Happy Thanksgiving
I am thankful for you, my hearts.
If today feels loud and soft at the same time — same.
If you’re cooking, or avoiding cooking, or eating pie for breakfast because nobody can stop you — also same. And if you’re carrying a little tenderness into the day — well, pull up a chair. You’re in good company.
This is my first Thanksgiving without my mom, and everything feels a little… altered. Like someone bumped the table and all the pieces slid an inch to the left. I’m grateful, truly — for the people I love, for the dogs curled against me because they miss her too, for the memories — but there’s grief woven through the gratitude. A little thread of ache in everything.
And before we go any further, let me say this out loud: Thanksgiving is also a colonialist nightmare of a holiday. The mythology we were fed as kids erases a brutal history, and I’m not here to pretend otherwise. But I also believe in choosing gratitude where I can — not in a way that ignores the truth, but in a way that honors it. Gratitude that’s grounded, awake, accountable. Gratitude that says, yes, this day is complicated, and yes, I still choose to notice what’s good.
And honestly? It’s all going to have to be okay this year.
So today, here’s what I’m thankful for:
Readers who show up, even in the messy seasons
Indie creators who inspire me every damn day
Dogs who somehow know exactly when I need a forehead kiss
Found family — the platonic, queer, spiritual, soul-deep kind
Stories that remind us love is still possible, even when the world feels sharp
And you — yes, you — for letting me write from the heart and trusting me with yours
Now… can we talk Black Friday for one hot second?
Because wow, this country feels like a burning dumpster floating down a flooded street wrapped in blinking ads. Capitalism is out here screaming BUY BUY BUY like an unmedicated parrot. (Or a blonde Justin Timberlake?)
So here’s my very soft, very mild Black Friday promo:
If you’re going to buy books anyway…
Buy from indie authors. Support real humans. Support stories that exist because someone loved them into being.
If you want to support my work this weekend, here’s where the magic happens:
💕 Second chances
💕 Grief + healing
💕 Slowest of burns
💕 A lot of heart
💕 Queer love
💕 Trans joy
💕 Christmas in Hawaii
💕 Big feelings, big swoon
Journals & Challenges
📚 Diversify Your Romance with beautiful prompts for the reading year ahead
📚 Studying Ruth companion Bible study journal to Holland, My Heart
📚 Studying Eve companion Bible study journal to When Ivy Met Adam
And truly — if you buy direct or leave a review or share a post or tell a friend? You’ve made my whole weekend. Indie authors feel every single nudge of support.
But listen — if all you do today is rest? If all you do is eat pie and breathe through the grief and let yourself be held? That counts too. That’s enough too.
Happy Thanksgiving, my hearts. I’m thankful for you — in the quiet, honest, complicated way gratitude shows up after a year that changed you.
