Every Tuesday, get to know a bit about the stories behind the books you love, and discover your next favourite novel.

Zilla: Black metal in an even darker storyline, a weird storytelling form, and I’m swooning in love. Michael Bettendorf’s Trve Cvlt sounds like everything I like best in a book. So Michael, can you introduce us to your black metal horror gamebook?

Micheal: Trve Cvlt is a meta-take on stories similar to Choose Your Own Adventures with a bit of a fatalist spin.

You wake up with a brutal hangover, but that can’t crush your spirits: you’ve been invited to take back the drum throne for Abyss, the cult band you co-founded.

It means setting aside a turbulent history with Abyss’ vocalist, Austin. You aren’t sure if he’s invited you back to bury the hatchet or if he’s just desperate because infamous black metal legends Waste Doctrine are rolling through town. They’ve given you the opportunity to open for them and maybe, finally, get the hell out of this nowhere town.

The promise of the upcoming gig doesn’t come without its share of hurdles, though. Austin’s hellbent on creating a ritualistic experience out of the performance, turning the abandoned roadhouse he’s chosen as a venue into a bloody, occult nightmare.

Yes, it’s black fucking metal, but is it too far?

Only you can decide.

Zilla: What inspired you to write this book?

Micheal: Trve Cvlt is rooted in an urban legend, specifically Cult Road and the alleged house(s) where local cultists gathered. Me and a couple of buddies went out looking for Cult Road one day and ended up lost on some backroads. We eventually found an abandoned farmhouse that was the epitome of dread. We almost ran out of gas on low maintenance roads before finding our way back. I wanted to write a black metal book for a long time, but didn’t know what it was supposed to be, but eventually I framed it in this setting and it clicked into place. It wouldn’t have existed if Alex Woodroe of Tenebrous Press didn’t tell me, “Pitch her something weird. Something no one has done,” at StokerCon 2023. I thought her partner in crime, Matt Blairstone was in on it, but it turns out I pitched him cold. Still the best rouse Alex has pulled on me. I’m forever grateful.

Zilla: What would your characters say if they met you?

Micheal: Austin would probably call me a fucking poser. The unnamed main character would probably have my back. So would Danny…mostly. Ryan would likely tell me to get better at drums.

Zilla: A range of responses! So who is your favourite character in Trve Cvlt?

Micheal: I think Abyss is my favorite character. It didn’t start as a character, but it morphed into one. It’s chaos. It’s love. It’s dread. It’s a god. It’s an ungod. It’s a manipulator. It’s existential dread. It’s us. It’s…the abyss.

Zilla: Who do you imagine reading your book?

Micheal: I wrote it for the outcasts and metalheads and weirdos and I think they are among the crowd who read it, but I also think it has struck a chord with the horror-curious.

Zilla: Thanks for sharing your story and your process. We’re looking forward to reading! Where can the Night Beats community find you and your book?

Micheal: You can find me on Bluesky @BeardedBetts, at www.michaelbettendorfwrites.com, and my linktree. You can pick up Trve Cvlthere.

Every Tuesday, get to know a bit about the stories behind the books you love, and discover your next favourite novel.

Zilla: We always love having Claris Lam here to talk about her books, though today is a special interview—she’s crossed genre! Claris, can you tell us about Refilling the Well and your venture into poetry?

Claris: Refilling The Well is my debut poetry chapbook. This chapbook focuses on themes of self-care, burnout, burnout recovery, and hustle culture. 

I also think Refilling The Well focuses a bit on hope – hope that things will get better, even if they’re hard right now. 

Zilla: That seems like a really timely topic. Why did you write this book, and why now?

Claris: My burnout in summer 2023 inspired me to write this book, specifically. I went through creative burnout in summer 2023 specifically because I felt, at the time, I had to keep “working” on my creative craft to become some form of success that others seemed to have. It looked like that if you were a “successful” author, you had to be making huge book sales every month and/or capable of selling many books a year or even a book every two weeks. At some point that summer, I just lost all inspiration and drive to write much if at all.

