Welcome to my Blog-o-sphere!

I have never been a blogger. During my entire life, I always shyed away from blogs, public forums of any kind, etc. Even my writing, I often kept it pretty close to the vest, very private. Naturally, the decision to put my words, my stories, and MYSELF out there is absolutely terrifying to me right now. But, from everything I've learned and seen, I knew it must be done.

So this will be my nice, short and sweet introduction to, not only my blog, but my official author website!

HI! Welcome! I'm Tori! Thanks for joining me here! If you are reading this post, or even on this website, it means you have an interest in my debut novel A CROWN OF STAR & ASH, which is coming out in January of 2024. Right now, all the covers are not the official covers, but rather place holders until my cover reveal.

I started writing when I was very, very young. I want to say that my first finished novel was when I was about 14--with about a dozen other non-finished novels, and very, very long serialized fan fiction on a website that now only exists on the Way-way-Back-Machine (RIP). But during those long writing stints, I never liked to share my writing. Not with my family, partners, or most of my friends. My best friend and I swapped notebooks with our WIP, and that was the only person who ever read my private writing.

My books have always been personal things to me. They are pieces of my heart, parts of me I scraped out of the bottom of my soul. Bits of me that I'm always secretly afraid to be judged by the world. But A Crown of Star & Ash was different. It was borne from a very traumatic, very dark time in my life that left an everlasting impact on my mind, heart, and body.

I'll definitely be dedicating an entire blog post in the future to the backstory of ACOSAA, but long story short, Deya's journey was a mirror of my own battle with CPTSD and the after-effects of trauma and extended abuse. This book exploded out of me in a single month. After six years of not being able to write almost anything, I sat down and within a month my most complex, diverse, and intricate story and world was sitting in front of me.

Deya, Caelum, Val, and Rayner were friends to me as I came to terms with my own pain and trauma, and how it had changed me and my body and mind. With this book, I was able to put a bit of that pain to rest...to peace.

I'm so excited to share this world with you all! I could not think of another story more fitting to be my debut novel.

I hope you stick around to join me!

Love,

Tori