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November News

The bonsai collection at the Marjorie McNeely Conservatory in St. Paul, with the weak November sun at its mid-day height. The tiny trees are sporting fall colors.
The Bonsai Collection at the Marjorie McNeely Conservatory.

We’re at the tail end of autumn here in Minnesota, with a sprinkling of snow expected in a day or two. I took the photo above a couple of weeks ago outside the Marjorie McNeely Conservatory in St. Paul. A short bit of history: the glass-domed Victorian-style garden opened in 1915, sits next door to Como Zoo, and is well worth a visit if you’re in the area.

That’s their bonsai collection, each tree on a shelf of its own, with the weak November sun at its mid-day height. Not sure why but it surprised me to encounter tiny trees sporting fall colors, same as their big cousins a few yards away! Nature is amazing. Below is a photo of the big trees just down the path.

The big trees at the Marjorie McNeely Conservatory.

Book News

That Murder Feeling picked up a lovely early review from Readers’ Favorite: “Neve Maslakovic takes the genre and twists it… A unique, original, and charming mystery.” Less than two months to go till release day! If you’re a NetGalley reviewer, you can now access the ARC here.

In backlist news, The Far Time Incident, the first book in my time travel series, is the Monthly Kindle Deal for November. Last few days to grab it at the discounted price…

What I’m Reading

Murder by Memory by Olivia Waite. Scifi novella. A fast paced, fun mystery set on a spaceship. The first in a series (Dorothy Gentleman Book 1)

My second recommendation is a book with a very long title: Dinosaurs at the Dinner Party: How an Eccentric Group of Victorians Discovered Prehistoric Creatures and Accidentally Upended the World by Edward Dolnick. Non-fiction. Entertaining, educational, and witty. It covers everything from 19th-century’s intrepid fossil hunter Mary Anning to UK’s World Heritage site unofficially known as Jurassic Coast to how the word dinosaur came to be.

That’s it from me for now. Happy Thanksgiving if you’re in the US, otherwise enjoy what’s left of November!

Neve

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Call for ARC Readers

The publication date for That Murder Feeling is getting closer and I’m giving out ARCs! Read on if you’d like to have the book in your hands (well, in your digital hands, downloaded to your device) before release day, January 13, 2026, in exchange for an honest review.

Book graphic for That Murder Feeling by Neve Maslakovic. The book sits on a red background with a knotted brown and teal vine running through. Text reads: Murder plants something dark in the garden of the soul. PI Rodrick Gray must find it. Coming January 13, 2026

Let’s jump into a VERY quick Q&A about how the process works.

What’s an ARC?
Advance Reader Copy, i.e, a chance to read the book early. Since this is the almost-but-not-quite finalized version, you might still encounter typos or formatting issues.

Who should join?
Anyone who loves mysteries where the detective has an unusual ability, has time to read before the release date, and is willing to post an honest review on book platforms, blogs, or social media.

How do I get a copy?
This time around I’m using a short Google form for organizational purposes. You can find it here: ARC Sign-Up Form. After you hit submit, watch your inbox for an email with further instructions.

Important note: Please add your name to the list even if you’ve been an ARC reader for my previous books—this will be the official ARC team list going forwards.

When do I need to read it by?
The ARCs will go out mid-November. Release day is January 13, 2026, which gives you just about two months.

Need more info?
To learn more about the book and view a detailed FAQ, click here: ARC Form Info Page.

I know this is a big ask with the holidays coming up but if it sounds like something that’s right for you, I’d love to have you on my ARC team!

Neve

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Cover Reveal !

Let’s jump right to it, the cover for my new mystery series starter, That Murder Feeling!

This is my sixth book and the first one that belongs more on a mystery shelf than a sci-fi one.

When I started writing it, I knew it would land somewhere between a classic whodunit and something a bit stranger—imagine if Inspector Gamache wandered into a Stuart Turton novel—and that it’d likely be tricky to nail the right tone for cover. And… it was. Ebook Launch handled the design and I think they did a fantastic job of capturing the genre-bending aspect. The color scheme, border, and the four medallions in the corners were locked in early, but we had a devil of a time getting the vine to look JUST right, so much so that I considered dropping it altogether at one point, but felt the cover would be too stark without it. I particularly like how the vine twists around the R with a bit of attitude.

This is the ebook cover, which is always done first. Why, you ask? For the print book, the designer needs to know two things: first, the chosen dimensions (5.5 x 8.5 inches, or 6 x 9 inches, or whatever) and second, the EXACT number of pages in order to be able to calculate the spine width. Even with the text finalized, there’s still the front and back matter to add, which affects the final page count. Same with the book’s interior formatting, from the choice of font to the paper type. (White and cream paper have slightly different thicknesses. The formula, if you’re curious, is Spine Width = Page Count ÷ PPI, where PPI is pages per inch for the type of paper selected.)

