Newsletter

Mermaid’s Fury, the fourth Treggan Bay mystery, is out now.

Jern began the book in Thailand, then returned to Devon to walk its lanes, look at its wells and churchyards, and settle the details that make the fictional village of Coplestone Cross feel real. This month, she writes about the old places that keep their stories—and the questions that make their way into hers.

Jern’s update

Devon is a fascinating place, although I suspect it would consider fascinating a rather unnecessary word for something that has managed perfectly well without my opinion for several thousand years.

Some of its villages seem to linger in time. Preservation wins quiet little battles over modernisation; cottages keep their uneven walls, lanes remain confidently too narrow for modern cars, and a chimney leaning at an angle that would alarm any sensible engineer is not considered a structural problem but a feature of historic character. Add ivy and a brass plaque, and it may become important enough that nobody is allowed to straighten it ever again.

On the surface, these villages appear wonderfully coherent. They unite under common causes: cream tea, complaints about the weather, opposition to inappropriate window frames, and the firm conviction that everyone else is driving too quickly through the village.

But beneath that agreement, every place keeps its own private collection of stories.

There are tales of women heard crying beneath the ground, old wells that should not be disturbed, stones that remember promises, and figures glimpsed where the road disappears into rain. The stories change from village to village, and sometimes from one side of the same village to the other. One family tells it as a warning. Another insists it happened to an aunt. Someone else dismisses the entire thing as nonsense, then quietly leaves flowers beside the well.

Perhaps that is what happens when a village is old enough. Stories accumulate like moss. Most disappear when the people who told them are gone, but a few survive—altered, argued over, and polished smooth by generations of retelling. I find myself wondering about the first person who told each one. What did they see? What were they trying to explain? And, perhaps more importantly, what did they want everyone else to stay away from?

I began writing Mermaid’s Fury, the fourth Treggan Bay mystery, while I was still in Thailand. The draft came with a healthy population of asterisks: check the path, check the stone, check whether that sort of village well would still exist, check whether a scream could carry that far in the rain. Very reassuring things to leave for one’s future self on another continent.

So that is how I spent much of July: walking through old villages, looking at wells, footpaths, leaning chimneys and damp churchyards, and quietly finalising the little details that make Noah and Leo’s visit to Coplestone Cross feel real.

The best research, I’ve decided, is a quiet walk through a village at the end of the day, when the lanes are empty and the windows begin to glow. Everything looks peaceful.

Which is, of course, when you start wondering what the village remembers.

– Jern

Eddie’s update

While Jern was walking village lanes and checking wells, I was at the other end of our small publishing operation: maps, proofs, sample files, retailer pages, and the many small checks that sit between a finished story and a book readers can open.

We do this as two people. Jern writes the stories; I help edit and publish them. That can feel very small beside the machinery of publishing, but one of the nicest things this month was watching a Kobo promotion for the first Treggan Bay mystery lead to readers choosing Books 2 and 3—and even preordering Book 4.

The numbers are not enormous. The people are real, and someone wanted to keep going.

That is the part of publishing I want us to keep doubling down on: Jern’s voice, patient books, and real readers finding their way from one village mystery to the next.

– Eddie

Mermaid’s Fury is out now

The old fire was blamed on a mermaid.

In Mermaid’s Fury, shell offerings, an impossible scream, and a dead newspaper file draw Noah and Leo towards the truth behind a 1961 fire in Coplestone Cross.

The fourth Treggan Bay mystery is an atmospheric, clue-led old-case puzzle with village folklore, hidden family history, and Noah and Leo investigating together.

The book page has the free Chapter 5 sample, Series reading order, and current store links.

Read Mermaid’s Fury

Latest and next

Out now

1. Mermaid’s Fury — Treggan Bay Mysteries Book 4

At the desk

1. The fifth Treggan Bay mystery — in its final editorial pass

In closing

Thank you for coming back to Treggan Bay with us.

Thanks, Jern and Eddie Tonkoi

Part 7 of my Audiobook Audio V3 series is now live on Podfeet: The Noise You Notice. It also appears in NosillaCast episode 1110.

Recording at home in Thailand cured me of the idea that audiobook production begins with silence. Trains, motorbikes and birds exist, and some of the birds seem especially committed to joining the cast.

The useful question is not whether a noise exists, but whether it steals attention. A quiet, steady air-conditioner can disappear beneath a voice. A single bright bird call can pull the listener straight out of the story. Worse, cutting around every sound can make the background itself jump and change, creating a new distraction.

My practical rule is therefore simple. I wait out or retake intermittent noises that demand attention. Truly low, steady sound is often better left alone. If something needs attention later, I mark it and continue reading instead of turning a recording session into an editing session.

The aim is not perfect silence. It is stable, boring audio that leaves the story in front—which is much more achievable, and much kinder to everyone involved.

Happy reading,

–Eddie.

Part 6 of my Audiobook Audio V3 series is now live on Podfeet: Leave Headroom. You can also hear the demonstrations in NosillaCast episode 1109.

The lesson arrived while I was recording a scene in which a policeman shouts. My old instinct would have been to lean away from the microphone for safety, but that would also have changed the sound of the voice. This time I stayed put, raised my voice, and trusted the space I had left in the recording.

