Books Published in 2025

 As an author, I know how important it is to keep having new books published in order to keep readers interested in my books. Fortunately this year, in spite of only having a few books released, I have managed to keep that interest with each book’s publication. Promotion of the books has gone well; there have been many likes, shares, and comments from people saying they bought or will buy the book. I am very relieved and extremely grateful to everyone who has stayed interested in my books. THANK YOU!

 

And thank you for your continued support in spite of this low level of production this year. I was supposed to have three other books released this year – two short story collections and a children’s book – but that didn’t happen. This was not because of any laziness or neglect on my part; that is just how it happened. Hopefully, all three of these books will be published in the new year. One of my self-published children’s books will be republished through the new division of Twisted Dreams Press in January, and another children’s book, the second one in this series, is scheduled for a January release. 

 

I had three books published this year, and all three of them were from the same publisher. (Thank you, Crystal!) I am VERY grateful that two of them especially did finally see publication; these two particular books were rejected many times for a number of years. So I was very happy to finally see Curse of the Blood Witch and Noiseless achieve the status of publication. They went through many rounds of revision over those years!

 

As to my other poetry book, 3 A.M. Poetry, it was written several years ago. I’d recently dug it out, typed ALL of those poems up (I wrote those poems during my notebook writing days!) and polished them. Then I asked my UK publisher if she was interested in the manuscript and she said yes, so I sent it off. These poems are a reflection of the kind of life I lived growing up, as well as from young adulthood, and it was very cathartic to go over these poems again, relive those memories, and get them into print. What a surprisingly healing experience that was!

 

There are quite a few books I have scheduled for publication next year, as well as many more to submit. I do know I should have more than three books published in 2026. And I start writing a brand-new nonfiction book in January. Stay tuned!

 

Here are my books that were published in 2025:

 

 

Curse of the Blood Witch

Kaya Morgan’s bad day gets worse after she is attacked by a vagrant who leaves a bite on her neck.

 

Her world is turned upside-down when she wakes up with a sensitivity to light and strange powers.

 

Soon she is caught up in a life of hungering for blood while also struggling to let go of everything that made her human.

 

Logan O’Boyle is a 300-year-old Irish vampire willing to guide Kaya on her journey, but once it is revealed that she is not just any vampire but one cursed by the blood of a woman who existed centuries ago.

 

Everything changes and Kaya must accept being a vampire or die.

 

Buy link

 

 

3 A.M. Poetry

Survivors of an abusive childhood know just how hard it can be to break free from their past.

 

Memories linger.

 

The anger remains. Trauma and nightmares sometimes take hold, pulling the survivor right back into the hellish world they escaped from. Add to this the mental health issues they must cope with, such as sleeping disorders, anxiety, panic disorder, suicide ideation, and depression. Then throw in addiction for good measure.

 

All of these elements can make life a living hell for anyone who has survived such trauma. It creates a nightmare that may never end. The poems in this book reflect battles the author has had to fight, then and now.

 

Some of these battles are an ongoing torment that could make the dangers of mental health disorders seem like a welcoming reprieve from the neverending torment they must learn to live with.

 

Buy link 

 

 

Noiseless

Individuals living with deafness have existed for millennia, yet in today's world, we remain undervalued, misunderstood, discriminated against, stereotyped and underrepresented.

 

We constantly run into communication barriers, discrimination, ableism and misconceptions. For many of us in the Deaf community, we struggle with social isolation, finding it hard to fit in and be included in a world that prioritizes the ability to hear. The poems in “Noiseless” capture various aspects of what it's like to live with deafness.

 

These poems hope to show that deafness is not the tragedy which the hearing world claims it to be. Thanks to greater awareness of the Deaf community, Deaf culture, and Deaf-focused education, individuals who are deaf are at long last finally finding their place in the world, no matter what barriers remain.

 

We still have a long way to go, but together we can make society a more Deaf-friendly place to be.