It was scary, handling burnout. I never knew what it was like to be completely out of ideas before, because I often come up with ideas really quickly. However, it was a good period for me to reflect on what “success” as an author actually meant to me. 

Zilla: That’s such an important part of being an author—finding that internal motivation, and knowing that you can’t define success against anyone else. Can you distill your inspiration into an image?

Claris: Given the title of this chapbook, the image of a well inspired me. I thought about how wells, when overused or going through hotter than expected times such as droughts, can end up drying out and be unable to provide water to others. Our creative minds are like wells—it can generate a lot of ideas, but it also can only provide so much—especially when going through stressful times. And if we have no ideas left, that well of ideas is essentially dried out. 

Zilla: Who did you imagine reading your book as you wrote it? 

Claris: I imagined those who enjoyed poetry reading it, but I also imagined others going through their own periods of burnout, especially fellow creatives. I’ve read and heard of stories from many creatives who fell into similar periods of burnout for various reasons, including mine.

Zilla: What’s your next writing project?

Claris: At this time of writing, I’ll be releasing my debut YA short story collection, Stay Magical!, in fall 2025! It’s magical girl themed. Anyone who is familiar with anime and manga like Sailor Moon, Ojamajo Doremi, Pretty Cure and other series should consider reading it!

I’m also currently writing a new short story collection that is fairytale-themed and is a bit more experimental compared to my past work. I have the first draft done and I look forward to edits and revisions! 

Zilla: Thanks for sharing your story and your process. We’re looking forward to reading! Where can the Night Beats community find you and your book?

Claris: Refilling The Well released on February 10^th, 2025! You can order it here. 

As for where you can find me, check out the following:

Website: https://clarislam.ca 

Newsletter: https://buttondown.com/clarislamauthor 

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/clarislamauthor/ 

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/ClarisLamAuthor 

Bluesky: https://bsky.app/profile/clarislamauthor.bsky.social 

Tumblr: https://clarislam.tumblr.com/ 

Bookbub: https://www.bookbub.com/profile/claris-lam 

Goodreads: https://www.goodreads.com/author/show/22277014.Claris_Lam 

Every Tuesday, get to know a bit about the stories behind the books you love, and discover your next favourite novel.

Zilla: We all need a good zombie story now and again, and even better if our human heroine is queer. This is why I invited Joseph Picard here to tell us about his post-apocalyptic novel, Lifehack. Joseph, can you introduce us to your book?

Joseph: Lifehack follows Regan as she breaks up with her cheating girlfriend then moves in with her brother. One of his peers twists a medical nanotech project into a zombie plague (the old slow/dumb kind) as a resignation letter.

Regan looks for her brother in the quarantined city for 2 years before she’s ‘rescued’ by a soldier she falls for immediately. Alisia’s a redead, and Regan’s been alone and going slightly batty. Priorities get a little jumbled, and the original culprit is still a potential threat out there somewhere.

Lifehack began my first series and impacts many of my books, even in my 3rd series.

Zilla: What inspired you to write this book?

Joseph: At the time, I’d only ever done one-shot short stories, but Regan and her exploits grew into 4 shorts, which eventually were refined into a book. I was drawing a lot back then—feedback on art of Regan actually resulted in Regan’s orientation… it seemed to fit her.

Zilla: Is your work more plot-driven or character-driven? Or a secret, third thing?

Joseph: Dungeons and Dragons-driven? I come up with a scenario, then sprinkle characters into it. Once they’re ‘active’ I lose most of the control. They reveal hang ups or quirks as events unfold. They fall in love, solve, or create danger. Sometimes they end up pitted against each other. I can kind of predict their path, but a few have surprised me.

Zilla: What’s your next writing project?

