omg whats tradewinds?? (im a new reader so im sorry if this has already been answered) i wasnt aware you had another faetales story out there, is it posted on another website? do i have to buy it? if so, where?
Hello new reader!
As it said in the previous post, Tradewinds isn’t available for wide release at all. It’s not on AO3 or anywhere else, and was only available for a certain tier of Patreon supporters for a limited time.
As also said, the reason it hasn’t been released (it was never intended to go up on AO3, but to be released as a novel and self-published, so it’s complete) is because I can’t locate an Indigenous Australian sensitivity reader who is happy to read m/m explicit sex scenes. Until that happens, the story is benched, I’m afraid.
I actually have a blurb already (and a synopsis, etc. All the technical specs for release). It’s also been looked over by a professional editor in the m/m industry who says it’s basically ready to go. The cast is primarily Malay and Indigenous Australian, as it’s set in the Southern Hemisphere and dealing with an entirely new array of fae and fae traditions etc. (though it’s still a Fae Tales story):
Matan is a pheasant shifter aligned withthe Seelie fae, living in a world of fairy-tales and magic. A successful trader of fine silks inMalaysia, Matan has been raised to believe that Seelie are the heroes of thefae world, while the Unseelie are the villains, untrustworthy and devious bynature. When Matan unwittingly creates a terrible situation for his family, hefinds himself in need of money, and fast. The easiest solution is to join anUnseelie caravan of bird of prey shifters, the Golden Raptor Guild. There,hiding his true identity and pretending to be Unseelie, he meets Udir, abearded vulture shifter and gun-toting poisons trader with a murky past. Udirquickly unveils Matan’s true Seelie identity and blackmails him into doingwhatever he wants, whenever he wants it.
As the caravan travels along thewind-swept coasts of South-Western Australia, Matan comes to see that Udir isnot who he first appeared to be, and that the other members of the Guild arenot the villains he expected. Matan navigates Udir’s tragic past – which neverquite stays in the past – the politics of Unseelie trading, his own commitmentphobia, all as he becomes increasingly unhappy lying to the people who arebecoming the closest thing to a family away from his own family. His easysolution becomes trickier and more dangerous at every turn. Matan is left withonly one question: how can he be loyal to his family as well as be with Udir,while his very place with the Guild is based on a lie?
*
Trust me, I want to get it out there! But I’m pretty stymied right now, and I’m not willing to just take the risk and publish it, in case I’m committing a huge cultural faux pas (or multiple) without realising - I’ve done a fuckton of research and been careful not to use any actual Dreamtime stories (I’ve kept the Dreamtime as a separate realm in the Fae Tales verse) etc. but that doesn’t mean anything, I need to get it looked at. And unfortunately, that’s something I can’t magically make happen. I’ll keep an eye out on databases of sensitivity readers and keep my fingers crossed but so far, no dice.
The good news is once I do find a sensitivity reader (actually I’ll need two, but Malaysian sensitivity readers are available and I’m not too worried about finding/paying one) the novel is complete, part of a series, and really close to being ready to publish. It’s just…yeah, I can’t push that through alone. :)