Tag Archives: spooky

Sculpting a Spooky Series: author talk with Kim Wilkins

May 2026

Welcome to May’s newsletter! If you showed up by accident but want to receive monthly content, please subscribe below:

In this month’s newsletter, scroll down to find:

  • Podcast: author talk with Kim Wilkins
  • Captain’s Log: Peruvian Flat (not so flat)
  • Review Corner

Podcast: Kim Wilkins

Welcome to my Author Nook, a monthly podcast I created where I chat with authors about their literary brain children, and bibliophiles about their niche areas of obsession. Find it on Spotify here, and Youtube here.

As you know, I release episodes once a month with no set date so the best way to stay in the loop is to follow and subscribe on either Youtube or Spotify.

This month I had the honour and privilege to sit down with a childhood hero of mine, Kim Wilkins, author of over 30 books spanning genres, demographics, and both fiction and non-fiction. Nearest to my heart is her Gina Champion series that I could not get enough of as a teenager and which is still incredible to read again as an adult. She is also a professor of writing and publishing at Queensland University in Australia.

So pour yourself a cuppa tea, settle in, and listen in as we talk about teenage psychics, creating a small town setting the you feel you’ve fallen into, and how to craft true terror that spans a series.

We mentioned a few things to read today that I’ll list and link below:

Kim Wilkins
(Kimberley Freeman)

Kim Wilkins was born in London, and grew up at the seaside north of Brisbane, Australia. She is a Professor of writing at the University of Queensland. She has enduring obsessions with Viking-age England, misty landscapes, pagan mythology, Led Zeppelin, and ginger cats.

She writes her spooky novels under Kim Wilkins and her women’s fiction (non-spooky) novels under the pen name, Kimberley Freeman.

Find more information:

Website for Kim Wilkins
Website for Kimberley Freeman
Goodreads
Instagram

Captain’s Log: Peruvian Flats (not so flat)

Peru: a bucket list dream

I don’t think I can really put into words what my two weeks in Peru gave my heart and soul. I have always wanted to hike the Inca trail into Machu Picchu and couldn’t have imagined how profound it was to walk the path humans have walked for centuries, how moving it was to round the corner and pass through the sun gate to get my first glimpse of the ancient city (after summiting the stairs lovingly named the “Gringo Killers”), and how indescribably beautiful it was. No feat of imagination could compare to the real thing.

We also hiked up the surreal Rainbow Mountain which is the same elevation as the base camp at Mount Everest. It’s wild what altitude does to the body and I felt like such a champion making it to the top.

It wouldn’t have been a complete Peru tour if I hadn’t found my boy Paddington, and luckily for me, he was waiting for me on day one of my trip to welcome me into his homeland. What a thoughtful wee bear he is.

Review Corner

Reviews are so helpful in getting word of Contest of Queens, Queen’s Catacombs , and Queendom Come out there. If you have time, and if you’ve read the book, I would be eternally grateful if you could leave a star rating and/or a written review on Goodreads or Amazon.

Thank you to all the wonderful people who have left a star rating or review!

Here are just a taste of some Amazon reviews I missed and am so so grateful for!

x live magically

featured image: https://i.pinimg.com/webp/1200x/24/0d/8a/240d8ad75e9c27b198a49f0b0457d66e.webp

Just a Guy in the Woods Escaping an Eldritch Horror: author talk with Alexander James

April 2024

Welcome to April’s newsletter. If you showed up by accident but want to receive monthly content, please subscribe below:

In this month’s newsletter, click the headings or scroll down to find:

  1. Podcast: Author Nook with Alexander James
  2. Dungeons and Dragons Podcast
  3. Captain’s Log: The UK can’t keep me away
  4. Review Corner

Podcast: Author Nook with Alexander James

Welcome to my Author Nook, a monthly podcast I created where I chat with authors about their upcoming releases and we nerd out over their literary brain children. Find it on Spotify here, and Youtube here.

