Here we are at the Autumnal Equinox and I have to marvel at how quickly the summer flashed by. And what a summer it was! Let’s hope Mother Earth calms down a bit—but sometimes you just have to scream and throw things before anybody pays attention. Who can blame her?

Things are brewing in Sorchia’s Universe—as they always do at this time of year.

• Look for a bunch of guest posts on Halloweenie topics from now through October AND a sale on Zoraida Grey and the Family Stones at the end of October.
• I’m teaming up with several outstanding authors to present a newsletter. This month, my contribution is a recipe from the Scotch and Salad Diet. You’ll also find freebies and giveaways galore. Sign up the newsletter HERE.
• Witchling, An Anthology of Zoraida Grey Short Stories is nearing completion and will be available to subscribers to this blog for free for a limited time. I hope this is available by Halloween, but I’m not totally in control of that. Fireworks will explode right here when it happens.
• Zoraida Grey and the Voodoo Queen is in the pipeline. More news soon on release date, cover reveal, and all the other bits and pieces that go with it.
• Zoraida Grey and the Pictish Runes is in progress. I’m about 20 K in and you’ll be seeing snippets and tales from research in the coming months. My goal is to get the manuscript to my editor by the end of the year but we’ll see how that goes.
• I didn’t do a fantastic job of getting the word out about my Novel Magic guests, so here are links to some excellent books for Autumn Reading.

Why Be Normal When You can be PARANormal? by Debra Doggett

New Release in Casi McLean’s Lake Lanier Mystery Series

Some Whisper, Some Shout by K.K. Weil

Paranormal Elements to Boost Mainstream Stories by Connie Johnson Hambley

Now, I have to apologize for being AWOL for August and most of September. I’ve had some sort of brain-zapping, energy-sucking mutant virus which infiltrated my personal biosphere sometime in July and not only made itself comfortable but built a duplex and invited its college buddies over for the summer.

Yes, my virus went to Virus College.

Mercifully, I don’t remember most of it since I self-medicated myself to the edge of a coma. I’m afraid I lost a few brain cells. Unfortunately, I did not lose any appreciable weight. This is how illness works for me—all the suffering and none of the benefits. Nobody felt sorry for me (I did quite a lot of this all by myself, but it would have been nice). Nobody took care of me. And I still don’t fit into my skinny jeans.

Now that I’m on the road to recovery, it’s time to make good on those fever-induced promises I made to the Universe.

As far as I can recall, one of them was to cut down on the drinking—only on holidays. Fortunately, we pagans have a holiday of one kind or another at least twice a month—so there’s a little wiggle room with this one.

Another promise was to lose weight—which means getting back to the exercise and healthy diet which resulted in a loss of about thirty pounds a few years ago. Unfortunately, many of those pounds have crept back when I wasn’t looking. So back to square one.

And all that got me thinking about those little gems of healing magic I’ve come across as I researched.

I did a whole series on healing crystals. Here is one post which will lead you to the others. OR you can select the Category Crystal Fix from the category list on the right.

Crystal Fix: Beryl