A Little Marisol Update

A lot has been moving quietly behind the scenes, and this morning felt like a good time to gather it all in one place.

The May Kickstarter books are officially in production.

The bespoke editions have cleared approval at BookVault and are now marked In Progress. Fifteen of those books are being made right now, with an estimated dispatch date of late August.

Seeing that green line move forward felt very, very good.

There were so many tiny things behind that moment. Foil files. Cover adjustments. Endpapers. Interior checks. Measurements by fractions of an inch. Plenty of staring at a screen thinking, “Nope. That little thing is going to bother me forever.”

Now the files are approved. The books are being made. And in the words of Mister Rogers: “It’s such a very good feeling.” 😅

The paperback side is close too. Once those copies arrive here, everything gets gathered together for the final stretch of fulfillment.

And somewhere in the middle of all this, I decided on one more thing.

No extra charge.

Every book will already be passing through my hands before it heads to the post office, and signing them felt right.

These copies have become very personal by now. There has been so much care put into the covers, the foil, the interiors, the little details nobody will ever know took an hour to fix.

A signature belongs in there.

The original fulfillment window was October, and things are sitting in a good place right now.

That is a nice sentence to be able to write.

The next Moon Over Marisol* Kickstarter launches September 1 and runs through **September 17*.

This one centers around the **Spooky Assignments**, and it has become one of the strangest, coziest little corners of Marisol so far.

There are pumpkins. Spiders. Monsters. Curses. Vampires. An occasional werewolf. Zombies. Frogs. Scorpions. Dinner parties. And a Jersey tomato quest that somehow became a trilogy.

One of my favorites is still:

The Scorpion, the Frog, and the Fairly Odd but Pleasant Dinner Party

The omnibus cover is finished. The book is coming together. The campaign itself is largely in place.

So while the May books move through production, most of the creative energy around here is drifting toward September.

And apparently the farm has decided to join in.

I took this picture of some of our own cucurbits sitting in the truck bed, mixed in with the squash and a half-eaten watermelon.

It made me laugh because the whole thing looked like a tiny Marisol scene before Marisol even showed up.

Actual farm-grown cucurbits, because apparently Spooky Season starts in the truck bed.

That is pretty much where things stand this morning.

The May books are being made.

The physical copies are getting signed.

The paperbacks are close.

And Spooky Season is coming together one strange little story at a time.

After all the fixing and checking and rechecking, there is finally a little more room to enjoy this part.

The books are real now. And that feels very very good. ❤️

Much love,
Dennis