September was wonderful. A great day at the Smuttastic Book Fair in St. George We received much-needed rain here in our desert state, which always feels like a gift. I also attended a book fair down in St. George that was a great success. I was thrilled to sell quite a few complete sets of my series and even got to offer Book 4 of the Somewhere Aching series as a pre-release. Overall, September brought a lot of exciting wins. Of course, life always likes to keep things intere

It’s been raining cats and dogs my entire life. Not the cute kind. The kind that turns the ground to mud, floods the gutters, and leaves you soaked before you’ve even stepped outside. I’m burnt out. Not temporarily, not seasonally. Chronically. I haven’t slept well my entire adult life. I had four children in five years, which meant I was basically pregnant from nineteen to twenty‑four. Then came raising my adorable mob.

How many of us grew up crushing on the bad boy? I did. Through my teen years, I gravitated toward jerks—boys who objectified me, pushed boundaries, and treated me like a challenge instead of a person. I even spent years hopelessly in love with a stoner who dropped out of school to pursue a career in… being a pothead. Meanwhile, when I met my husband—a genuinely kind, respectful man—I instantly friend‑zoned him. He couldn’t possibly be my missing piece, right?

This weekend was a whirlwind — two full days at the 2026 St. George Smuttastic Book Fair, five hours of travel each way, and more conversations than my introvert heart was prepared for. I’m exhausted in the best possible way, and before I collapse into a well‑earned coma, I had to jump online and say thank you.

August was… a lot. The kind of month that makes you laugh, cry, and question your life choices all in the same afternoon.

What the actual #%*¥.L Seriously, UPS? Seriously? Why is everything so hard right now? This past week has felt like a cosmic joke with terrible timing. My shipment of books for an upcoming book fair arrived soaked—UPS left the boxes sitting in a puddle on my porch. Half the inventory? Ruined.

I had a dream last night—the kind that lingers, the kind that teaches you something about yourself that’s hard to learn while awake.

I’ve been thinking about one of my favorite songs of all time: The Sound of Silence by Simon & Garfunkel. Every time I revisit it, I’m struck by how ancient it feels. Like scripture written for a world that didn’t exist yet, but somehow predicted ours perfectly.

There’s a moment in Last of the Mohicans that has lived inside me for decades. The younger daughter stands on the edge of a cliff, the music rising like a heartbeat. She looks at the man who intends to take her. His hand outstretched. Then back at the chasm behind her. She hesitates. She chooses. She jumps. That scene carved itself into me. That breath‑held, soul‑splitting moment is my benchmark for a great story.

July came in swinging. Two book fairs, rolling out my ARC for Book Four, and creating the book trailer for this deliciously dark installment in the Somewhere Aching universe. I’m running on caffeine, stubbornness and the faint hope that autumn will save me.

Watch the official book trailer for A Karma to Kill For, Book 4 in The Somewhere Aching Series. Trailer release ahead of the September 19th launch. Dark romance, suspense, and emotional intensity.

I have a confession. Some days, the state of the world feels so bleak that I catch myself wishing something dramatic would shake society awake. Something that would force us to confront the widening gulf between the haves and the have-nots. The United States is one of the wealthiest nations on the planet, yet millions of people struggle just to survive. It’s heartbreaking, and yes, it makes me angry.

I spent the Fourth of July weekend at my mountain property, soaking in the quiet. We visited the Little Grand Canyon—Utah’s spectacular hidden gem—and I wasted hours lolling around, staring at the sky. It was supposed to be a decompression weekend. Did I decompress? Not really. Because I knew what waited for me when I got home: The final edit of Book Four.

Hello Friends, July has arrived in a rush of sunshine, late nights, and the kind of busy that makes the days blur. I’m neck‑deep in creating book merch for upcoming fairs — mugs, bookmarks, keychains, stickers, annotation cards — a whole world of Somewhere Aching in physical form. It’s chaotic, but it’s also a joy.

I’ve wondered why some of us feel compelled to chase something bigger than an easy life. Maybe hardship sharpens that instinct. Maybe it’s the desire to turn pain into meaning. For me, it has always been about inspiration. The kind I’ve received from writers, artists, musicians, and inventors whose work carried me through storms I thought would drown me. I want to be that for someone else.

For years, I buried my voice—softening the darkness, hiding the truth, and censoring the parts of me shaped by trauma. But honesty has a gravity all its own. I write with grit now, without guilt, and for the readers who crave fiction that feels real.

“My name is Karen,” she said, standing slightly to introduce herself. “And yes, I am a Karen.” She didn’t smile when she said it. In fact, she didn’t smile at all, which was refreshing. Women were conditioned to smile, as if the fate of humanity rested on their positive attitude. If that were the case, then Karen was single-handedly wrecking the world.

A raw, emotional look at why I wrote the Somewhere Aching series — a dark, trauma‑rooted, character‑driven romance about healing, fate, and soul‑deep love.

Self‑correcting stops so many people from ever expressing themselves. I’ve known people who desperately wanted to write but couldn’t bring themselves to put down a single sentence out of fear of criticism. And honestly, the world encourages this. We worship materialism. Only things that make money are considered valuable. Creativity becomes a commodity instead of a calling. But this is exactly when you have to dig deep, awaken your inner rebel, and do it anyway.

Everywhere I look, I see assimilation: on social media, in churches, in institutions across the globe. People becoming like each other to fit in, smoothing out their edges until nothing unique remains. I’ve never understood how they do it.