Joseph: The Daughter of Erebus series (which expands from the last book in Lifehack’s series, Echoes of Erebus) is coming soon. Daughter of Erebus: Sparrow is currently in the hands of my editor. Meanwhile, I’m chipping away at Daughter of Erebus: The Wronged.

There are still a ton of questions about Sarah’s future. She strives to lead a normal life, but being made out of tech made by Lifehack’s mass-murderer makes public relations a bit dicey. Sarah and her human found family have to face threats from other nano-creations, and public distrust. And despite wanting to keep life as simple as possible, romance finds a way, and Danielle finds a way, too… it confuses Sarah’s synthetic brain thousands of times faster than it would a human’s. She’s got neurosis down to a science.

Zilla: Thanks for sharing your story and your process. We’re looking forward to reading! Where can the Night Beats community find you and your book?

Joseph: Amazon has my kindle, paperback, hardcover, and audibles. But if you’re not an amazon fan, (who could blame ya?) my personal site has links to the books2read links for all my books. For example, you can find Lifehack.

You can find me hanging out on FB, (thoughI’m trying to back off a little from FB given some recent moves by zuck), and I’m settling into Bluesky.

Every Tuesday, get to know a bit about the stories behind the books you love, and discover your next favourite novel.

Zilla: I devoured C.L. Methvin’s gruesome, touching and grotesque collection of short stories Eusect. I was delighted when they agreed to do an interview with us so I could pick their brains (not literally). C.L., can you tell us a bit about your book?

C.L.: It is a collection of horror shorts all flavored with Southern Gothic dread, varying in tone from subtle SCP-esque horrors to explicit gore, and in length from ~500 words to 6k+. Blurbed as follows:

The end is scary. The perpetual is scarier.

A suicidal housemate’s property regresses in ownership. A father is tormented by his immortal infant son. A school of fish offers communion with the heavens. A woman’s dead body multiplies across the world. These fourteen stories of terror, gore, and dissociation present people facing themselves and the infinite―often both at their worst.

Zilla: Let’s start with an introduction—between you and your characters. What would they say if they met you?

C.L.: “How fucking dare you.”

Zilla: Honestly, I can’t fault them for it, though as a reader I’m glad you did. Of all the characters you’ve tormented, who’s your favourite?

C.L.: In general: probably Aften from my 2022 novella Biting Silence. The book presents the story and characters in media res, and as such the reader doesn’t have much to go on to really meet the characters, essentially treating the reader as a wallflower. The circumstances under which the reader is introduced to Aften make him very swiftly (I think) a sympathetic character. What makes him my favorite is how one then watches his actions unfurl alongside other character vignettes and context(s) and slowly realizes the behavior and sympathy may not have been deserved. 

In EUSECT, probably the cute old woman Miriam, for reasons I’ll let the reader discover 😉

Zilla: Oh, Miriam. She’s certainly committed to self-discovery, and you have to admire someone who doesn’t let age slow her down from seeking new experiences. I’m a sucker for a love story, so as a reader, I’d pick Richard. When you’re in reader-mode, who’s your favourite character?

C.L.: It’s hard to choose just one, but probably Dorian Gray. The horrors he faced and enacted were just so human, even if the compulsion via portrait wasn’t necessarily. He was captivating, unapologetic, malleable, indulgent in his vices—and all of these wrapped up into a naïve socialite made for the perfect mixture of a man who could get away with anything. I find my favorite characters are often those who captivate (whether good or bad) by being extremely human. Martin’s Tyrion Lannister is clever; Woolf’s Mrs. Dalloway is endearing; Ellis’s Clay is infuriating—each of them exemplify certain traits so wholly that everything they do is painted by it, and that consistency regardless of circumstance makes them feel real.

Zilla: After all this chat about characters, would you say you’re a character-driven writer?