 

Buy link

Living in a Noiseless World: A Deaf Poetry Book Shares What it’s Like to Be Deaf

 

It’s hard to write about a disability unless you have experienced that disability yourself. And while I don’t like the word “disabled” or “disability,” the fact is that deafness is a disability and being deaf makes a person disabled. That is the label which society has given to anyone who can’t hear, walk, see or speak. “Disabled.” And while I grudgingly accept this designation as I have navigated through almost forty years of living with deafness, I have not allowed that term to define me, or the life that I choose to live.

 

I have included Deaf characters in my fiction. I have written articles about deafness and on topics relevant to the Deaf community. I have also written essays about being deaf. Some of those things were published. I have written poems about being deaf, and so far, only a couple of those poems have been published.

 

Now people will have the opportunity to read many more of those kinds of poems, because at long last, after many years, my collection of deaf poetry has been published.

 

Noiseless is a collection of poems about deafness written by a deaf poet. These poems shed light on what it’s like to be deaf, as well as issues affecting the Deaf community. These poems also offer insights on relevant topics and reminders of the need to do away with ableist attitudes and ableist language in society. Ultimately, the poems in this book reflect a strong desire shared in the Deaf community: That we only want to belong and be a part of everything that our hearing peers get to be a part of. (And including sign language interpreters at important televised and public events sends the message that Deaf people are being included.)

 

I started writing poems for this book many years ago – I can remember asking someone for feedback on some of the poems in 2017. When I felt the manuscript was ready to submit, I sent it out – the publishers as well as contests which were held by publishing companies. None of them accepted the manuscript, even the ones which published books relevant to the disability community.

 

While these rejections poured in, I took the manuscript through another round of revisions. While working on these revisions, I stayed up to date on news and issues which impacted the Deaf community. Some of these news items I read inspired poems that ended up in the final draft of the manuscript that was eventually published.

 

At the same time, many of my own experiences as a Deaf person inspired many of the poems in this book. How I was moved to the back of a church because my ASL interpreter was too much of a “distraction” for those in attendance. How a hearing person would refuse to write things down for me when she spoke then got upset when I couldn’t understand what she was saying. And of course, the many times people have screamed into my ear after they were informed that I am deaf, as though talking louder would allow me to magically hear them. (There is a difference between deafness and hard-of-hearing.)

 

These are just some of the aspects of living with deafness which these poems explore. While the poems in Noiseless are not meant to capture what it’s like to be deaf for everyone (because not everybody who is deaf is able to speak, like I can, and everybody lives with their disability differently), I do hope that some of these poems are relatable enough to Deaf readers that they will find it enjoyable.

 

Many thanks to Crystal Baynam at Baynam Books Press for accepting this book for publication, editing it, and for the cover design. I also wish to thank everyone for all of their support for this book.

 

Noiseless is now available in ebook and print formats.

 

Here is the blurb:

 

Individuals living with deafness have existed for millennia, yet in today's world, we remain undervalued, misunderstood, discriminated against, stereotyped and underrepresented.

 

We constantly run into communication barriers, discrimination, ableism and misconceptions. For many of us in the Deaf community, we struggle with social isolation, finding it hard to fit in and be included in a world that prioritizes the ability to hear. The poems in “Noiseless” capture various aspects of what it's like to live with deafness.

 

These poems hope to show that deafness is not the tragedy which the hearing world claims it to be. Thanks to greater awareness of the Deaf community, Deaf culture, and Deaf-focused education, individuals who are deaf are at long last finally finding their place in the world, no matter what barriers remain.

 

We still have a long way to go, but together we can make society a more Deaf-friendly place to be.

 

And here is the link

A Deaf Writer with Hearing Characters

Recently, I came across a call for submissions for an anthology. They wanted sf/f stories from writers who have disabilities. Since I am deaf, and I had a sci-fi story I was trying to find a home for, I submitted my story. I figured I met their requirements in just being a writer with a disability; they didn’t say anything about how the stories submitted should contain characters with disabilities. My story didn’t; there were no deaf characters and there were also no other characters with disabilities.

