book cover – HESSE PHILLIPS

Lightborne Updates: Paperbacks & Staying Alive

I must admit I love a good paperback. Smaller, lighter, easy to carry, a paperback book feels like a close friend. I love the subtly textured surface and faint newsprint smell of the paper, and the way the spine of a truly beloved paperback becomes grooved and whitened with age. Hardbacks are great and all, don’t get me wrong – but a paperback is a living thing.

So naturally I was giddy with excitement when my complimentary author’s copies of the forthcoming Lightborne paperback edition showed up at my door the other day. I’ve seen PDFs of the new cover and therefore thought I knew what I was getting into when I opened the box, but no PDF could possibly do it justice.

I think someone in the design department at Atlantic Books must have heard me going on and on about how much I loved the gold on the “deluxe” edition cover from last year, because they went all-out with it. Believe me when I tell you, this baby glows.

And it looks pretty great from the back too.

With the official paperback launch date set for 6 March, preorders are of course available (and encouraged!) But for those who prefer ebooks, the ‘Zon is also running a Kindle Deal on Lightborne for the month of February, where you can score a copy for just £2.19.

It should probably go without saying that all of this is coming at an exceedingly weird time, particularly yet not exclusively if you’re American like myself, and particularly yet not exclusively if you happen to also be queer, and writing queer books, and plan to continue being and doing all of those things for as long as you have breath in your body. I am glad, at the very least, that I made some difficult but necessary decisions to start out the year, and intend to carry that energy with me into whatever comes next.

The intersection of my self and my obsession with history means I cannot avoid writing about queer survival under truly intolerable conditions – history is sadly saturated with them. It also means, of course, that not everybody makes it out alive, and those that do emerge scarred, battered, and at least a little bit broken. But we will always have a future, even in the bleakest of times. History may often show us in our darkest hour, but it also offers hope: we’ve always been here, and will always be here.

For me, the most important words I wrote in Lightborne were these:

You must live because I love you – because you must be avenged
– because to live is a form of vengeance, when so many have
sought to destroy you.

Sometimes it comes down to that: staying alive. Because us staying alive really pisses off the ‘phobes.

And if I’ve learned anything about myself this year, it’s that I get a kick out of pissing off ‘phobes.

Lightborne Updates: UK Paperback Sneak Peek

I can’t help but want to talk about perhaps too many things in this post, as I know many of us are still reeling after last week. Perhaps shocked and blindsided, perhaps proven right in the worst way possible, perhaps teetering just above despair. Anyone celebrating is invited to leave at this point. Anyone lashing out, lighting fires, throwing blame at those more vulnerable than themselves, screeching “I told you so” as they rub salt into others’ open wounds, is invited to seek therapy.

It feels very strange and not a little delusional to be talking about my book at a time like this. Not that it doesn’t feel strange to talk about the future at all, given how little we can say for certain about it, other than that things look bleak. They certainly look bleak if, like me, you are a queer author who writes queer books. As I discussed at length in my previous blog post, we could easily be entering a dark age in terms of art and literature, an age in which books like mine will become hotly contested objects. But it’s one thing to worry about whether or not your book might still be legal in your home country a year from now, quite another to worry whether you, as a human being, will also be legal: your marriage, your passport, your family, your friends, your livelihood, your joy, your resistance, your thoughts, your dreams.

However, as a number of other queer authors have also pointed out, there’s no sense whatsoever in backing down before the fight has even truly begun. We are already tired, especially those of us who have been targeted before, but I hope we are far from giving up. Now is a time for those of us who can afford to be loud to scream with all our might.

Knowing my history as a queer person is a double-edged sword, because I’ve seen my community in its darkest hour, but I’ve also seen us emerge from that darkness, again and again. Whatever is coming, we have every right to feel dread in the pits of our stomachs, but also every reason to believe we will find ways to survive it. As Marlowe says in Lightborne, “to live is a form of vengeance, when so many have sought to destroy you.”

As long as humanity lives, we live. I’m sure it drives those who hate us crazy.

All that said, I’m extremely lucky to have exciting things to look forward to in 2025, among them the paperback launch of Lightborne in the UK. Come what may, in March there will be a whole new edition of the book out in the world, with a stunning new cover to rival the old one.

And now, without further ado:

We still have the beautiful gold accents that gave the original cover such a bold presence on the shelf, but now with a much darker, moodier atmosphere, and even a subtle appearance from Kit Marlowe himself. I chose this design among several options – it wasn’t easy, as they were all impressive – but I loved this one for that rich blue tapestry background, and the vintage feel of the design.

