Scarlet Witch, Golden Evil...

plus In Other Lands schemes

Hello my charmers,

Today my Scarlet Witch story is out!!! No big deal though, I am completely calm!!!

I was genuinely stunned with delight when I got the email asking me to participate in the Women of Marvel anthology. In an issue with Gail Simone, living legend! Marvel is as close as we get to modern myth-making, stories that spread all across the world and turn with the telling, from the year where all I saw online was The Winter Soldier to the times I’ve turned to relative strangers and gone ‘I cannot talk about A Sport, but have you seen...?’ And I got to choose which character to write about.

It was a very easy choice for me. I’m a long-time fan of witches, figures of tragedy, power and moral ambiguity—I support women’s rights and women’s wrongs--so it had to be Wanda Maximoff. From there came an idea, wanting to lean into both my love for a sinister but cosy witch house and alternate universes. And Darcy Lewis because an irreverent companion to the supernatural always pleases me. And monsters.

Not only did I feel privileged to be asked, but by the artist I was given. My Marvel editor Sarah Brunstad has been waiting for a chance to deploy Arielle Jovellanos’s artistic skill, and I am so proud to have been paired up with her in our joint Marvel debut. I think her art is so gorgeous, flowy and evocative, and pairs up so well with my witchy words. This all happened very quickly over the winter, and I was in terror I’d mess up, but I had great fun and I think it came out beautifully.

Witch House by Sarah Rees Brennan in Women of Marvel

In other news, Long Live Evil is getting a special edition in Ireland. Not in Irish, but a fancy golden foil look which is lovely and supportive of Irish bookshops to do for me, and celebrates the fact that I am Irish—the land of saints and scholars. (I am obviously both.)

I think it’s fabulous and opulent, in a way that evokes my Palace on the Edge (the setting for much of Long Live Evil—the ladies are kept in that tower, the skeleton is in rich garments, those jewels are cursed but very sparkly, do not fall into the Dread Ravine), and it makes me very happy.

If you would like to preorder the golden Long Live Evil

Today is also the last day one can nominate for a Nebula award, and as I would love to write more in the In Other Lands universe (and have schemes to that end) and recognition is helpful to that end, so if you’re eligible to vote and you liked my In Other Lands novelette Tears Waiting to be Diamonds enough… er… you could vote it in…

Vote in the Nebulas

In other news, Sarah is on the move! My baby sis is expecting her second and extending her house, so I said ‘Have my house, feed the cats’ and wandered off to adventure.

First, I visited my publisher in London. Orbit UK has been extremely lovely to me, and Jenni Hill (blue hair) my UK editor is the first one who said she wished to buy Long Live Evil. And so she did! This was the first time we’ve met in person, though we’ve already had long conversations about vampire books and the Viking invasion of York. Same with Nazia Khatun my publicist (the other blue hair), though we’ve already discussed Korean drama Marry My Husband at length. It was so fabulous to eat cupcakes as we made evil schemes. There are so many schemes to come! I will reveal them all as soon as I am allowed.

Right now I’m in St Ives, Cornwall, writing this post and the sequel to Long Live Evil by the sea on a mini retreat with Kat Dunn, writer of the gorgeous Gothic Bitterthorn.

And next…? Briefly back in Dublin to attend a birthday party and rock star Jay Kristoff’s signing for Empire of the Damned, then I will let you know…

This is a very businessy email, so next I write I promise a villain parody as a present. You on my list shall have the parody first.  

2024 is an exciting, terrifying time for me, rocketing back and forth from ‘Are things… going well?’ to ‘Surely not, all will crash to ruin!’ But thank you, for being with me through both ruin and hope.