Next, here’s a brief introduction to the book:

Meet Rodrick Gray, PI…

Rod Gray has a gift that’s both a blessing and a curse: he can see other people’s emotions. And hear them, touch them — even smell them. He’s given a name to the inside-out realms he encounters, with their strange botanical growths, weather, and creatures: soul gardens. It’s a noisy way to walk through life, but in his small 1980s Minnesota town of Two Lakes, it helps him see what others can’t.

There’s one soul garden he’s never wanted to enter. A killer’s.

Until now. When the town’s richest man is found dead in a blizzard, suspicion lands on Rod’s childhood friend Clementine Baker. Someone sabotaged the victim’s car, stranding him in the woods. There are plenty of suspects, but Rod’s hunting blind — the feeling left behind in the culprit’s soul could be a thorny vine, a lurking serpent that hisses I did it, or something entirely unexpected.

Meanwhile, old feelings for Clem clash with growing doubts about her innocence. The police are closing in, his heart’s getting in the way, and time is running out. Rod must find murder’s mark before his oldest friend pays the price.

The first Soul Garden Mystery. A genre-bending 1980s whodunit of snow, small-town secrets, and a whole lot of tangled feelings.

Preorder links have started to pop up — the ebook will be available on Kindle, Nook, and other retailers. The current list is here and will expand as the book shows up in additional stores.

I’ll be sending out a call for ARC readers in early November, so keep an eye out for updates on my website, or check your mailbox if you’re signed up for my newsletter.

Finally, if you were a beta reader for the book, be on the lookout for a separate email — I’ll be sending them out to ask if you’d prefer an e-book or a signed print book.

Thanks for reading,

Neve

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Mid-Summer Update

The Reading Room at the British Museum

Hope everyone’s July is going well! It’s been very hot, rainy, and humid here in the Twin Cities.

The above picture is of the Reading Room in the British Museum in London. I took it back in May, when we visited family in the U.K. The museum, as always, was very crowded. Despite the sign, there’s no reading allowed in the Reading Room, but it’s a huge domed space with a grand ceiling and a calm, bookish vibe and I was happy to peek in.

The ceiling of the Reading Room.

Publishing Update

THAT MURDER FEELING, the series opener that I’ve been working on for a while now, has a publication date! The book is in the copyediting stage and the plan is for it to come out right after the New Year, on January 13, 2026.

Here’s the short pitch: To crack his first murder case and save his childhood friend, a small-town 1980s PI must trust his extraordinary ability to see emotions as living gardens. A whodunit with a cosmic twist.

More details next month. Stay tuned!

Backlist News

My near-future mystery/thriller All the Whys of Delilah’s Demise is on Barnes & Noble’s list of Hidden Gems: Unmissable Indie eBooks. The book is currently on sale on Nook for $2.99, so it you haven’t read it yet, it’s a good time to pick it up.

What I’m Reading

I have three books to recommend.

Stuart Turton’s The Last Murder at the End of the World. A standalone novel. This one is hard to describe. As promised in the title, there is a murder, but it’s more of a sci-fi novel than a traditionally structured mystery. A weird and unconventional whodunit—my favorite kind of read.

Cascadia’s Fault by Jerry Thompson. Non-fiction. The subtitle says it all: The Coming Earthquake and Tsunami that Could Devastate North America. Thompson digs into historical and geological evidence of the fault that lies 30 miles offshore on the West Coast. I learned enough about plate tectonics and wave heights to make me uneasy the next time I happen to find myself in Seattle, but the tone of the book itself is not one of panic, but a reminder that it’s best to be informed, and who can argue with that.

My Life in France by Julia Child and Alex Prud’homme. Memoir. I don’t even remember how I came across this one, but I’m glad I did. Julia Child arrives in 1948 Paris as a clueless 36‑year‑old who speaks no French and can’t cook. This joyful book didn’t exactly inspire me to spend more time in the kitchen, but it’s a lovely reminder that every meal should be savored—and so should the unpredictable adventure of life itself.

That’s it for now, thanks for reading!

Neve

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Neve’s January Newsletter

Hello. Grif hopes you are well.

Happy January! After the holiday break, I’m back on work on Book 2 of the new series. I’ve been using Aeon Timeline to pull all the series details into one place. The software has proven to be very helpful in keeping it all organized — character names, dates, and so on. I’ve mapped out the outline for the book in it and color-coded things nicely. I would post a screenshot, but it would include story spoilers!

