Can't spell retreat without "treat"

I write to you from the chilly clime of West Melton, a small community about half an hour's drive from Christchurch. I'm on a writing retreat!

A view from someone holding a camera in a spa pool, showing her bare legs floating in the water. There's a glass of wine on the rim, and beyond is a wide horizoned landscape of farmland and grey sky.
It's fuzzy because my phone is in a plastic bag, my favourite read-and-soak tip.

Lots of writers go on group writing retreats, where the authors work busily and happily in the company of others. I have tried this a time or two, and it has been a lot of fun, but in terms of productivity, I do not need to be surrounded by fascinating people with great conversation who love many of the same things I do.

If I want to write a lot, I need a solo writer's retreat. I need to be alone with my laptop and my brain, an endless charcuterie board of meal-snacks, a lot of coffee, and an indeterminate sleep period. I need an Airbnb, isolated but not too remote, comfortable, but not sybaritic, and ideally including access to some kind of hot-water-soaking technology to do nice things to my hips after I sit cross-legged on a bed for hours. I need to have no one to talk to and nothing to do but write.

This is an exaggeration, but not by much. I brought my tablet for e-reading, and my knitting1, to facilitate getting up from sitting cross-legged on a bed before it becomes hours. But most of what I've been doing is writing Magician First Class, the first Sparks and Recreation book. I'm having a great time.

However, I have managed to not completely forget about my marketing responsibilities2. XO, Xena, #6 in the Olympus Inc. series (or #8, if you count the prequel novelette and stand-alone novella, or #3 of the Trojan Women arc) is coming out in one or two days, depending on your timezone, and this means it's nearly your last opportunity to pre-order it!

A tall brunette woman in athletic wear has her hand on the shoulder of a shorter blonde woman in a showgirl outfit. The blonde woman has her hand on top. They're adorable.
THEM

XO, Xena is a high-speed, suspenseful romance with burlesque, murders, exes, circus arts, annoying cousins, maternal guilt, organized crime bosses, festival vibes, hot sex, and a Spiegeltent. I really loved writing Xena and Cressida, who have both survived some serious setbacks, playing to their strengths and choosing each other.

Pre-ordering can be done on a variety of platforms. It is good for me, for algorithmic boost reasons, and it is good for you, for the convenience of magically appearing books on your e-reader reasons! It's a win win!

I would especially urge those of you who don't buy from Amazon to pre-order and download, because at some point, this book, like the other Olympus Inc. books, will hit Kindle Unlimited, and I do not want you to miss out. Pre-ordering turns "Oh yeah, I want to buy that" to "Oh yeah, I bought it!"

Whether you are on retreat or in the thick of it, I hope you enjoy the remainder of your week.

That Healey Girl is the newsletter of Karen (or Kate) Healey, a romance and speculative fiction author who lives in Ōtautahi, New Zealand and shakes plots loose by wandering along the river. Please feel free to forward this newsletter to anyone you think might like it.

1 I wrote this casually, with what I hope is the savor-faire of a real knitter, which I am not. Every now and then, usually in winter, I am seized by the urge to Knit Something. Rarely, I finish it. Earlier this year I tried socks and gave up almost immediately. Now I am trying a hat, about which I am cautiously optimistic.

2 Honestly, a miracle.