The back cover, I should add, is equally gorgeous:

Those who have read the book already will surely recognize Frizer’s knife peeking out! I fought for that knife, I will say, and I’m so glad I did. Authors – this is me advising you to fight for things you want on the cover. You might not get them, but you’ll have no regrets.

I’m beyond excited to see the paperback in its full glory, as I hope readers will be as well. Whatever dangers are barreling down at us from the future, I hope we’re able to find reasons to stay excited and engaged. After all, the world desperately needs that from us. Our anger and outrage is necessary, but so is our hope, our creativity, our joy.

It might mean the difference between simply getting through whatever comes next, and doing the work that desperately needs to be done: of building a better world than the one we started with.

Lightborne Updates: Cover Sneak Peek!

Before we get into the thing you’re actually here for, let me start this one off by saying, if you’re not listening to the 7AM Novelist Podcast with Michelle Hoover, then start now – not just because yours truly makes the occasional appearance on the show, but because I do so in excellent company. This latest season features an all-star cast, including Anjali Duva, Ron Maclean, Nancy Crochiere, Sara Johnson Allen, Marjan Kamali, Joanna Rakoff, Emily Ross, Andrea Meyer, Virginia Pye, Henriette Lazaridis, Colwill Brown, Crystal King, Chris Boucher, Dawn Tripp, Hank Phillippi Ryan, Mark Cecil, Jenna Blum, Jane Roper, Ethan Gilsdorf, Whitney Scharer, Shalene Gupta, Louise Miller, and many more, all ready to help struggling writers work through whatever’s holding them back from getting words on the page.

Recently there were two back-to-back episodes dealing with the stressful process of publishing your first book, as Aube Rey Lescure hopped on to discuss the launch of her debut River East River West, and Kasey LeBlanc, Christine Murphy, and Aaron Hamburger came on to talk about the travails of starting book 2. Listening as someone who can relate all too well to the topics at hand, I found my mental state veering wildly between excited and despairing, inspired and terrified.

Let’s be real: publishing a book is the thing we writers tell ourselves will finally make our lives fall into place, fix our self-esteem issues, vindicate our hard work, even solve lifelong crises of identity. For over a decade, it was the thing I felt I had to do, if only to justify the time and money I’d sunk into writing my soon-to-debut novel, Lightborne. And of course, I am thrilled beyond belief that it is finally happening. But I’m also learning that publication will fix absolutely none of the above problems. It will, in fact, create a few new ones.

Now that debut authors are speaking more openly about the mental health struggles they face in the lead-up to pub day, what emerges is the clear need for us to support one another. The tawdry, soul-crushing business of self-promotion can feel desperately lonely; the burgeoning public exposure can make you paranoid and crash whatever modicum of self-esteem you’d built-up since surviving high school. The dark, primal urge to dig yourself a burrow and hide in it starts to take over.

But this is why community is so essential to the debuting author. It may come via social media, or through writing groups and classes, or – just maybe – through fellow listeners of a writing podcast. I’m very fortunate to know many of the panelists on the 7AM Novelist through the legendary Boston writing center, Grub Street, where I participated in the Novel Incubator Program some [cough cough] years ago. But one of the great things about the 7AM Novelist is how it allows writers from all around the world to make connections. Seeing ideas exchanged and friendships forming in the chat box during every live episode recording truly warms this withered old heart.

So I very much hope anyone reading this will be sure to check out the show and support the author panelists: google them, subscribe to their newsletters, buy their books! This season is particularly exciting because every episode deals with questions submitted by listeners – even though I’m on again tomorrow, Jan 11th, I still don’t know what topic we’re going to get. So if you have a sticky issue to work out with your WIP, your writing practice, or career, please do go to the podcast page and submit your answer to the question, “What’s holding you back?” Maybe I’ll even get a chance to help you through it.

And now that you’ve scrolled all the way down here, you may collect your reward: a first look at Lightborne’s lush, evocative final cover!

As you can see, the cover will build on the proof design, using the same black and gold damask pattern and a simply gorgeous font based on 16th century typography. I’ve been informed that the pattern will, in fact, be stamped in gold foil – so in person, it’s going to be stunning!

Preorders are rolling out, so please check with your local booksellers. For those who use NetGalley, ARCs will be available soon.