For now Book 1 is still in a holding mode. Publishing does not move fast, and I do want to make sure that the series has the best possible launching pad into the world. I’m hoping to have a more concrete update in the next newsletter, but we’ll have to see.

Sci-Fi Explorations Bundle

Last few days of the Sci-Fi Explorations Bundle! Thirteen authors coming together to offer their books in a themed collection. Includes my futuristic mystery/thriller All the Whys of Delilah’s Demise. Find all the details here.

The Sci-Fi Explorations Bundle expires on midnight ET on Thursday, January 30th.

What Have I Been Reading?

I’ve got a couple of books to recommend:

Emily St. John Mandel’s Sea of Tranquility. Science fiction. I flew through this one. The past, the future, pandemics, time travel. A beautiful and unsettling read.

I’ve also been enjoying Joe Moran’s First You Write a Sentence. Non-fiction. This is not exactly a craft book, more of an ode to the beauty of the written word. A book best read at an easy pace and savored.

Social Media Update

I’ve been poking my head out of my hobbit hole to check out the new social media options. I tried Threads for about 5 seconds, but there’s no way to turn off autoplay for videos, so that’s an automatic no from me. I do like Bluesky, and it’s becoming livelier, with a robust and growing book community, so much that I keep wanting to call it Booksky. It has the feel of Twitter before it was X, with a similar interface and a 300-character limit for posts. Like Mastodon, there are no ads on Bluesky (though that may change down the road) and it has some cool, unique features like Starter Packs.

If you’re on Bluesky, you can find me here.

Thanks for reading!

Neve

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Sci-Fi Explorations Bundle

A bit of early 2025 news! My mystery/thriller, All the Whys of Delilah’s Demise, is in a StoryBundle! If you’re not familiar, StoryBundle offers curated collections of ebooks where you can pay what you want and support great authors. The Sci-Fi Explorations Bundle was curated by Carolynn Gockel and features 13 terrific books.

The way it works is, there is a $5 minimum, for which you’ll get the basic bundle of four books. If you’re feeling generous, $20 gets you nine more bonus books — All the Whys of Delilah’s Demise is one of these. You can also give a portion of your purchase to charity.

The bundle is only available for a limited time, so take a look here for all the details: Sci-Fi Explorations Bundle.

If you’d like, you can help spread the word by sharing this email or Substack post.

Thank you so much for your support, and happy reading!

Neve

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December News

Hope everyone had a great Thanksgiving, or a great week if Thanksgiving isn’t a thing where you are. December here in Minnesota has rolled in with frigid temperatures. No snow yet, just bare trees and nightfall arriving early.

Book Cover Update

My thanks to everyone who voted last month on the two options for the new cover of All the Whys of Delilah’s Demise. I decided to go with #2, which ended up with a slight lead over #1. We did, however, incorporate elements of #1 into #2, by tweaking the structure and look of the eye. (Incidentally, I’ve always wanted an eye on the cover, but not a horror-style, disturbing one. I think this one strikes that balance just right!)

Drumroll, please… The final cover! The designers at Miblart knocked this one out of the park.

I’m in the process of uploading the new cover for the ebook on Amazon, Barnes & Noble, Kobo, Google Play, at the bottom of this email, and wherever else the cover makes an appearance. The print book will take a a little longer, as it requires waiting for a test copy to arrive in the mail.

To celebrate the new cover, I’m putting the book on sale for $0.99 across all retailers until the end of the year. If you haven’t read it yet and are in the mood for a dystopian murder mystery, now is a great time to pick it up! The full list of retailers can be found here: All the Whys of Delilah’s Demise.

What Have I Been Reading?

Benjamin Stevenson’s Everyone on This Train Is a Suspect. This classic-style mystery takes place on the Ghan, a passenger train that crosses central Australia in a 1,850-mile journey, sort of like an Australian version of the Orient Express. This is the second book in the series and it’s just as witty and entertaining as the first one.

Packing for Mars by Mary Roach. Nonfiction. This was written in 2010 and focuses on the pre-Space-X era, but if you’re interested in the history of space exploration, it’s well worth a read. Funny, candid, and entertaining.

Social Media Update

Not counting this newsletter and the Monday evening writers’ chat on Mastodon, I’ve been taking a brief social media break. Five stars, would recommend. I’ll jump back in after New Year’s, but for now it makes for a quieter world, at least temporarily, and we could all use some of that.