It worked. The shout sounded like the same person in the same room, simply louder. I could bring its level down later without having baked distortion—or a sudden change of tone—into the performance.

That made headroom feel much less like a technical meter-setting exercise. It is permission to perform naturally without watching the red line or quietly making every dramatic moment smaller. Set the recording level sensibly, separate it from headphone comfort, and then stop negotiating with the meter.

The best kind of headroom is the kind I can forget about once I begin reading.

Happy reading,

–Eddie.

Both halves of Metastable are now out in the world. Carter and Tan’s story has reached the hard-won ending Jern promised—and she has already turned back toward Treggan Bay.

This month, Jern reflects on leaving Carter and Tan to their future. Eddie has been living in headphones, and the next Treggan Bay mystery has moved into production.

Jern’s update

The rain has finally arrived for real. Somewhere across the country, rice farmers are breathing sighs of relief, while everyone else is rediscovering the ancient spiritual practice of drying laundry indoors.

I’m very pleased to announce that Carter and Tan have, at long last, reached their happy ending in Metastable Book 2.

Admittedly, it may not resemble what mainstream romance usually considers a happy ending. Nobody runs barefoot through a field of wildflowers while emotionally available music swells in the background. Believe me, I tried. But Carter insisted barefoot running through unmanaged terrain presented entirely avoidable health and safety concerns.

Still, they are happy, the story ends, and Eddie didn’t once write “gratuitous” in the margins with enough force to puncture the page. I consider that a triumph.

Their story continues quietly in my head. Every now and then, usually during moments when my brain has gone pleasantly soft and unfocused, they appear again to show me what has happened since we last left them. Pooh, I believe, once referred to this state as having fluff in the brain, which feels medically accurate enough for me. It happens with all my stories eventually, and I’ve grown rather fond of these unexpected visits.

For now, though, I have a brief pause before travelling to England for the summer—or at least for the particular weather system the British insist on calling “summer” out of tradition and optimism. I’m looking forward to it all the same.

Before I leave, I want to return to that coffeeshop downtown, order the same iced tea, and sit quietly for a while.

Perhaps, if fortune is feeling generous, the two men I once rudely eavesdropped on will walk in again and take the seats across from me.

I won’t say hello. I certainly won’t mention that I turned them into fictional characters and appropriated their physics theories for literary purposes.

I’ll simply sit there with my iced tea and watch another story begin to unfold.

– Jern

Eddie’s update

Since Jern wrote that, both books have gone out into the world. Metastable: Book One of Two launched on 2 July, with Book Two of Two following on 9 July. The two-book Carter and Tan arc is complete.

I have spent much of my own time on audiobooks. The Gravedigger’s Handbook is fully recorded and I am listening through it now. It is a beautifully emotional story, and I enjoyed trying to find Lucien’s focused, intense voice: a man exacting about his work and his duties, even when the world around him becomes much harder to explain.

The latest live instalment in my Audiobook Audio V3 series is Part 5: Remove the Safety Net. It is about replacing “I’ll fix it later” with better behaviour while recording: pausing properly, breathing before difficult lines, and resetting after a mistake instead of rushing into the retake.

Jern, meanwhile, has gone straight back to Treggan Bay. Our return to Devon seems to have given her exactly the nudge she needed. Mermaid’s Fury, the fourth Treggan Bay mystery, is now in production. We are not announcing its release date yet, but Noah, Leo, and the village are very much with us again.

– Eddie

Metastable, now complete

Metastable is an explicit, psychologically intense two-book M/M romance about physics, friendship, shame, control, queer belonging, and learning to make care more honest than control.

Explore the complete Metastable duet

Latest and next

Out now

1. Metastable: Book One of Two
2. Metastable: Book Two of Two

In production

1. Mermaid’s Fury — Treggan Bay Mysteries Book 4; release date to be confirmed
2. The Gravedigger’s Handbook audiobook — recorded; listen-through in progress

In closing

Finishing a story does not always mean the characters go quiet. Sometimes it simply means they stop needing the reader to watch over them.

Thank you for following Carter and Tan through both books—and for coming back to Treggan Bay with us.

Thanks, Jern and Eddie Tonkoi

Part 5 of my Audiobook Audio V3 series is now live on Podfeet: Remove the Safety Net. It also appears in NosillaCast episode 1106, alongside Allison’s look back at Macstock X, a conversation about EVs for All America, and Security Bits.

The earlier parts of the series were about making recording more predictable. That has an awkward consequence: once everything is consistent, my habits become consistent too.

The safety net I am removing is the assumption that every awkward breath, hurried restart, or slightly panicked retake can be fixed later. Usually it can, but thinking that way encourages me to rush and quietly creates more work for future-me.

The better answer has been deliberately unglamorous: pause for longer than the listener will hear, breathe before difficult lines, and reset properly after a mistake instead of charging straight into the retake. It feels slower while recording, but the result sounds calmer and is much easier to work with.

