August 5th, 2026

August 2026
First: The Theme

Haha! Not as late as June! To be fair, there’s been a lot going on, and I have a lot to talk about this month, not all of it writing related, though much of it tangentially. There isn’t a theme for this month because there’s just so much to cover, and it’s hard to fit it under one umbrella, so we’re gonna skip that part and move directly into the talking about what I’ve been up to bit.

Let’s go.

Second: The Work

This is probably the bit that’s easiest to cover because it’s where the least has changed. I’m continuing to work on Broken Vessels, and some clogged vents have recently come un-stuck which means the words are flowing easier. I probably say that quite often, but the thing about writing a series this big and complex is that when you have all the moving parts that need to fit together, it’s very easy for the writing process to become extremely herky-jerky and full of constant stops and starts as things start to flow easily for a few chapters before they get log-jammed just a little further down river. That’s not how it goes with every book for me, but it sure is with this one.

In a lot of ways, honestly, things coming unclogged has been the trend of the past month, which will make more sense when I get to the next section. I am also working on the book I received back from my agent, though for the sake of being completely transparent at the moment… it is a mess. There’s a whole PoV that needs to be added, and the book needs to grow by about 50k more words. As anyone who really knows me will tell you, that’s extremely doable, but it wasn’t expected and that’s been a bit of a weight on my neck. I love the story, though, and enjoy writing it, so I will soldier through.

And that gets us to the next section, where the dam actually broke.

Third: On Craft

Ordinarily this part would go in the What I’m Doing section, but this time it’s related to my work, even though it wasn’t work itself. Two weekends ago, now, I attended Tournament of Roses in Portland, a spring HEMA tournament featuring several different categories of weapons. I competed in Longsword and Messer, and I coached two students all the way into the quarter-finals for one, and the other to a silver medal win in the finals, both in longsword. I was—and am—extremely proud of both of them and the sheer amount of hard work they’ve put in over the years and recently.

But me? I got destroyed in longsword. There’s a bit of background for all this and I’ll try to be as succinct as possible. The short version is that I have always struggled with competition. Even before the pandemic I had a whole host of psychological demons that it took me years to fight past, and in 2019 I was on the upswing. I had my best placement in a tournament ever, and had finally started figuring some of my shit out. My trajectory was upwards.

Then Covid happened, and my psychological state was just destroyed. I wont go into the deep details, but on top of catching it like so many others (I was fortunate enough to already be vaccinated by the time it was my turn) I was mentally and emotionally wiped out. When we came out the other side my body has changed. I’d gained weight, I was slower and my cardio was shit. The first tournament I competed in after things opened up again, I was completely thrashed. I could barely breathe in the ring, and my sense of shame at having performed so far below what I felt my level was had me giving myself shit for six months. The next 4 years weren’t much better. My cardio gradually improved as I kept training. I took up another martial art (and man what a blessing it has been to be “just a student” in another context). I worked on myself and on my psychology. I felt like I was improving, albeit slowly. Clawing back bits and pieces of what I’d lost.

But there was also a new, major barrier: I’d developed an anxiety-triggered breathing issue where when I hit a certain stress level my airway would just start closing up and I’d go from being fine to gasping for breath. I was in and out of doctor’s appointments. I saw a Pulmonologist who determined that it was likely psychosomatic and sent me to a speech therapist, who gave me some breathing exercises. That helped some, but I retained the ceiling to my capabilities because for the most part it simply was not possible to fence at full capacity for more than a few seconds without my fear and my anxiety triggering a gagging episode. I’d go from fighting full bore to suddenly ripping my mask off and staggering, unable to breathe. Everyone told me it was psychosomatic. I knew it was psychosomatic, but no amount of pleading or trying to master my fear seemed to do anything other than temporarily alleviate it. It would come roaring back again the moment my stress returned to elevated levels, no matter what I did.

I got thrashed in the longsword tournament at Roses, and my shame spiral started again. I bottomed out the morning of the second day, when I found myself sitting on a bench, feeling once more sorry for myself. I was competing in Messer in a few hours, and I felt like garbage. Worse than a washed-up has-been. I felt like a washed-up almost-was, which is in some ways worse. You get stuck in the cycle of imagining what you were just on the cusp of accomplishing and it becomes this horrible cycle of bitterness and frustration. That emotional pit consumes people. I’ve seen it happen, watched it drive people from their hobbies, loves, relationships. Then something happened I didn’t expect.

I said, out-loud to myself: “I am sick of losing.”

The shame evaporated. I found myself staring at my hands. That was it, wasn’t it? I was just sick of losing. Not “I deserve to win,” not “I am entitled to success.”

Just “I. Am Sick. Of Losing.”

I walked into my messer matches. I lost the first one by a handful of points. I doubled out of the second one. Both were embarrassing, but they carried their lessons. By match 3 I was frothing. I stepped into the ring and said “Not this time.” I closed rapidly. I saw the opening. I took it. I dissected my last two opponents like frogs. I am not saying that the secret to success is to simply refuse to admit defeat—but there is an intense and immutable truth to the idea that when you get sick enough of holding yourself back to actually leverage the skills at your command to the fullest extent of your ability, shit can change, and it can change fast.

Also, I have not had a single gagging fit since I learned to silence my anxiety by giving it a personification and telling that person—in my head—“shut the fuck up.”

Fourth: What I’m doing

I have been deep in the Warhammer mines in my free time, as it has been extremely hot here and the smoke is currently thick in the air around Tacoma. I am back to training regularly, and I am leaning hard into the stuff that relaxes my mind. I have been reading the next several volumes of the Apothecary Diaries, and I finished book 1 of Ravenor. God, I forgot how well Dan Abnett can write. There’s something to the mix of sci-fi, fantasy, space-adventure, and noir detective work that keeps me deeply invested in this story and its characters. I am returning to Ninth House and have started Blacktop Wasteland, an absolutely stunning thriller by S.A. Cosby.

I also told my agent that if the chance to write for the Black Library comes up at any point, I want to write for 40k. 100%.

Oh, do you want to see some pictures? Here’s a few:

In Conclusion, or What’s Next?

As of the time of this writing, Glassblade Chapter 17 is going out to early access on 8/10/26, and 16 drops on Wattpad on Friday. I am deep in the word mines, which is part of the reason for the delay on this Newsletter, but as I said in last month’s notification, better to be getting my work done and be late on my communiques, than stay in touch regularly and fall behind on the stories for which y’all actually come to this place. Next month’s newsletter should be on-schedule, and I’ll have some other interesting stuff to talk about then. Until then, I remain hard at work, and bringing you fun stuff to read!

Stay healthy, stay friendly, stay curious.

-Joe