C.L.: Definitely more character-driven! My general style of writing is to envision a character and circumstance and then let them interact with the situation. I find in many cases, plotting (for me) gets easily derailed because I may have outlined what I need, but if the characters would not organically reach that point, then the story doesn’t go there. Cliché as it may be, the characters often write themselves. 

Zilla: Beyond following the characters’ lead, do you do any research for your books?

C.L.: It depended on the story in EUSECT: for some, none; for others, maybe a few days of on-and-off research. I’m not one to write too heavily on a topic if I’m not familiar, for fear of misrepresenting an element of it. 

Zilla: Thanks for sharing your story and your process. We’re looking forward to reading! Where can the Night Beats community find you and your book?

C.L.: Handles on Twitter and Bluesky, and EUSECT can be found for purchase in various forms on tRaum Book’s site!

Every Tuesday, get to know a bit about the stories behind the books you love, and discover your next favourite novel.

Zilla: If you’re in the mood for a science fiction adventure, you are in luck, because Fiona Moore is here to tell us about their novel, Rabbit in the Moon. Fiona, take it away!

Fiona: Here’s the blurb:

Ken Usagi, a daring young journalist from the icy wilderness of Nunavut, is thrust into a perilous journey through the war-ravaged remnants of the former United States. Haunted by a chilling encounter with a mysterious biotechnical machine—a relic from his troubled childhood—he becomes convinced it holds the key to ending the devastating conflict tearing the world apart.

Far to the south, Totchli, a brilliant young biotechnician from a Mesoamerican society pummeled by catastrophic climate change, receives a desperate order. He must venture north to uncover the fate of a critical colonial expedition, a mission that once carried the last hopes of his people’s survival. Communication channels with the expedition have fallen eerily Silent.

As Ken and Totchli embark on their separate quests, the very fabric of reality begins to unravel. Their paths converge, leading to a fateful encounter where the boundaries of their worlds blur and shatter.

Zilla: What inspired you to write this book?

Fiona: The initial inspiration was something of a mashup. I had been watching Apocalypse Now while also reading the Raffles novels and Castle Keep, and I had an irresistible image of a riverboat going through a jungle, crewed by Harry Manders from the Raffles novels and Alfred Benjamin from Castle Keep. When I have an image like that, I start exploring it. How did it happen? Where are they going? What are they looking for? It all just came from there.

Zilla: I love that! Were there any other images that inspired you?

Fiona: As well as that mental image, there was another source. A friend of mine told me a story about how, on an early morning walk, he’d seen two magpies herding a rabbit. One driving it from behind, the other hopping in front. That struck me as a very sinister image, but also one that tied in with the novel—these people, symbolically associated with rabbits, being driven by forces they don’t understand towards conclusions that might be disturbing.

Zilla: How much research did you need to do for your book?

Fiona: On the one hand, a lot—on the other, hardly any! I’m a university professor in my day job, and I’m very interested in Indigenous approaches to economics as an alternative to the growth-focused model. This is one of the reasons why the novel centres on two futures, one in which the Inuit are the most stable and successful society in North America, and another, where an Aztec-influenced post-human society dominates.

Zilla: Thanks for sharing your story and your process. We’re looking forward to reading! Where can the Night Beats community find you and your book?

Fiona: You can buy the book here: https://books2read.com/u/mVLQgp and I am drfionamoore on Facebook, LinkedIn, Twitter, Instagram, BlueSky and TikTok. My blog is www.adoctorofmanythings.com.

Every Tuesday, get to know a bit about the stories behind the books you love, and discover your next favourite novel.

Zilla: We can all use some beauty in our lives—the open ocean, teeming with life, the unshackled consciousness we call dreams, and the joy of sharing both with each other. Clara Ward’s ecofiction gives us all of these in their book, Be the Sea. Clara, can you introduce us to your book?

Clara: Be the Sea dips into a queer neuro-inclusive future with chosen family, sea creatures, and mysterious dreams.