That is the point of Part 5: the next improvement is not another clever tool. It is better behaviour while I read. The less I lean on “I’ll fix it later”, the more natural the recording stays and the kinder I am to the version of me who has to edit it.

Happy reading,

–Eddie.

Part 4 of my Audiobook Audio V3 series is now live on Podfeet: Choosing the Book Voice. It also appears in NosillaCast episode 1104, with Allison’s usual mixture of tech, listener contributions, and the wonderful Security Bits.

This one picks up where the mic-technique episode left off. Once the setup is repeatable, the next question stops being “can I get the same sound again?” and becomes much more awkward: what voice do I want the listener to live with for the whole book?

That turns microphone position from a source of accidental drift into a small creative control. A slightly closer placement gives more warmth and intimacy. A more off-axis placement can soften the edges. The hard part is that none of these is automatically right. The best choice depends on the book, the listener, and whether the sound still feels comfortable after more than a quick sample.

The useful test, for me, was not which version sounded most impressive in ten seconds. It was which version let me forget about the sound and follow the story. For Jern’s character-led work, that meant close enough to feel human, angled enough to keep the consonants comfortable, and plain enough that the voice gets out of the way.

That is the practical point of Part 4: choosing the book voice is also choosing what not to keep chasing. Once the sound is chosen, I can write down the physical setup, return to it tomorrow, and stop auditioning a new narrator every time I sit down.

Happy reading,

–Eddie.

After a bit of a hiatus, Part 3 of my Audiobook Audio V3 series is now live on Podfeet: Mic Technique Is Processing. It also appears in NosillaCast episode 1103, alongside the usual mix of tech, listener contributions, and Allison’s show notes.

This part follows naturally from the previous one. If I am trying to do less repair work later, then the sound has to be right earlier. And “earlier” does not mean a plugin or a clever preset. It means the simple physical business of where my mouth is in relation to the microphone.

Changing distance, angle, or height does not just change volume. It changes tone, consonants, proximity effect, and how much room sound gets into the recording. In other words, mic technique is processing. It just happens before the audio becomes a file.

The practical answer, for me, is repeatability. I use a fixed seat, a fixed microphone position, and physical constraints so that the setup puts me back in the same place each time. Once consistency is boring, I can start making tone choices on purpose.

Happy reading, and happy listening.

–Eddie.

At the end of March, Part 2 of my Audiobook Audio V3 series went out on the NosillaCast podcast, hosted by Allison Sheridan at podfeet.com.

In the first part, I talked about the painful decision to abandon a long edit and start again from the original recordings. The second part was about the workflow that came out of that decision: the recording and editing chain I now use, and the places where I try not to wing it.

The central shift is that I no longer want processing to rescue poor audio. I want the microphone capture to be good enough that the later stages can stay gentle: careful recording, light cleanup, editing on good audio, loudness adjustment, and then the slightly humbling discipline of listening through properly.

It sounds technical, because it is, but the point is practical. Every tool I remove is one less chance to damage the voice. Every decision I make early is one less problem to repair later. And if tone has to be right at capture, the next question becomes unavoidable: microphone technique.

Happy reading, and happy listening.

–Eddie.

Back at the start of March, I started a new structured series over at the NosillaCast podcast, hosted by Allison Sheridan at podfeet.com. The series is about audiobook audio: not the performance side first, but the practical decisions that help me record, edit, and produce Jern’s audiobooks with fewer surprises later.

In Part 1: Capture Right, Stay Boring, Sound Human, I explained why the series exists at all. The short version is that I threw away about forty hours of audiobook editing and started again from the original recordings. That was not a glamorous creative revelation. It was more the sort of lesson that arrives wearing steel-capped boots.

The useful lesson was simple: instead of recording audio I can fix later, I need to record audio that does not need much fixing. That changes the order of the work. Capture comes first, the chain stays boring, and editing becomes improvement rather than rescue.

That first part set up the whole V3 idea: record closer to the target, make important decisions early, and stop trusting future-me to repair problems that current-me could avoid.

Happy reading, and happy listening.

–Eddie.

Metastable has moved from a hot-weather writing obsession into an actual launch. Metastable: Book One of Two is now listed on the retail sites and launches on 2 July 2026 at $2.99. It is an adult, explicit M/M romance about Carter and Tan: physics, friendship, shame, control, queer nightlife, and the dangerous interval where care and damage can look worryingly similar.

Book One has a strong HFN ending, but it is not the end of Carter and Tan’s relationship arc. Book Two is now in final editing, and I am holding the public date until the finished file is ready.

There is also a free sample of Metastable available through BookFunnel.

Jern’s update

Carter and Tan in Metastable Book 1 have completely taken over my summer. Meanwhile, Black Fire sulks quietly from the corner of my iPad like a forgotten demi-god waiting for worshippers to remember his temple exists. I reassure him from time to time that he deserves my full and undivided attention. Perhaps in 2027.

Metastable Book 1 came to a conclusion in April, right in the middle of both peak Thai summer and a global oil shortage. I had every intention of staying home during Songkran and getting a respectable amount of work done. Unfortunately, it was unbearably hot, and Silom Road was out there tempting us with water guns and poor decisions.