This month I am joined by the wonderful Alexander James to talk about his debut novel, The Woodkin. We chat about hiking, finding a character’s voice, Dungeons and Dragons, and the darkness with teeth and a hair-raising giggle. So turn on all the lights, check behind the curtain, and settle in for a spooky-adjacent chat.

Website
Twitter
The Woodkin

The Woodkin

On the trail, anything can happen.

After secrets and betrayal shatter his marriage, Josh Mallory seeks solace on the Pacific Crest Trail, in the mountains of Washington. On the trail, he’s just another hiker. On the trail, he can outrun the memories.

But this backpacking trip swiftly turns grisly when he comes across the body of another hiker who seems to have fallen to his death. Josh is forced to detour through a small mountain town, where missing hiker posters flutter in the windows, and residents show no interest in hearing about the dead hiker. Unease that something is not quite right chases him back to the trail.

But night falls too quickly and in his haste to get away, he becomes trapped on a mountain ridge beneath the light of a full moon. Feeling more and more uneasy, Josh soon realizes that he may not be alone on the mountain, and begins to fear that, like the missing hikers, he won’t make it out alive.

Get your copy here

Dungeons and Dragons Podcast

The first three (of four) episodes of the Dungeons and Dragons podcast I was fortunate enough to be a part of are out for your viewing pleasure! Join MC, Alexander James (The Woodkin), Elijah Menchaca (The Glintchasers Series), me, and Jess as we play our leading lads and ladies and fight to restore our worlds and be the heroes we wrote about!

It was honestly an absolute blast, I’m so excited for the final episode to come out because it’s a goodie, but until then, enjoy!

Here are the Spotify links if you’d prefer to listen to the adventure. All episodes as well as audiobooks and exclusive author interviews can be found on CamCat Unwrapped’s channel.

Episode 1
Episode 2
Episode 3

Captain’s Log: The UK can’t keep me away

Hay-on-Wye? more like “Yay”-on Wye

As many book lovers know, there is a book town. There is. It’s in Wales, and it was established by a guy (Richard Booth) who pronounced himself King on April Fool’s day some time in the 1960s and it stuck. His Majesty ruled his Kingdom with a kind heart and trusted bookmark, and the land was peaceful. Over the years, dozens of second hand bookshops cropped up and defined this Kingdom as one land full of a thousand worlds. For, as King Richard Booth decreed:

And when I say this was a town full of bookshops, I mean it. These weren’t even all of them, nor were they all of my favourites:

The Stone of Destiny

Speaking of Kings, I visited the stone that has witnessed the crowning of Kings since biblical times.

I’d like to say I did my research, but I went up to Perth, Scotland for a night on a whim and it was a three minute walk from my hotel. Some may call it fate, others destiny I suppose. Honestly, it was the most emotional I’ve ever been about a chunk of sandstone in my life. Do I have a picture of it? No, they didn’t allow photography so you’ll have to google it to see what I’m talking about.
Otherwise just imagine a weather-worn, time-stained sandstone block with two ancient iron rings on either side.

But, what is the Stone of Destiny/Stone of Scone, I hear you ask? Well, it’s the Stone that, legend has it, John used as a pillow in the Bible. The Stone that witnessed Egyptian royalty rise and fall. The Stone that was present for the coronation of Scottish Kings of old, and ever since the 13th century is now a key participant in all English monarch coronations – having a pride of place at the recent King Charles’s crowning.

This Stone is a symbol of power, monarchy, and Scotland.

It was stolen and smuggled across the border by four university students on Christmas 1950 when trapped in England for too long. It rallied a nation.

It is what I love about the UK: the tradition, the weight and majesty given to time-honored symbols, and the community drawn together by them.

Review Corner

Reviews are so helpful in getting word of Contest of Queens and Queen’s Catacombs out there. If you have time, and if you’ve read the book, I would be eternally grateful if you could leave a star rating and/or a written review on Goodreads or Amazon.

Thank you to all the wonderful people who have left a star rating or review!

x live magically

feature image: https://steemit.com/poetry/@skyefox/a-man-in-the-woods-an-original-poem