In November 2039, marine scientist Wend Taylor heaves themself aboard a zero-emissions boat skippered by elusive nature photographer Viola Yang. Guided by instinct, ocean dreams, and a shared birthday in 1972, they barter stories for passage across the Pacific. Aljon, Viola’s younger cousin, keeps a watchful eye and an innovative galley. Story by story, the trio rethink secrets, flying dreams, and how they experience their own minds.

Zilla: What inspired you to write this book?

Clara: My earliest memories are of the ocean. I was born in Kāneʻohe, Hawai’i, back when loving the ocean meant fighting to protect Kāneʻohe reefs from human sewage.

Rocking on a boat or standing with surf lapping at bare feet has always been my happy place. After half a century, I realized that wherever life threw me, I always returned to the ocean. My fight has grown to include climate change, ocean acidification, plastic and other pollutants—too much for a single person or a single lifetime. Alongside this realization came the characters for my story, a near-future chosen family drawn together by mysterious forces and their love of the sea.

Zilla: Who did you imagine reading your book as you wrote it—your own chosen family of readers?

Clara: While writing, my head was full of characters who cared enough to act. Whether a teacher, scientist, sailor, photographer, lawyer, or marine lifestyle entrepreneur, each found their own path to preserving the ocean. I wrote my characters’ grief over losing the coral reefs alongside their drive to protect a giant manta ray. I believed readers as diverse as my characters could share a sense of wonder and be inspired with love for the ocean, the earth, and each other. People want to save what they love. I pledged all my royalties to Conservation International and launched Be the Sea out into the world.

I found plenty of kindred spirits while speaking on environmental and marine science panels. However, the readers who embraced the book most fiercely from the start, some literally hugging the book to their chests, were those who saw themselves in my neurodivergent, nonbinary, and queer protagonist. Those readers not only changed my connection to our community, but they literally changed the trajectory of Be the Sea a month after it came out. Neurodivergent readers especially told me they, or someone they wanted to share the book with, needed an audiobook version right away. I told my tiny indie publisher, Atthis Arts, and they supported this shift in scheduling. The audiobook for Be the Sea came out in December!

Zilla: If your characters met you, what would they say to you?

Clara: I live in Silicon Valley now, and half the young people I know have jobs that could be read as science fiction by outsiders. They challenge society to accept them as they are: queer, trans, neurodivergent, proud. They ask when—not if—sea level will rise a meter, and they take for granted that we need alternatives to fossil fuels and plastic packaging as soon as possible. It has become common to hear people of all ages say that we need a solution for these problems yesterday. Sadly, although my book takes place fifteen years in our future, that’s what I hear my characters saying to me. I did the best I could, and wrote Be the Sea for them, yesterday.

Zilla: I love this. Thanks for sharing your story and your process. We’re looking forward to reading! Where can the Night Beats community find you and your book?

Clara: You can find me (and lots of bonus material for my book!) on my website (https://clarawardauthor.wordpress.com/novels/be-the-sea/). Be the Sea is available at your favorite online or brick-and-mortar bookseller.  Or go directly to my small press publisher, Atthis Arts (https://www.atthisarts.com/product/be-the-sea/) and use code BETHESEA this week only to get 20% off your entire order and a free Sea Creature postcard!

Every Tuesday, get to know a bit about the stories behind the books you love, and discover your next favourite novel.

Zilla: Some stories are so real, so important, that we turn to fantasy and fable to give them life. Lauren C. Teffeau gives us a book like this in her environmental fantasy novella A Hunger with No Name. Lauren, can you tell us a bit about your book?

Lauren: A Hunger with No Name is a coming-of-age tale with an environmental focus featuring an immersive fantasy setting inspired in part by the high desert of New Mexico.