 

Still, the whole thing made me think. I have been deaf since age 13, and by the time I became deaf, I was already writing stories, poems, and articles. Becoming deaf didn’t change how I wrote my stories; I did not start writing stories with deaf characters in them. I have, however, come up with novel ideas with deaf characters, but I haven’t written those novels yet. (I’ll get around to them, at some point!)

 

But even so, I didn’t write stories with deaf characters. Then I wrote a children’s story with a deaf character, who is the main character in the story. Unfortunately, I didn’t have any luck placing it with a publisher, and these days I can say that I am glad for that! It needs a lot of work. I actually plan to revise it at some point in the near future and try to find an agent for it. (Right now, I have to finish writing my middle-grade series!)

 

As far as writing anything deaf-related is concerned, that happened in my poetry and in my nonfiction writing. I have written a lot of deaf poetry (with only two published so far and I have a collection of deaf poetry I plan to get out there at some point), as well as a lot of essays on subjects related to being deaf. I wrote articles on deafness, and I also wrote for a newspaper called SIGNews, which was a national newspaper for the Deaf/HOH community. I wrote about Deaf education and Deaf parenting for that paper, but I eventually branched out to cover other topics.

 

And as a ghostwriter, I have been sought by other writers who are deaf who want me to write for them mainly because I am deaf.

 

And, of course, I wrote essays about my experiences as a deaf parent in the book, Parenting Pauses.

 

But as far as my fiction is concerned? Well, there are not many deaf characters. I do plan to introduce a deaf character in The GHOST Group (in Book 9), but we are not there yet. In one of my novels, my character learns sign language so she can communicate with a deaf barista, but that deaf character never makes an appearance.

 

This tendency to not include deaf characters in my fiction very often has always baffled me. Writers of fiction are told to write what we know, and if there’s one thing that I do know, it’s what it’s like to be deaf! (This is a common question I receive.) So why haven’t I included deaf characters in my fiction? I mean, aside from the children’s book I wrote, there really aren’t any. Why haven’t I included deaf characters who go through the same struggles I have as a deaf person – the discrimination, hostility, ignorance and feeling left out? I write about this in my deaf poetry, but not my deaf fiction. And I really wonder why I haven’t done that yet.

 

Part of me thinks that maybe the reason why is because writing fiction is like a form of escape for me. One thing I know very well as a deaf person is the communication barrier that exists between me and the hearing world. There are so many things I chose not to do simply because of that barrier. For example, I can’t participate in group discussions, because I can’t keep up with the conversation when there are multiple people talking and EVERYBODY is talking fast and nobody wants to slow down to sign to the deaf girl what everyone is saying. But when I write fiction, I can be a part of those things. I can “talk” with people on the phone through my characters, shout things to someone in another room and hear their response through my characters, and have an ongoing back-and-forth conversation that is not slowed down for signing through my characters.

 

I know this kind of discrimination exists in the hearing world. One guy I was interested in a long time ago said he likes to walk and talk and he prefers not to be with someone who can’t hear and keep up with the conversation. I was told I could not have a job at this one agency because I couldn’t answer the phone. I have sat through MANY appointments and meetings where everyone is talking but I don’t understand a single thing said because there are no aids to help me understand them.

 

I know all of these things, and more, as a person who is deaf. As someone who has been deaf for a long time.

 

I think as much as I like to escape from those limitations in my world by writing about a world where those problems aren’t there is nice, but I really think I should start putting in more effort where I have deaf characters going through those experiences just so more people can understand what life is REALLY like for a person who is deaf. There are struggles, yes, but we find a way around them and we adapt our lives to live with them. We can’t communicate on the phone like everyone else, but we CAN still communicate on the phone. We can’t order at a drive-thru like everyone else, but we CAN still order at a drive-thru, thanks to certain businesses who are aware of customers with disabilities who want the same access to fast food that everybody else has.

 

Life is different for people who are deaf, but we find a way to make things work. After I bring my deaf character into my series and after I get that children’s book published (fingers crossed I find an agent for it!), perhaps then I will finally start to include more deaf characters in my fiction. I think that really needs to happen.