So naturally, we ended up joining the festivities before later pretending to lament the collapse of civilisation into a giant public water fight while nursing sore knees by evening. If that sentiment makes immediate sense to you, then you, too, are probably over fifty and negotiating daily with your stamina.

Still, somehow, miraculously, I got it done.

Eddie has been going over the draft of Metastable. I did warn him beforehand that it was thoroughly NSFW. He edits in the narrow sliver of time available between work, sleep, and what I assume are increasingly serious existential crises brought on by my pacing choices.

With luck, he’ll approve the manuscript without too many structural edits. I abandoned all hope of gentle line edits years ago. Eddie approaches a manuscript the way an overworked surgeon approaches a complicated organ transplant: grimly, professionally, and with occasional bursts of restrained violence. I once watched him repeatedly circle the same paragraph until the paper nearly tore through from concentrated disappointment.

Meanwhile, Carter and Tan continue navigating their relationship, which in Metastable Book 2 becomes heavier, and far more psychologically complicated. It also requires a surprising amount of research into sex and human behaviour.

At least, that remains my official excuse for writing rather slowly.

– Jern

Eddie’s update

From my side, the last few weeks have been about getting the existing books tidied up: refreshed book matter, updated samples, and cleaner pages for readers who want to know where to start.

The big current news is still Metastable.

Book One is now listed on the retail sites ahead of its 2 July launch. I am keeping the launch price at $2.99, partly because this is the first half of a two-book romance arc and I want readers to feel clear about what they are buying into.

It is not a light campus romance, and it is not a closed-door romance. It is explicit, adult, psychologically intense M/M romance, with a strong HFN ending in Book One and the full hard-won HEA reserved for Book Two.

Book Two is now in final editing. The shape is real, but I am not going to put a public date on it until the final file is ready. I would rather be boring and accurate than exciting and wrong.

There is also now a Metastable page on the website with the reader-fit notes, content guidance, and sample link in one place.

– Eddie

July Smashwords sale

One small backlist note: a handful of Jern’s backlist books will be in the Smashwords Summer/Winter Sale from 1 July.

For the first week, Murder in Treggan Bay will be free at Smashwords. The sale runs all month, but that free window is planned for the opening week. The rest of the Treggan Bay trilogy will also be discounted, along with The Boy with the Crow and Lanta: Another Life.

Metastable is separate from that sale and launches at its planned $2.99 price.

Latest and upcoming

Metastable

1. Metastable: Book One of Two - launches 2 July 2026
2. Book Two - in final editing

Treggan Bay Mysteries

1. Murder in Treggan Bay
2. The Watchman’s Secret
3. Murder at Torre Manor

Memento Mori

1. The Boy with the Crow
2. Judas and the Ghost
3. The Boy the Wolves Took

In closing

This is the satisfying part of the process: not quite finished, but close enough that the shape is visible.

Thank you for reading along with us. If you try the Metastable sample, I hope Carter and Tan behave themselves for at least three pages before becoming deeply uncooperative.

Thanks, Jern and Eddie Tonkoi

We have been quiet again this month, though work has continued in the background. Jern has started writing something new, after one of those moments where a plan gets interrupted by a much more interesting idea. I have also been deep in the less visible side of publishing, including a translation project that turned out to be rather more involved than I first expected.

Remember that ARC copies of Jern’s novels are currently available on BookSprout and BookSirens, just search for Jern Tonkoi. There is also a link to the subscriber-only extras at the end of the email.

Jern’s update

Summer arrived early this year. That may sound delightful if you live somewhere sensible and temperate, but in Thailand, early summer simply means the heat from yesterday lingering in the air like a guest who has missed at least four increasingly obvious hints that the party is over.

And so I began spending my daylight hours drifting between coffeeshops and bars. Iced tea became less of a beverage and more of a constitutional requirement. Even the trendiest cocktail bars—the sort serving drinks with names like Velvet Sin, Daddy Issues, or Kiss Me In The Panic Room—will still hand you a glass of Thai iced tea without judgement. As they should. Civilisation depends on it.

I had a plan for 2026. I was going to dust off one of my older trilogies, Black Fire, and finally prepare it for publication. But plans are delicate little things, and reality tends to take a personal interest in ruining them.

One afternoon, while sitting in a coffeeshop in downtown Bangkok, scrolling through the seventh draft of Black Fire and quietly dying of embarrassment at my own prose, two men sat down at the bar across from me. Instead of editing, I spent the next hour shamelessly eavesdropping on their conversation. A terrible habit. Deeply unethical. Tremendously productive.

And that was how Metastable began: two men discussing particle physics over iced tea. Not exactly the sensational beginning one imagines for a novel, but there we are.

Originally, it was meant to be a standalone book. But, part way through Book 1, I found Carter and Tan far too fascinating to leave alone. The story, unfortunately for all of us, decided to deepen.

– Jern

Eddie’s update

From my side, I have mostly been working on finishing touches to the website, returning to develop the newsletter, and updating my book database. Lots of behind-the-scenes work that no one really sees or cares about, but it all helps keep the project organised.

Oh, and translations. How did I forget translations?

