny spring afternoon, so I said, “sure, we can try an episode.”

Friends, if you have not heard the dulcet tones of Cecil Baldwin, you are missing out. His voice is like an auditory caress, and the story is compelling, without being too horrific. It’s a playful sort of horror, almost a pastiche. Things just, you know, happen that way in Nightvale. It’s nothing to be concerned about.

We started listening in the car when we carpooled, and I got hooked. Since then, I have listened to the entire archive of Nightvale, plus all of the first season of Alice Isn’t Dead (scarier than Nightvale but not by a lot), and I’m only a little behind on Within The Wires (I was afraid this one would be body horror, but it’s not). The trouble with catching up on something, as those of you who like to binge-watch probably know, is that you run out eventually. The slow drip-feed of twice-monthly updates feels like nothing compared to opening the faucet of the archives.

So I bought a few audiobooks on Audible. When I’m alone, I listen to Writing Excuses, so I was already familiar with Mary Robnette Kowal (who also has a lovely voice); furthermore, I quite adore the works of Seanan McGuire, and my husband had yet to start reading her October Daye series. So it seemed like an obvious fit: listen to the books in the car, narrated by a voice I like and written by an author I admire.

There’s something different about experiencing a book in audio form vs reading it. I learned to speed-read early, and often I have to read books in small bits and pieces on my phone, slurping up a chapter during a bathroom break or in the waiting room of a doctor’s office. Listening to the book forces you to slow down and really take in the small details that might have been overlooked. Listening to the first book in a series you’ve read many times can therefore open some of its secrets to you that you may have missed the first time through. Now I want to buy all my favorites in audiobook format and listen to them on plane trips, when I can sit and just bask in the writing.

So anyway, that’s my recommendation: Nightvale, and Rosemary and Rue.

What do you guys recommend I listen to? Tweet me at @janebaileybooks with your suggestions.

New covers!

Mon, 08 Aug 2016 00:00:00 -0500

You guys.

You GUYS.

I have the best news ever.

A few weeks ago I got together with a very talented cover artist to design a cover for my upcoming book Heartbeats. Now, don’t get too excited, the first draft isn’t done yet, but I wanted to go ahead and spring for a cover to help motivate me to finish it. And while we were designing that cover, we decided to redesign the covers for The Hunt and Wolfbound to match. The covers I had put together years ago were pretty amateur, to be honest, and I’d been meaning to have them redone now that I have an actual budget for these sorts of things.

These covers are so amazing, y’all! Beyond my wildest dreams. I’m very pleased to be able to reveal them now:

Aren’t they GORGEOUS you guys?! I love how defensive Eileen looks, and how sad and yet somehow inquisitive John comes off as. I also love how despite having the same sort of general concept (canine in a forest) they each are unique to the book. One of the early drafts of the Wolfbound cover kept the snow concept from the old cover, but we decided it really fit John’s story more, so we removed it in a later draft. Don’t you just love the snowflake logo though?!

Anyway, I’m super jazzed about Heartbeats now. It’ll be months and months before it’s ready to show you all, but it’ll be well worth the wait.

New Q&A up!

Wed, 13 Jul 2016 00:00:00 -0500

I’ve posted a Q&A that goes into some of my favorite things and a little about my writing process. Check it out!