Thurava of Astrava is intended to become a herder, a most honored position for her dwindling community that clings to life on the banks of the Najimov, the river that’s the lifeblood of the high desert. But the Glass City on the horizon threatens the delicate balance the Astravans have managed to hold on to for centuries, polluting the air and water as the city grows bigger and bigger. The Glass City’s clockwork liaisons offer to bring the Astravans into the Glass City’s walls, but they will have to give up their ways and their precious herds to do so. Thurava must decide who she is without her animals, using the stars as her guide, putting herself on a collision course with the secrets the Glass City holds dear.

Zilla: Is there a visual image that inspired this book?

Lauren: I had a dream of a young woman staring off toward the horizon and being both horrified and fascinated by what she saw. When I woke, I started writing the story that ultimately became the book.

Zilla: Is your work more plot-driven or character-driven? 

Lauren: No story is exactly the same, but I seem to have developed two writing modes: possession projects and battle projects. Battle projects are usually idea- or world-forward in that I have an idea or story world I want to explore in a narrative way. The trick is finding the right point-of-view character to bring that idea or world to life. That process can often feel like a battle as I try to fit all the pieces together into a cohesive whole and find a compelling character to chart the way. My debut novel Implanted was like this—I had a very ambitious idea for a world, but it took a while to settle on my main character.

In contrast, possession projects like A Hunger with No Name are story ideas that are more character-forward. And once I know the character, I usually have an idea of how the story should be structured to best capture their arc. Once those pieces are in place, the writing process often feels like the story is possessing me until I fully get it out of my system and onto the page.

Zilla: I love that description of writing projects—I relate to that a lot. Who did you imagine reading your book as you wrote it? 

Lauren: I was thinking of my daughter and things I wanted to know about how the world worked when I was growing up. The book examines a lot of different types of female relationships: mothers and daughters, female friendships, encounters with women from different generations, and I hope the book provides some insights on how to navigate those relationships. It’s too early to know who will read the book as it’s only been out a few weeks, but I hope it finds readers interested in folklore, science fantasy, automatons, and the high desert.

Zilla: Thanks for sharing your story and your process. We’re looking forward to reading! Where can the Night Beats community find you and your book?

Lauren: You can find me at my website, or on Instagram, Bluesky, or Linktree. My book is for sale at the press website, as well as Amazon, Barnes and Noble, and on Bookshop.

Every Tuesday, get to know a bit about the stories behind the books you love, and discover your next favourite novel.

Zilla: Night Beats contains plenty of writers, so what about a story starring one? Reggie Morrisey is here to tell us about her contemporary novel, Flights of Fancy, that offers us exactly that! Reggie, can you tell us about your book?

Reggie: The painting The Last Supper, by my artist husband Vincent Mancuso, graces the eBook cover, realizing in pastels my vision of the life of Sage Anthony.

I started to imagine her life on a 2014 transatlantic flight to New York and filed away my notes in a folder labeled ‘Tomorrow File.’ For literary purposes, let’s say I imagined her story on a flight from Paris to New York.

Sage Anthony is a mystery writer, pigeonholed into a genre that bores her. Murder in medieval convents and abbeys are her stock and trade, but she cannot write gore anymore. After growing up in New York’s Hudson Valley minus a biological father, taunted by a homicide-detective stepfather and wary of Stepfather #2, Sage has a mind rife with suspicion. Blunt trauma to her head makes her thirty-something life tortured, even though she lives in a loft apartment on the New Paltz, New York estate of an aging billionaire who is obsessed with her––but then, so was his wife.

Unconditional love eludes Sage. Guarded affairs and a fixation with finding her “Dad” consume her. Her Irish-born mother is similarly guarded in her affairs, critical of Sage’s choices, and she fumes as a 21st century American patriot. Her daughter is not tuned into politics or current events, only the weather.

Sage’s life proves the maxim, “What you think about expands.” Up against a book deadline, her creativity kicks in an unlikely direction. Luck follows as Sage strikes it rich and does whatever she fancies at her own New Paltz estate and in France. 

The book takes you to France more than once. The last trip is capped by a February 2020 stopover in Milan for Fashion Week. Remember what happened in the winter of 2020 in Milan and the rest of the world? Yes. That.

