He seemed so desperate, Andrei told him he did.

A poet's face, a chief inquisitor's voice, and the brain of a municipal sanitation manager.

(From chapter 11 of Wealthgiver. Search for "Wealthgiver" "The Infirmary" and "Daniel M. Bensen." To read the whole chapter, get a paid subscription, on sale until the end of December)

Wealthgiver

It's finally starting. The whole novel/conlanging project, new chapter every Thursday.

Find it on Patreon and Substack

- "earthly, humble" from the mythological Semélē, possibly from Phrygian, from *dʰǵ`ʰem-

5 days until Wealthgiver begins.

#Lexember day 28

Nettles, from Dacian diký, possibly from *kes-n-dʰeh₁-kon "small thing that becomes itchy."

From the Good language, created for the novel Wealthgiver, available soon.

What is more deadly than a fever, Doctor? A diplomat's suspicions.

This was supposed to be a trial run for Vessian, a fictional language that evolved from ancient Thracian, and a part of my current novel-in-progress Wealthgiver.

I say “supposed to” because I wrote the English version of the follow message almost a year ago. Let’s hope the Vessian parts of my novel will take less time.

~~~

We are the Good. Ami emi Vessiti. (WE-nom BE-1st-plur GOOD-nom-plur-def)

You can forget the lies you have heard about us; we are not evil. Iu ivuss galti ta egmirat dravdzissi tsi tsepis zlivti be nami; me emi zuli. (YOU-plur-nom BE-2nd-plur-aor CAN-past.part-plur TO FORGET-2nd-plur LIE-plur-acc-def THAT Be-2nd-plur HEAR-past.part-plur FOR WE-dat NOT BE-1st-plur EVIL-masc-plur)

I’m trying something new this year, which is a vacation.

Last summer you might recall I struggled to find my peace with not writing. And the summers before that, too. The beginning of July would find me in the middle of a project, and I’d spend the summer scrabbling for the time I needed to keep it alive. Or I’d try to start a new, light, summer project, and scrabble to keep that alive.

This year, I made sure not to do that. I pushed to finish draft three of Wealthgiver by the end of June. I sent it out to beta readers. It was safely out of my hands, and now I wasn’t going to do any writing at all.

I stopped doing my morning rituals. No more exercise, no more meditations. No more vitamin supplements. There’s no need for all that support since I’m not doing anything in particular in the morning. At first, it worked.