Hello and Merry Christmas to all who celebrate.
Is Die Hard a Christmas movie? (wouldn't know. never seen it! Ha!)

I love this time of year because it's a time to reflect on the year and to plan for the next.

I recently picked up The Book of Alchemy: A Creative Practice For an Inspired Life by Suleika Jaouad.

The book centers on the art of journaling and 100 different influential people ranging from Kiese Laymon, Jon Baptiste, Lindy West, John Green, Elizabeth Gilbert, Salman Rushdie share essays on what they've learned from journaling, how they've survived, how they've grown, how they've loved, how they've found magic and creativity. At the end of every section is a journal prompt.

I've read the intro by the author (I need to pick up her memoir Between Two Kingdoms immediately). and I'm looking to take this on as a 100 day project done in community (that means WITH YOU, if you're game!) starting January 11.

You can request the book from the library now so it's available, but my recommendation is to pick up a physical copy (I've linked it below). This is going to be one you'll want to revisit.

Let me know if you're a journaler and if you're interested in joining!

(I've created a Discord channel!)

So I heard you're looking for books to pre-order in preparation for 2026?👀

So you may have heard about pre-orders and you may have heard WHY its important but let's get into it a bit more, in a summarised manner! I will attach the resource of why you should pre-order the books, especially by marginalised authors who depend on these numbers to release more books, get a larger marketing budget (or a decent one), and show that there is a readership for their books!

THE GRAPHICS ARE ALL THE WAY IN THE BOTTOM WITH A BOOKSHOP.ORG UK AND US SHOPS to browse through and HERE is a goodreads list of all the available SWANA books too so you can add it in your TBR!!!!

Why are pre-orders important?

Thank you to authors who continue to educate us readers and the community on why Pre-orders are important! As someone who has been learning this throughout the year and advocating for it,

1. It shows publishers that we, as readers and well buyers, are interested in the books BiPOC authors are publishing

2. The more the book sells (yes, as a pre-order) the more marketing effort goes into it

3. It alerts bookshops, book subs...etc. that the book is doing well and they should stock more of it (this is so important because it shows it'll sell if they do buy it AND this allows more reader to find the book)

4. It helps the authors hit a best seller list (which does wonders for the author and the book)

In a world where SWANA authors make up less than 1% of the trad pub world (thank you to Jananie from Boundless Press for sharing this stats on threads, check her Bindery page out in here and check out Dust Settles North by Deena which was one of the SWANA 2025 releases) we need to continuously share and advocate for the authors who are here now and show that we want more of them!

So, what SWANA books are we pre-ordering in 2026?

Here's a list and attached to this blog post are the books you can click on to pre-order easily if you're in the US or access my bookshop.org list and get clicking! If you're in the UK, here is the bookshop.org list for you guys but some books are missing so I have added the link to get them elsewhere (some are affiliate).
Keep in mind, for some of the books, it is too early as they're not on the list YET but I will update and let you guys know when it is!

Here are the ones missing from bookshop.org:

• Our Ex's Wedding by Taleen Voskuni: Amazon (UK)

• Where No Shadow Stays by Sara Hashem: Amazon (UK), Blackwell's (UK)

• In the Country I Love by Alaa Al-Barkawi: Amazon (UK)

• Everything Comes back to you by Jackie Khalilieh: Amazon (UK)

• Letters from the Last Apothecary by Bita Behzadi: Amazon (UK)

• Ungodly Chaos by Selma Soren: Amazon (UK)

• Bashir Boutros and the Forgotten Realm by George Jreije: Amazon (UK)

AND FINALLY, here are the graphics of the list:

Thank you for subscribing to Chanterelle Solace and Ifrits & Ink! Please do consider joining as a paid member to help us become an imprint and support/uplift marginalised authors in the future for either $5 or $12

Friends, I can’t express how grateful Tatiana and I are for everyone who shared the cover reveal for What Feeds Below! Thanks to you, we earned a Top New Releases banner on Amazon which means people are definitely pre ordering!!! (just FYI, What Feeds Below is cheaper on Bookshop right now if you haven’t pre-ordered yet!)

You’ve seen the outside of the book, now we want to give you this early look at the first page (before we share it publicly!)

Let me know below if you’d sign the waiver and enter the Void.

Happy Holidays folks!

Whatever you celebrate (or don’t) this time of year, I hope you have a happy cosy time.

And for an alternative seasonal option for you monster lovers out there, here are two very short novellas I highly recommend - one spicy, one acespec.

What’s a Girl Gotta Do to Get on the Naughty List? By Kimberley Lemming.

A Black woman is very angry at her cheating spouse and sister, and Krampus might just be the distraction she needs…

This was so funny and so hilariously hot.

Naughty & Nice by Azalea Crowley

I LOVED this adorable queer seasonal novella, a Santa x bigender Krampus acespec romance.

What happens to the human manifestations of Christmas spirits from January to June? They go on a romantic foodie holiday to Portland, of course!

This one is out on 31st Dec.

Much love folks,

Disco x

The closest McKay Used Books is in Manassas, Virginia. On our road trip, we stopped there.

I always love stopping there because I truly never know what I'll find. That makes it super fun. They offer new and used books along with other collectible items like records and video games.

I go for the books (even though if I ever run into a copy of Gallop Racer 2006, I will surely pick it up).

Aisles and aisles of every genre fill the huge store.

I gravitate towards fiction and they often have special editions. My score was the Fairyloot Sleep Like Death by Kalynn Bayron! It's so pretty.

From there we went to Buc-ee's. I'd never been to one before and had no idea what to expect but even what I encountered still wasn't what I imagined. Amazing.