The Memento Mori trilogy is now available in German, which was a mammoth task, and more challenging than I first realised. Trying to maintain Jern’s voice in a foreign language is hard enough. Trying to do it in a language with its own grammatical intricacies makes consistency a real challenge as well.

There was also the question of localisation. The original uses Irish phrasing that would likely feel out of place in German, so translation was the only real option. Across three books totalling around 300,000 words, I needed to maintain a voice from start to finish that kept readers inside the story.

It took a lot of time, but the results seem to have come out very well. I am really pleased to have those editions finished and available.

– Eddie

Latest releases

Memento Mori (The Mason Trilogy)

1. The Boy with the Crow
2. Judas and the Ghost
3. The Boy the Wolves Took

Treggan Bay Mysteries

1. Murder in Treggan Bay
2. The Watchman’s Secret
3. Murder at Torre Manor

Translations

1. Lanta (German)
2. The Watchman’s Secret (German and Spanish)
3. Murder in Treggan Bay (German and Spanish)
4. The Boy with the Crow (German)
5. Judas and the Ghost (German)
6. The Boy the Wolves Took (German)

Upcoming

Jern is currently working on Metastable, and there is a strong chance of more Treggan Bay coming soon, but time will tell.

I will be waiting patiently for Metastable to reach me, and clearing the decks for when it does.

In closing

We are moving at a steadier pace now, but there is still plenty happening. Thank you for reading along with us.

Please get in touch if you have any questions, or if you just want to say hello.

Thanks, Jern and Eddie Tonkoi

After an explosive 2025, we have continued at a steadier, more sustainable pace in 2026. The Treggan Bay series continues with Murder at Torre Manor, and Jern has just passed onto me the first draft of her latest book. Even as I read it for the first time, she is excitedly plotting the sequel. We’ve been quiet, and this is also a quiet, and therefore short, update. Remember that ARC copies of Jern’s novels are currently available on BookSprout and BookSirens, just search for Jern Tonkoi. Also, a quick reminder there is a link to the subscriber-only extras at the end of the email.

Latest releases

Memento Mori (The Mason Trilogy)

1. The Boy with the Crow
2. Judas and the Ghost
3. The Boy the Wolves Took

Treggan Bay Mysteries

1. Murder in Treggan Bay
2. The Watchman’s Secret
3. Murder at Torre Manor

Translations

1. Lanta (German)
2. The Watchman’s Secret (German and Spanish)
3. Murder in Treggan Bay (German and Spanish)

In closing

We have plenty more coming this year, just at a steadier pace now that most of the Jern’s original stories have been updated and released. Please get in touch if you have any questions.

Thanks, Jern and Eddie Tonkoi

We start 2026 with an exciting sequence of releases as Jern has finished editing the Memento Mori trilogy, squeezing in another murder in Treggan Bay during the festive season. Meanwhile, I have been working on translations, and released the audiobook version of Murder in Treggan Bay. In this issue Jern goes into more detail about the trilogy that pushed and pulled at her for so long. As mentioned it’s an intense read, but a rewarding one. Remember that ARC copies of Jern’s novels are currently available on BookSprout and BookSirens, just search for Jern Tonkoi. Also, a quick reminder there is a link to the subscriber-only extras at the end of the email.

Jern’s update

No forgiveness cuts deeper than the kind you owe yourself.

Memento Mori was born from a single image: a rainy night, a young man sitting alone in a dim bedroom, talking to a skull as if it were the only soul who truly listened. The moment whispered of guilt, grief, and the hazy boundary between the living and the dead. From that one scene, Mason took shape—and the story began to take root, dark and unrelenting.

The inspiration found me while travelling through Ireland. I had a long stopover in Cork, a city that hums with contradictions. The River Lee winds through its heart like a silver thread, dividing and rejoining. The University College Cork nestles among the trees, its Gothic arches and shadowed courtyards carrying a quiet sort of dignity. On damp evenings, the city glows—streetlights reflected in wet cobblestones, church spires piercing low clouds. There’s a weight to the air there, the scent of rain and stone and older secrets that never quite wash away.

This is my third trilogy, but writing Mason pushed me well beyond my comfort zone. There were moments I found myself hesitating—small personal hurdles that mirrored his own quiet struggles. Mason is fragile, yet resilient; I often cheered him on as he stumbled through the dark. But there were times, more than I’d like to admit, when I wanted to reach through the page, still his restless mind, and simply hold him for a while.

Memento Mori wasn’t an easy story to write, but it was worth every step. I grew as a writer—and as a person—and the story became everything, and more, than I had first imagined on the page.

I’m often asked what genre Memento Mori belongs to. On the surface, it’s a murder mystery—a tangle of secrets, lies, and quiet reckonings. But at its core, it’s a story of love—not the simple kind, but the kind that binds the broken together, that grows in the cracks, that turns strangers into family.

Because in the end, Memento Mori isn’t just a reminder that we die.

It’s a reminder that we live—and that even in the darkest corners, there is always something left worth saving.

