Joyce
Their Haunted Bodies #1
This was a place of comfort once.
Enveloped in memories and ghosts, my days feel endless, short, repetitive. Time is slippery until Tuesdays—most Tuesdays, anyways. I’ve been called to the cabin to grieve a mother, a body, an ideal love. I’ve escaped for clarity and the deep breath I can’t take anywhere else.
As I settle in, the unexpected finds me. It sneaks in through shattering glass and rustling leaves. It’s seen and unseen, felt and heard and known.
Though the world is dark from where I am now, healing seems possible. If only I can get out onto the lake. If only I’m able to understand the house witch as much as she did. If only I learn the ways of the woods like Dad. If only.
I will speak with the birds. I will become the sky. I will come undone and remake myself. But who will I be on the other side?
Quiet and evocative, Joyce is embodied dark crip magical realism examining life in a haunted body.
Finish it, love it, and share it with your book club! Then grab the Book Club Guide to have a memorable club meeting!
You want to know more about my choices? Visit my recommendation article on BookDNA.
From left to right: 1. Rory rolling on the title and a small bee in pulled honey / 2. A glass bee made by Sarah Walker @ Shadowfire Glass (sarahandjoe8@gmail.com) / 3. The pulled honey living its best life out in the woods on a rainy day. Yes, the birds loved it.
mood board
Credit top to bottom, left to right: 1. @the_reprogrammed.parent / 2. Virginia Woolf / 3. Nick Linden via Unsplash / 4. Maksim Romashkin via Pexels / 5. @oneawkwardmom / 6. @womenwhorunwiththemoon
launch event <3
Top to bottom, left to right: 1. Closeup of fused glass lantern with me reading in the background / 2. Me reading Joyce in public for the first time with the embroidery from the cover behind me / 3. Another side of the fused glass lantern with me reading in the background / 4. Another side of the fused glass lantern close up / 5. Me after a long night with the hubs (Wesley Mitchell) kissing my head / 5. The final side of the fused glass lantern with me reading in the background / 6. The hubs (Wesley Mitchell), a friend, and me laughing / 7. Erin Hall, a friend, me, Rose Wilde Hall, Angelique O'Rourke | *named people are authors I've published in anthologies—check em out
