Relentlessly overtaken by events

Conventional publishing wisdom holds that you’re supposed to adopt a buzzy, overexcited tone when announcing the release of a new book, the better to build up hype. I’m not sure that wisdom holds when the book in question is about a very serious, very horrible thing that won’t stop showing up in the news while you’re writing and publishing the book.

New Novella: “A Reckoning in Whitehall”

Jason Collier is on his way up in the world. Wealthy and well-educated, he’s translated a successful business career overseas into a parliament seat at home in Britain. His marriage to one of the world’s most powerful tech executives has made him a key asset to the government. It is, in light of all this success, of little concern to anyone who matters that Collier has left a trail of violated and abused victims behind him.

Jay Moriarty certainly isn’t anyone who matters — but twenty years ago, Jason Collier hurt a boy named Sebastian Moran. For that, Moriarty is going to destroy him.

Read it Here

“A Reckoning in Whitehall” is the tenth story in my series The Casefile of Jay Moriarty, a modern-day queer take on the iconic Sherlock Holmes villain, his partner Sebastian Moran, and the various crimes they commit together.

This one gets pretty heavy. It’s about abuse and sexual violence, and the ways in which they’re enabled by structures of power. I originally hashed out the concept early last year in an attempt to understand what were, back then, current events; I was not expecting it to be even more relevant by the time it came out.

I put a lot of love, anger, and grief into “A Reckoning in Whitehall.” It’s not a nice story, but I did my best to make it an honest one.

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-K