Between the Pages 2025: Third Edition

September 2025 | Quarterly Update

Prologue

Welcome, readers, to the third edition of 2025’s quarterly updates!

For those who are reading for the first time, this blog update is intended to talk about my latest writing projects and what I’m planning for the next quarter. While I tend to focus primarily on the writing aspect of things, I also highlight some of the non-writing activities I’ve been up to.

Lets get to it!

On the Page: A Progress Report

For the bulk of the last three months, I’ve spent some time working on two separate projects. One is in my typical genre of fantasy, focusing on the story of a dragon rider named Eden, her dragon Jynx, and a little rebellion that they and their allies have gotten mixed up into (working title: EDEN). I’m currently on pause for this draft and its sitting at around 35k words. I’m not sure when I’ll be jumping back into it, but where it is currently at feels more like a “zero” draft than a first draft, in that its a lot of vibes with a loose frame of a plot.

The second is a contemporary romance, similar to another draft I’ve previously written (if I take either of these further toward publication, I can see them as companion novels in a series). This specific manuscript follows a book blogger named Katy and a professional video gamer named Aleks and their budding romance over a summer in Norway. The working title for this one is Imparadise, which is an inside nod for myself to my prior contemporary romance manuscript. This one, too, is on pause a bit since summer is coming to a close and sits around 45k, though I can see myself finishing this zero/first draft up at 50k sooner than later before taking a more lengthy break to work on something different.

The reason I’ve put both of these projects on pause is because of something that is exciting (at least it is for me). Right when mid-August hit, I picked up Bunnies, Beds, & Breakfast (BB&B) for another full editing pass. If you’ve been around, you may recall I drafted BB&B over the course of 2-3 weeks last summer and that I’ve been struggling to dive back into it fully since my initial editing pass last fall.

Well, I did it. I went through from start to finish, made edits and adjustments and minor tweaks. And I’ve begun the next, anxiety-inducing step of the process: I’m querying this manuscript.

I’m only doing a small batch to start. Last week I sent about five queries, and I’m going to leave it at that for a week or two before sending another batch, then set myself up to wait by turning to the next project (or returning to a prior one). This is my second manuscript that I’m taking a go at querying for, and while I’m expecting a slew of rejections (my first manuscript that I queried only got rejections, unfortunately), I can still see myself pursuing other routes of publication for this novel if the traditional route doesn’t pan out.

I will be talking about BB&B on my socials more, though I’m sure it feels like I’ve been pretty absent in those spheres lately (I have been). The thing about this is that I don’t thrive as a content creator. Making content for the internet saps my creative energy and makes it harder for my brain to do the writing thing. I have noted proof of this being true for myself, and that’s just how it is. I’d rather write a book than spend the equivalent energy trying (and likely failing) to go viral.

On the Page: Upcoming Projects

Other than my querying with BB&B, I am not entirely certain what my next writing project is going to be. I have a handful of ideas that I’ve noted down that I could expand upon into potential stories, but as of this moment, I cannot say which I might pursue.

I have one specific idea for a new project. Its very much in the early stages of brainstorming, but right now its something like Frieren: Beyond Journey’s End meets Howl’s Moving Castle (the movie, not the book, as I have regrettably not yet read the book – something I may need to remedy in the near future). Right now all I have for this project is a vibe and a few lines of overarching plot thoughts. I’d want to spend a few days at least working out an actual outline before attempting to draft, though, as I think it will be more complex of a story from the get-go than I typically start with.

Until then, I might do something a little crazy like take a few weeks off of actually writing. I write pretty consistently, operating on a Monday through Friday schedule, only taking a day here or there during the week when my husband has time off or if there is a holiday. So it might be good to do a bit of a refresh and let my brainstorming brain do its thing for a bit before I jump headlong into the next thing. We’ll see!

Off the Page: Books, Music & Games

The Bookshelf

I’ve already over 80 books this year, which might be my personal record for a single year if I remember correctly, so below I’ll list my top reads of the last few months rather than list out every single title I’ve read. If you’d be interested more specifically in the books I’m reading, you can also check out my StoryGraph page.

For television, my husband and I have gotten through the second season of Apothecary Diaries and have been enjoying the first season of Witch Watch. Other than those two animes, I haven’t spent very much time in front of the TV – though, of course, I have watched K-POP Demon Hunters several times and have been blasting the album on loop.

Off the Page: “Extracurricular”

As always, I’d like to report some of the non-book and media related activities I’ve partaken in because, though it may not always appear so, my life doesn’t revolve entirely around books.

I’ve been keeping up with my running as I’m training for a full marathon that’s coming up in October. I recently took a few days off to rest a minor injury, and running has felt really good since I started back up. So, I think that brief respite was a really good idea ahead of this final training segment leading up to the big run next month.

I’ve gotten really into gardening over the summer. Unfortunately, my garden has had some hits and misses. I planted a lot of vegetables I haven’t tried before, and they’ve been struggling. Neither my bell pepper nor my tomato plant made it past growing a stalk and putting out leaves. While the jalapeño pepper got a little further a long and sprouted some peppers, we’ve only gotten a few and the plant itself seems to linger on the edge of life. I’m considering simply putting it out of its misery at this point.

I have, however, had several resounded successes in the garden. My golden raspberries are currently ripening, and they are by far the sweetest tasting raspberries I’ve ever eaten. I had a really good harvest of carrots a few weeks ago, which we incorporated into a roast that I made for a dinner one night. And, despite a late planting (the first week of July, instead of in early June like it should have been), I have a mini white pumpkin growing and a second that just flowered that I’m waiting to see if it, too, will grow. I’m really excited about this little pumpkin, because I planted several old seeds that I had from one I’d gotten with our Halloween pumpkin two years ago, and its doing so well. I’m going to make a pie with it, once its time for harvest.

Lastly, I’ve taken up a new hobby: knitting. I jokingly told my husband that I want to essentially be a little old grannie this fall/winter once my running season is over. But I actually think that’s what’s going to happen, and I’m really excited about it. I’ve never knit before, so I’m starting with a basic scarf pattern that’s going fairly well. If I like it an stick with it after this initial project, who knows, I might become a knitter!

Ending the Chapter

I think that about covers everything for the third of my 2025 quarterly updates. Continue to follow along for occasional posts and updates on my socials (linked in the website header), or check back in December for the final edition of the year!

If you have any questions, want to talk books or writing, or if there is something you want to see in the updates here, feel free to send me a DM on one of my socials!

Kennedy