— Jern

Eddie’s update

Most excitingly for me, I have released the audiobook for Murder in Treggan Bay. I’m really pleased with how it came out, and thoroughly enjoyed giving a voice to Noah and all the residents. This week, I hope to start recording The Watchman’s Secret. If you want to know more, remember I did some segments for the NosillaCast podcast.

• Recording an Audio Book — by Eddie Tonkoi - Podfeet Podcasts
• Producing an Audiobook — by Eddie Tonkoi - Podfeet Podcasts

I’m writing a follow up, a structured series on how I am recording the current book.

Finally, I have also been busy working on translations, which are now on Kindle Unlimited for German and Spanish versions of both Treggan Bay Mysteries, and a German version of Lanta. More is coming soon, I just need to keep spinning the plates.

— Eddie

Latest releases

With Jern completing older trilogies and writing new stories, it has been a productive year.

1. The Boy with the Crow (Memento Mori Book 1)
2. Lanta (German)
3. The Watchman’s Secret (German and Spanish)
4. Murder in Treggan Bay (German and Spanish)

Upcoming

Memento Mori (The Mason Trilogy)

1. The Boy with the Crow (Released Jan 15)
2. Judas and the Ghost (Feb 12)
3. The Boy the Wolves Took (Mar 12)

Treggan Bay Mysteries

3. Murder at Torre Manor (Soon)

In closing

The first half of 2026 promises to be another busy period of releases, and we haven’t even mentioned werewolves yet. If you have any questions or just want to reach out, please do get in touch.

Thanks, Jern and Eddie Tonkoi

I have published a new segment to the NosillaCast podcast, hosted by Allison Sheridan over at podfeet.com.

In the first part of my editing pipeline, I talked about the quick, objective wins—tidying formatting and nailing spelling—so Jern’s finished draft is clean before we tackle anything more nuanced. This time I move into the trickier territory: grammar and consistency in a fiction voice. Rather than relying on a writing assistant that rewrites things for you, I use LanguageTool as a careful “second pair of eyes”, then tailor it so it behaves like a novel editor: it remembers what we’ve already decided to ignore for this particular book (dialect, character voice, running phrases), and it also learns our house preferences so the style stays consistent from chapter to chapter. The result is a focused report I can work through at my own pace, making every change by hand, and keeping Jern’s storytelling intact while I quietly remove the bumps that might pull a reader out of the story.

Happy reading, —Eddie.

I have published a new segment to the NosillaCast podcast, hosted by Allison Sheridan over at podfeet.com.

When Jern finishes a novel, I switch hats to technical editor. She writes freely in Scrivener with no red squiggles or “helpful” suggestions, and only when the draft is complete do I take over and run a set of checks I built to keep our books clean and consistent—without ever letting a computer change a single word on its own. In this first segment, I explain why I bothered (speed, consistency, and remembering our choices from one pass to the next), then walk through the early, unglamorous stages: breaking the manuscript into chapters, catching any leftover editorial notes, tidying common formatting slips like double spaces and punctuation quirks, and then doing a careful spelling pass that also learns our made-up words, place names, and book-specific terms. The goal isn’t to change Jern’s writing—it’s to protect the story by quietly removing distractions, so readers can stay inside the fiction.

Happy reading, —Eddie.

I have published a new segment to the NosillaCast podcast, hosted by Allison Sheridan over at podfeet.com.

Producing a genuinely professional audiobook is less “hit record” and more a small-scale engineering project: you’re managing hours of narration, a pile of WAVs, and a set of unforgiving standards (I use Amazon’s ACX specs as the baseline because everyone else seems to fit inside them). In this segment I walk through my end-to-end pipeline as narrator, editor, producer and publisher—how I record and archive a pristine original, do a first “cleaning” pass in iZotope RX to tame breaths, fluffs and mouth noise without changing file lengths, then a separate enhancement pass (de-click, de-noise, de-ess, loudness control) before moving into Logic Pro for structural work like trimming silences, chapter handling, and adding consistent room tone so nothing drops to dead silence. I also cover the final polish stage—EQ, loudness mastering, and the slightly tedious export/bounce routine—plus the last, non-negotiable step: listening to the whole finished book again before uploading, because a single missed line or skipped scene can undo weeks of work.

Happy reading,

—Eddie.

An amazing year draws to a close with the impending release of a new trilogy, one that has taken time to come to fruition. The Memento Mori trilogy is an intense read, one that rewards and inspires. In this issue Jern talks about her inspiration, I talk about my podcast segments and we look over the recent and upcoming books. Memento Mori is coming soon. ARC copies available on BookSprout and BookSirens, just search for Jern Tonkoi.

Jern’s update

I spent much of November and December immersed in the editing of one of my more recent novels, Memento Mori. It’s a three-book series, and the editing process is long, winding, and generously fuelled by caffeine in its many devoted forms. Tedious at times, oddly comforting at others—but very much necessary.

Memento Mori began its life in 2023, during a stay in Ireland. I had planned to drive the Ring of Kerry, but plans, as it turns out, can be remarkably fragile things. When I reached Cork, I sat down on a picnic bench at UCC and wrote the first paragraph. Then another. Before I quite realised what was happening, the story had taken hold.

