Hi Everyone! Happy almost-holidays!

I hope everyone is enjoying seasonally-appropriate weather. It’s been pretty nasty around here the past couple of days, but such is life, especially in December. The very exciting news is that earlier in the week I WALKED ALL THE WAY AROUND THE BLOCK!! (!!!!)

If you’ve just joined us, here’s a video of me walking in late November 2018:

This is after years of bouncing from doctor to doctor and having them shake their heads in bewilderment and suggesting I was dehydrated, or stressed out, or had an “aversive personality.” But all the psychotherapy and positive thinking etc. didn’t stop me from getting steadily worse and worse. Finally in 2017 I got a positive diagnosis of Lyme disease plus co-infections. I started treatment towards the end of summer break and my ability to walk increased by about 400% over the course of a week.

Then the fall semester started and I went back to teaching. Within 24 hours I was back somewhere behind square one.

Fast-forward to the end of 2018, and my ability to walk had steadily continued to decline. Finally my doctor and I came to the conclusion that it might be mold/water damage exposure from my work building that was making me worse rather than better, despite aggressive treatment of the Lyme disease.

And we must have been right, because once I got out of the building and started practicing mold avoidance and mold detox treatment, my ability to walk has slowly increased. I’m still not “normal,” and still have episodes of having to hold onto the walls to walk across a room, but on good days I can now pass as normal for short periods, especially when walking downhill. I’ve also been able to start driving myself around town again, which is super-handy.

So that’s my health update. A number of you have been following along with my progress (or lack thereof at times) and shared your own health stories with me, which has been very supportive and helpful. So to all of you struggling with health problems: I wish you improvement, or at least a pain-free holiday season. And if you want to find out more about mold exposure, I strongly recommend checking out Julie Rehmeyer’s website and her book Through the Shadowlands. And if you’re brave, I recommend visiting her Facebook updates on what happened to her after she was re-exposed to mold. Spoiler alert: it appears to have damaged her neck in a way that will require surgery if she is ever going to recover again.

Okay, so that’s the health stuff, which turned out to be rather long. I was originally planning to make this post about books I’ve read recently and enjoyed, and ask for recommendations, but I think I’ll hold off until next time, since I’ve read several really good books this fall and I want to be able to concentrate on them fully. It may take a little while to get to, though, since–heads-up!–I am contemplating a move over to MailerLite. If you’re getting this on my mailing list, I’m not expecting there to be any major disruption in service, but it might take me a few weeks to get everything pulled together.

In the meantime, I’ll finish off by thanking everyone who helped make the launch of The City of Shadows such a success. It hit #1 in two different categories in the Amazon.com free store, which was super-exciting. Okay, not remunerative, but a big thrill nonetheless. And if you got a copy either as an ARC or during the launch and feel moved to leave a review, that as always would be much appreciated. The link is here.

And here’s this week’s selection of giveaways:

Who doesn’t need more epic fantasy? Check out the Give the Gift of Epic Fantasy giveaway.

Want to start something new for the new year? Check out the First in Series giveaway!

Escape into the enchantment with the Enchanted Worlds giveaway!