ATTENTION: I will be at Conestoga Mall today, Saturday, March 23, 2024. 1-3pm. Selling Books.
If you find yourself thinking, “Holy cow, that is today! In a matter of hours!” you are correct, factually, and equally correct in your tone of pure horror suggesting you are appalled to discover I did not post about this in advance.
If you find yourself thinking, “Holy smokes, Kristopher must be very bad at maintaining a website and that is why this post is so last minute!” well, you are only partially correct.
The real reason this post is so late is that I have been hard at work writing my next Real Love book for Lorimer, and the first draft is due on April 1st! That’s soon!
That’s right, this is also a book announcement post. This post has multitudes.
My new novella is about winter sadness, forming community both IRL and online, my obsession with Animal Crossing, and queer teens falling in 💕love💕, and will be released Spring 2025.
Despite once being a kid who spent way too much time playing video games and being on the internet, I never played a big Massively Multiplayer Online game like World of Warcraft or Final Fantasy XI/XIV. Mostly because I didn’t have enough money to buy a computer that could run a game like that. I did, however, play less demanding, free-to-play MMOs like Runescape, Dofus, Maple Story, and my favourite, Ragnarok Online.
A lot of this book comes from playing those games with my friends. A lot of it comes from a love of cozy games like Harvest Moon and Stardew Valley. But most of it comes from my love of Animal Crossing.
Because I was awarded a grant for the writing of this book, I will now post the logos of both the Ontario Arts Council and the Government of Ontario.
[pause for contractual provincial recognition]
I’ve played every Animal Crossing game since the first English release of Animal Crossing for the GameCube. Years before New Horizons would become a popular, I was slinging coffees for my main man Brewster in New Leaf, which is still my favourite. The giant pigeon man would always insist you drink your coffee while it was still dangerously hot, which may be why I am well known in my household for always burning my mouth. The short story that would become this book was started because I was obsessed with Pocket Camp during NaNoWriMo 2017 and I was dreaming up a future Animal Crossing where I could hang out with my NPC faves and my real friends all at the same time.
The teenagers who read this book will probably have a different, but similarly emotional, reaction to Animal Crossing. For so many, it was a lifeline. A cozy, safe little virtual world to hide in when the outside world was all anxiety and fear. The game to play during lockdown or a two week isolation with case of Covid. A game that makes you feel happy and thankful and cozy and sad, a confusing bundle of recent nostalgia.
Obviously, I am not writing a book set in Animal Crossing, because Nintendo would sue me. The game in my book is, as of writing, called Happy Town and is looking less and less like Animal Crossing every day as I think up ways an MMO might try to appeal to everyone in this meta-verse-obsessed time for tech companies.
As happens, this book is becoming about much more than I planned when I wrote up the outline for it. And as usual, I am riddled with self-doubt and hope that I can turn this into a Good Book in time for people top read it!
To help, I bought a tiny Brewster stuffed toy. His magic is powerful. I can feel it working.
Until next time, true believers and false prophets!