Zilla: What’s the link between music and your book?

Reggie: Music plays a role in all my books. Characters reveal themselves in the music that feeds their souls, and it even hints at their moods and ulterior motives.

Zilla: What author do you wish would read your books?

Reggie: Amor Towles is my ideal choice to read my books. The author of A Gentleman in Moscow is a master of plot, dialogue, pace and eras, and when it comes to surprise endings, Towles has the instincts of Edgar Allen Poe.

Zilla: What role does the setting play in your book?

Reggie: Location is so vital in my stories that each setting could be called a character.

Zilla: What’s your next writing project?

Reggie: The sequel, Gossamer Wings, launches in 2025.

Sabitha: Thanks for sharing your story and your process. We’re looking forward to reading! Where can the Night Beats community find you and your book?

Reggie: You can find Flights of Fancy by clicking on my Amazon Author Page, or aim your device camera to scan the QR-code.

Follow me on Instagram@OfTwoMinds2, and find me on Goodreads. Check out my Reading Nook interview about my 2022 eBook, The Monks of Malibu. And visit my website to read short stories and essays, read or listen to my poetry, see works of art and learn more about Flights of Fancy

Every Tuesday, get to know a bit about the stories behind the books you love, and discover your next favourite novel.

Zilla: There’s a lot of doom and gloom in the world, and sometimes what we need is a reminder that more hopeful futures exist. Brightflame is here to tell us about their solarpunk fantasy, The Working, which offers us just that spark we need.

Brightflame: A modern coven must thwart a looming eco-cataclysm and find the key to the bright futures we need.

Betsy’s a modern-day Witch with an ageless problem: she’s worried about screwing up her coven’s ritual. Again. But the coven has a bigger issue to face—a greed-fueled entity will soon obliterate Earth’s ability to support life.

Zilla: What inspired you to write this book?

Brightflame: I wrote The Working to answer my own burning question: what can we do about the massive ills of the world, not only our climate emergency, but all the intertwined ills that include fascism, racism, and greed? What is the Working to counteract this and restore a vibrant, regenerative Web of Life? I didn’t have an answer when I began to write.

I also wanted to embed real magical practice and ritual for younger Witches and covens—or anyone drawn to an Earth-based spiritual path.

Zilla: I love that, but let’s delve deeper into your inspiration. Is there a visual image that inspired you?

Brightflame: A pentacle—the five-pointed star—inspired the structure of The Working. There are five coven members in the story, each with their own point of view. A pentacle represents interconnection—each point is connected to every other point. The number five also represents the Elements: Air, Fire, Water, Earth, and Spirit.

Zilla: If you could meet your characters, what would you say to them?

Brightflame: I would thank them for their wisdom and allowing me to tell their stories. Yes, this is a work of fiction. Still, I got to know Betsy, Sail, Fire, Mari, and Tal as dear friends through the years of writing the book. And the five Old Ones in the story are based on my actual Ancestors who I met in the astral realm and who told me to get this story out to the world!

Zilla: And what would they respond back!

Brightflame: I fear the five coveners would ask who my favorite is. But that would be like asking who my favorite child is. I love them all!

Zilla: What’s your next writing project?

Brightflame: I’m shopping my story collection that forms a mosaic novel—the stories are all set in the same solarpunk future through time. Some of them are published—links on my website. And I’m working on a nonfiction Solarpunk Witchcraft book.

Zilla: Thanks for sharing your story and your process. We’re looking forward to reading! Where can the Night Beats community find you and your book?
Brightflame: Visit my site https://brightflame.com and consider subscribing to my newsletter and blog. My book: https://waterdragonpublishing.com/product/working/   Follow me on Instagram (@brightflame.2), Bluesky (@BrightFlame), Facebook (@brightflame.1), and Mastodon (wandering.shop/@BrightFlame)