Adapted from Jocelyn’s newsletter, originally sent August 28, 2026.
A note from the writing of Rapture, August 2026.
No podcast, no music, no audiobook. I need silence when I walk.
We have a massive trail system here, but I walk the same wooded loop every time.
It's a big lollipop shape. Some days I bend it into a figure eight and add another mile. Other days I turn around and walk the same trail backwards. I walk this one on purpose.
Out there I don't have to decide anything. There's not a lot of distraction. Trees and ferns and the trail. I don't have to think about which way I'm turning at the fork. One foot in front of the other over and over.
That's the point. My body handles it so my brain can leave. And it leaves.
It grabs the reins and gallops out into imaginary worlds. I come back an hour later with no memory of the last two miles and something new in my head.
(This is also why I have walked past neighbors, waved at them, and retained no memory of the encounter. If that was you, I'm sorry. I was in another dimension and you were not invited.)
Four years ago it came back carrying a scene.
It was not a light landing.
It smacked me in the head.
Hard.
Reunion was a handful of chapters into the first draft. The characters were still deciding who they were going to be on the page. And this thing landed fully formed.
Not the destination, not the journey to get there, just the image of what it looks like when they arrive. A postcard from a place I hadn't gotten to yet.
I stopped walking and said, out loud, to nobody: oh shit.
I've carried it ever since. Through the rest of Reunion. Through all of Reverie. Through two novellas.
It sat there the whole time grinning at me from the corner.
I finished a book last night by one of my favorite authors Robert Jackson Bennett. It's the third book in his new series.
About halfway through I could see exactly where it was going. It was not going to be a pleasant destination.
Not a twist. Not a gotcha. The slow terrible math of these people and these choices adding up to a place none of them want to end up in, and me watching it happen from the outside with absolutely no ability to stop any of it.
Did I stay up until midnight? Nah. I finished it before then. Was that because I balanced the book in my hand while cooking dinner? And then sat at the dinner table and didn't make eye contact with anyone? Why yes, yes it was.
(Just ignore me, I have to finish this. I can't stop now!)
Was it worth it? Do you even have to ask.
That feeling is the entire reason I read. As a writer I love it just as much, because I know exactly what that author was doing and how hard it is to do it well.
Then I sat down at my own desk.
The thing that is so much fun to watch from the passenger seat is not fun when it's YOUR turn to do it. I have lived with these characters for years, and I've known what each step is taking them closer to.
Book three is where several big loops close, which sounds tidy when I write it down, and it isn't. Some of it is really ugly. Some of it is going to leave scars.
It's all going to be so much fun.
So I got here this week.
I looked into the corner where this scene has been sitting. It said, "Are we there yet?"
I said, "Yes."
And it said, "About time!"
I get a few hundred words in and have to go outside and water the plants. My kitchen counters have never been cleaner. I have reorganized a spice drawer that was already organized, and looked directly at the garage, which is when I knew things had gotten out of hand.
There should be a word for the specific state of wanting to write a scene more than anything and also being willing to regrout a shower to avoid it. It should be a German word, because this seems like something a German would create a word for.
Then I come back and write some more words.
It's like walking on broken glass.
The other side of this has to be a slide. Right? You climb the thing for four years and then you let go and just go.
(Wheeeee!)
I'm not telling you what the scene is. Not one word. You'll get there and see the postcard.
But I will tell you this. When you hit it, you'll know it's the one. It has been sitting underneath this whole series.
What's a scene you're still waiting for? Not in my books, in anything. A book. A TV series. A movie. Whatever.
The one in a series you love where you already know it's coming, you've known for books/seasons/years, and you're half dreading the day the author finally writes it.
Tell me what you're bracing for. I want to know I'm not the only one.
Jocelyn
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