The Ring of Kerry quietly slipped off the itinerary, and I spent the rest of that summer in Cork instead, writing and wandering, in a country steeped in memory, mystery, and a particular kind of gentle magic.

I owe it to myself to return to Ireland one day and finish that journey. With luck, that time will come soon. I look forward to discovering what other quiet secrets the land is keeping.

— Jern

Eddie’s update

Updates to the website have been long overdue, but it is now more detailed and thorough than ever. Expect to see information on Memento Mori added in the next few days.

I have also been working to complete the audiobook for Murder in Treggan Bay. I have all the audio recorded now and I am just going through the production and final editing. If you want to know more about how I do this, you can read or listen to my segments on the process over at podfeet.com.

• Recording an Audio Book — by Eddie Tonkoi - Podfeet Podcasts
• Producing an Audiobook — by Eddie Tonkoi - Podfeet Podcasts

Lastly from me, I have been so delighted to have seen some amazing, beautiful, thoughtful reviews come in for Jern’s books. And, of course, the smile it gives Jern delights me also. If you do enjoy any of our books, an honest review on any site goes a surprisingly long way for an indie author.

— Eddie

Latest releases

With Jern completing older trilogies and writing new stories, it has been a productive year.

1. The Gravedigger’s Handbook – After a burial in the forgotten cemetery of St Aubin’s Rest, Lucien Morel begins encountering a young artist whose secrets stir both memory and mercy. As their bond deepens, the boundary between solace and haunting grows thin, asking Lucien what must be released—and what might be saved.
2. The Curse of Time (Tobias & Stuart 3)
3. The Watchman’s Secret
4. Murder in Treggan Bay

Upcoming

The Memento Mori trilogy is close to being finished, with Book 1 with reviewers and Book 2 with Eddie. Jern is still editing Book 3, but that won’t take too long unless she get’s distracted by a new story over Christmas…

Memento Mori (The Mason Trilogy)

1. The Boy with the Crow
2. Judas and the Ghost
3. The Boy the Wolves Took

In closing

During this holiday period we will find time to settle ourselves, to relax, but we also appreciate the time we have to continue with our passion project. We hope you do too.

Thanks, Jern and Eddie Tonkoi

I have published a new segment to the NosillaCast podcast, hosted by Allison Sheridan over at podfeet.com.

In this segment, I explain why I’ve chosen to narrate my wife Jern Tonkoi’s novels myself—and what that decision really costs in time, craft, and gear. Using my first audiobook (Lanta) as a starting point, I break down the hidden workload (recording, editing, proof-listening), the performance skills you have to develop (breath control, posture, fatigue, vocal presence), and a “start small” approach that lets you improve fast without redoing an entire book. I also share the practical recording fundamentals that made the biggest difference for me—room and reflection control, choosing a forgiving mic (I use a Shure MV7+), avoiding clipping, using a pop filter, and even a surprise productivity win from switching to a teleprompter app.

Happy reading,

—Eddie.

I published a new segment to the NosillaCast podcast, hosted by Allison Sheridan over at podfeet.com.

In this segment I walk through a five-day detour that became a core part of our indie publishing setup: migrating our author site away from Kit and onto a static Hugo build hosted on Cloudflare Pages and deployed via GitHub. I explain what a static site generator actually gives you in practice—reusable templates and partials, Markdown-driven content, and a simple directory structure where a single index.md plus a couple of images becomes a full book page—along with why I cared about “answer engine” visibility (AEO/SEO) as much as aesthetics. I also cover the nuts-and-bolts of my workflow on a Mac (including the one-command build/push deploy loop), the surprisingly fiddly fight with structured metadata for search engines, and the main win: a fast, fully-owned site with room to grow, even if the punchline is that ChatGPT still can’t directly “search the web” the way I first assumed.

Happy reading,

—Eddie.

Jern’s story about love, friendship, and the delightful absurdity of being human is completed with the release of The Curse of TIme, and Eddie starts a series on indie book production.

Jern’s update

Over the years, I’ve had more story ideas than I can count—some passing through quickly, others lingering for tea. A few even came with dramatic entrances and impossible demands. But none of them ever made it onto paper. Not even a line. Not even a note on the back of a napkin.

Until Tobias & Stuart.

I’ve always been drawn to MM romance and speculative fantasy, and since this was my first novel, I thought I’d start with something I knew well—academic life. It’s a world full of eccentric characters, strange rituals, and an endless supply of questions without clear answers. In its own way, academia already feels a bit fantastical. My challenge was to combine all three into one story.

Tobias & Stuart became the kind of book I wanted to read myself: an MM romance that doesn’t just flutter hearts but nudges the mind awake. At its centre is Tobias, an academic who’s built a perfectly sensible life for himself… until he hasn’t. His journey is one of confronting emptiness, finding courage in vulnerability, and slowly becoming the truest version of himself—all while the world threatens to unravel around him.

It’s a story about love, friendship, and the delightful absurdity of being human. Those small, stubborn things that—when you really think about it—might just be what saves the world.

I hope you’ll come along for the journey with Tobias and Stuart, and of course with Music, Death, and Time, who have a way of turning everything upside down just when you think you’ve figured it out.

