🎧 You can now listen to the audio version of this newsletter
In this issue:
jj’s moving castle
The majority of November was spent traveling, it feels like. At the very beginning of the month, Bear and I took a short trip down to Charleston and brought Castor and Pollux with us. The boys behaved beautifully for the most part, and we even introduced them to the beach.
Pollux was enamored, Castor...less so.
Immediately after our Charleston excursion (and I mean immediately), I jetted off to LA, and then to Seoul with my mother and little brother — my first time since the pandemic began, and my brother’s first since he was a child. We were only gone for a week this time, and it was definitely not long enough to eat everything I wanted to eat while I was there.
Some select photos from the trip:
From now until the end of the year, I don’t expect to be on social media much as I need to my butt in gear with the Guardians 2 draft. Of course, I say that, but watch me upload 3x a day. 💀
🧹 some housekeeping
With what seems like the imminent (?) death of Twitter, I’ve done some major organization here on and she abandons her mind to obscure arts. You can now subscribe and unsubscribe to various sections of my newsletter below:
Obscure Arts: In-depth explorations of creativity, capitalism, and making art in uncertain times
Orphans of the Same Womb: Photographs, essays, and meditations on being a member of the Korean diaspora and feeling lost in translation
The Morning Realms Dispatch: Updates, extras, and behind-the-scenes info on the Guardians of Dawn series
The Underground: Behind-the-scenes, annotations, and the infamous Unadulterated Wintersong
Sumire: A previously unpublished novel I wrote over a decade ago, now available online
Creative Alchemy: A podcast about the creative alchemy required to transform inspiration into art
There are also sections to which you can subscribe or unsubscribe that are not live on the website itself:
Lexical Gaps: For those who only want monthly updates from me, you can uncheck all of the sections except this one
Bangtan Bang: Thoughts, feels, lyrical analyses, and surprisingly very little squee about 방탄소년단 (BTS)
I’ve also made use of the Chat function on the Substack app, which is sadly only available to iOS users at the moment. I rather like the Chat function thus far, and until a text-based social media platform replaces Twitter, it will probably be the best place to get short-form JJ. I might even post some more personal photos on there instead of Instagram so I don’t have to think about whether or not they will be good for the Algorithm.™
🧩 lexical gap: doychle
I am one of the fortunate few who does not suffer overmuch (if at all, if I’m completely honest) from jet lag, but damn if doychle doesn’t perfectly describe my state of mind right now. 💀
🌞 the morning realms dispatch
I got copyedits for Zhara right before I left for Charleston, so the vast majority of them were done on the road. With the arrival of copyedits, the publication of my next book feels just that much more real. I can’t wait to share more with y’all as soon as I’m able, including stuff exclusive only to my 절친.
I have a lot of stuff brewing with regards to behind-the-scenes stuff — worldbuilding bibles, character sheets, and more. So much of it I couldn’t include in Zhara itself for the sake of plot relevance and pacing (not to mention she is my thiccest book to date), so I figure I’ll share them here.
I’m a nerd for worldbuilding stuff, okay?
✍🏻 writing updates
For all the traveling I’ve done this month, I got quite a bit of writing done here as well.
I’ve also reopened my Tumblr, mostly as a place to answer questions. If you have a Tumblr account, let me know! I’m still unsure of how I’m going to use it, but yanno, it’s kind of the only text-based social media platform left (that’s not Mastodon) so...
Speaking of which, I’ve also joined Hive and Post. (Both with the handle @sjaejones.) We’ll see if any of them take off. I think I like Hive the best so far, but it doesn’t have a web application, my EDS-thumbs don’t handle typing on a phone very well.
📖 reading
Seasparrow by Kristin Cashore. As per usual, Kristin Cashore knocks it out of the park for me. I love that the majority of her books are essentially intense character studies in a fantasy setting; in fact, when she focuses more on plot (as she does in Graceling and Winterkeep), I find myself less engaged. I think my favorite of the series is still Bitterblue, but Seasparrow is a wonderful addition.
Moira’s Pen by Megan Whalen Turner. I adored this. What a lovely gift for fans of the Attolia books. I live for this sort of extra-textual material; my favorite parts of The Lord of the Rings were, in fact, the appendices. Worlds are my favorite things to escape into, and I am in awe of how thoughtful and fleshed out the universe is.
The Ones We Burn by Rebecca Mix. YA needs more 6 feet tall butch lesbians as protagonists.
📺 watching
Little Forest. On flights to and from Korea, I usually try to watch Korean cinema and of all the movies on offer, this is the one that appealed most to me. While I watched it, I kept thinking, Wow, this feels more Japanese than Korean to me, and lo and behold, I found out later that it is a remake of a Japanese film. I really enjoyed it; it was a refreshing change of pace from the plot-heavy, premise-laden, high stakes-driven media saturating everything lately.
The Dragon Prince: Mysteries of Aaravos. I will admit that this show frustrates me a lot. Storytelling-wise, I find it a hot mess, but I ADORE the characters. They inspire a lot of affection in me — especially Soren (the himbo, of course) — and I care a lot, but I don’t understand any of their arcs? I don’t really understand how the plot ties to their growth? What exactly is happening in the writer’s room there? Regardless, I am still invested enough to see what happens.
The Vow: Season 2. In many ways, I find the second season superior to the first, even though I am aware that it’s not as “good” as the first. Honestly, it’s really the access to Nancy Salzman that carried the documentary for me, which I saw as a portrait of someone coming to understand the harm she’s caused. Nancy is both a villain and a victim, and watching her come to understand that she is the villain was both heart-wrenching and hopeful.
All right, if and when Twitter does go by the wayside, expect to see me update a lot more frequently here. To reiterate, if you only want my monthly updates, you can unsubscribe to all sections except Lexical Gaps here. As we get closer to the publication of Zhara, I may add a separate section that’s only news.
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