Jern Tonkoi

Eddie’s update

I’ve reached a point where I can support Jern well with the tools I have developed for editing and publishing, so I feel I can spread my wings a little and explore my version of creativity.

I am enjoying creating articles for the NosillaCast about my craft, channeling my love of teaching to create a series that I hope will be of benefit to anyone who is also embarking on a self-publishing adventure.

All this stemmed from a joyful return to creating audiobooks. Having narrated, produced, and published Lanta a while back, I now have my sights on the Treggan Bay Mysteries series and others. I have a setup, I have some time put aside, and I am really enjoying the processing of bringing Jern’s stories to life in audiobook format. Plus, it’s such a delight to play them back to Jern and hear her laugh, see her smile, and let her enjoy her writing all over again.

Eddie Tonkoi

Latest releases

We continue our busy period, with books Jern is re-editing and books she has written fresh. We’re also exploring new avenues.

1. The Curse of Time (Tobias & Stuart 3)
2. Mord in Treggan Bay: translation available in Kindle Unlimited in German
3. Murder in Treggan Bay
4. The Watchman’s Secret

Eddie has also started contributing to the NosillaCast at podfeet.com. It’s a technology podcast so may or may not be of interest to you, but I will post links briefly in the newsletter.

1. Shure MV7+ microphone review. Bought for recording audiobooks, and I’m about 10 chapters into Murder in Treggan Bay as I write.
2. Hugo website framework. About how and why I created the new website design at jerntonkoi.com. This one is on the sister-podcast, Programming by Stealth and is even more technical. A lighter version coming around Novemeber 18 on the NosillaCast.

Upcoming

Jern has just completed writing a new novel, her shortest so far at just over 50,000 words. I have done my initial edits and Jern is going to have a final look soon. We hope to get it out mid-December.

Jern is also working on final edits to a beautiful trilogy she a while back. I’m really excited to announce that one, but we’re not quite ready to tease it fully (especially with all the other work coming out right now).

In closing

Our publishing project is powering on with an incredible output still as Jern polishes off works she has been holding on to whilst weaving in new books to allow herself that creative release that pulls her towards writing. Expect a lot more over the coming months.

Thanks, Jern and Eddie Tonkoi

I have started contributing to the NosillaCast podcast, hosted by Allison Sheridan over at podfeet.com. It’s a technology podcast, so doesn’t directly link to Jern’s fiction, but the articles are all going to be about the things I do (which is everything that does not involve writing the stories).

The first one was released last week, and is a review of the Shure MV7+ microphone, which I bought as I embark on recording audiobook editions of Jern’s books. I’m 6 chapters into Murder in Treggan Bay, by the way.

I’ll post brief notes here as episodes come out, so pop back to see what’s new. I also provide a summary of what has come out in our monthly newsletter, so please sign up for that.

Happy reading,

—Eddie.

This month we have been busy finishing off projects long-since started. I have also been busy getting a new website ready. As part of this. I will send out a newsletter, just one per month, summarising key information including book launches. More on that later.

We start, though, with Jern’s reflections on the books of the moment, the Treggan Bay Mysteries.

Jern’s update

Each summer, I find myself wandering the coast paths of Devon—those ribbon-thin trails that flirt with the edge of the sea—wondering what secrets might be tucked beneath the rocks and gorse. The air smells of salt and wild thyme; the cottages huddle together against the wind, their stone walls crusted with sea spray, their roofs furred with lichen in the afternoon sun. Tiny gardens bloom between them—lavender, mint, and mischief. It’s the sort of place where stories don’t need to be written; they simply rise from the soil like mist after rain.

And it was there, between the leaning chimney stacks and gossiping gulls, that I stumbled upon Noah Yalland—London journalist, resourceful enough to untangle Parliament but somehow incapable of boiling an egg without supervision. He arrived in Treggan Bay like an uninvited guest at a wake and, naturally, tripped over a murder before he had his first cup of coffee.

Among the so-called ‘charming’ residents, Noah found himself reluctantly untangling one mystery after another—if only to make it back in time for supper with Leo, who has the patience of a saint and the griddle of a tyrant.

Jern Tonkoi

Eddie’s update

It’s been a super-busy few weeks, with the launch of Jern’s summer writing, along with final editing of her Tobias & Stuart series.

What really got me working and focused, however, was building the new website. I have moved away from other services and decided to create it myself using a fascinating little ststem called Hugo. Let me know if you want to know more, but what’s most important is it should now be easier to keep up to date, keep pretty, and keep active.

Latest releases

It has been a period of releases for us, as Treggan Bay Mysteries got underway with a buzz.

1. Murder in Treggan Bay
2. The Watchman’s Secret

Upcoming

Jern’s original books from last year have also been completing final editing and I’ve been getting these ready. The last in the trilogy, The Curse of Time, is slated for mid-November.

1. The Curse of Time (Tobias & Stuart 3): November 2025

In closing

It has been an epic couple of months and we are now in a place of relative clam and rest. Jern is plotting her next novel, I’m setting up a regular newsletter, and we’re both loving our project together. We hope you are too.

Thanks, Jern and Eddie Tonkoi