Thanks for reading,

Neve

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Help Me Choose a New Cover for Delilah’s Demise

There’s a poll happening over on Substack for a new cover for All the Whys of Delilah’s Demise. Hop on over and cast your opinion! The poll will be open until Tuesday October 29th.

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Neve’s Book Recommendations

Do I have a favorite genre when it comes to reading? As it happens, I have two.

They are (as you might expect) the ones I combine in my own books: science fiction/speculative and mystery. It’s by no means all that I read, but it is a big chunk of my Kindle content. 

I wanted to share a few recent favorites in those genres. These aren’t necessarily new releases, but they all lifted my spirits or stayed with me in some way.

Here we go, the books:

Vera Wong’s Unsolicited Advice for Murderersby Jesse Q. Sutanto. Strong-willed, lonely Vera Wong, whose husband has passed away and whose Americanized son doesn’t call often enough, finds a dead body in her Chinatown tea shop and we’re off from there. Delightful and charming, this novel is as much a found-family story as it is a murder mystery.

The Road to Roswell by Connie Willis. This humorous alien-abduction adventure reads like a 1930’s style romcom where dialogue is everything. There’s a road trip and a whole lot of references to Westerns and sci-fi movies, a good seasoning of UFO trivia, and an adorable alien. The ending leaves an opening for a sequel. If you’re looking for a lighthearted read, try this one.

The Woman in the Library by Sulari Gentill. This standalone mystery/thriller by an Australian writer kept the surprises and twists coming. Set in D.C., the story unfolds in parallel — we’re reading a mystery manuscript as it’s being written, chapter by chapter, by an author named Hannah, along with feedback on the manuscript by an aspiring author and fan of Hannah’s named Leo. The emails to Hannah from Leo, at first seemingly harmless, soon turn into something sinister. A cleverly plotted page-turner.

The Bullet That Missed: A Thursday Murder Club Mystery If you’ve somehow missed this popular series by Richard Osman, this is the third in the sequence and just as good as the previous two. (The fourth book came out in September; I just haven’t had a chance to read it yet.) Four elderly friends in an English retirement community meet every Thursday to tackle unsolved murders. Soon to be a Netflix movie, and what a cast! Helen Mirren, Pierce Brosnan, Ben Kingsley, and Celia Imrie. Am I looking forward to the movie? Oh yes.

We Will Teach You How to Read | We Will Teach You How to Read by Caroline M. Yoachim, a short story. I don’t read many short stories these days and I don’t even remember how I came across this one, but I am glad I did. This uniquely structured piece (story? poem?) revolves around a communication barrier between an alien race and humans, and reminds the reader that a fundamental shift in perception and thought process is sometimes needed. You can read it for free in Lightspeed Magazine. (But don’t try to read it on a phone! The format is 2+ columns of text, so a tablet or laptop works better.)

The photo at the top is of Grif the goldendoodle enjoying his Minnesota summer at the park down the block. We’re VERY happy that the July Fourth fireworks, which are a multi-night affair here, have tapered off. Grif’s not scared of them (and this is a dog who’s spooked of the doggie door we had put in just for him and refuses to use it, and also undecided how he feels about the strangeness of windy days.) Every time the fireworks went off in the neighborhood, he wanted to run into the yard and bark ferociously at them, only no one would let him out. Run to the back door. Bark madly. Every. Single. Time. Even at 2:00 a.m., which happened on more than one night. (Did I mention we’re happy the fireworks have finally tapered off?)

Thanks for subscribing to this newsletter and hope you’re having a great July!

Neve

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Nebula Conference Schedule

This year will be my first opportunity to attend the Nebula Conference, so yay! It’s being held in Pasadena this time around, June 6-9. There’ll be panels, office hours, meet-and-greets, and the Nebula Awards banquet on Saturday. The Grandmaster this year is Susan Cooper.

I’ll be participating in a panel alongside fellow authors Erik Grove, Curtis Chen, and Jordan Kurella:

It’s No Joke: Honing Humor in Your Work Thursday, June 6, 1:30PM – 2:30PM

This is a panel that will discuss the merits of adding humor to any story, as well as the ways to do it in a nuanced way. A well-timed joke can break the ice and bring readers into a story but misplaced humor can do the opposite. Writing “funny” is serious business. From quips to pointed satire, comedy comes in many forms; this panel will offer a sample of them and discuss when and how to use them.

I’m also hosting an Author Meet-and-Greet the same day, Thursday, Jun 6, 2024 4:00PM – 4:30PM. I’ll be at Table E. Since I’m flying in from Minneapolis, I probably won’t have any books to sell onsite, but I’ll bring along bookmarks, maybe a copy each of my books so people can peruse them in person, and plenty of willingness to chat about anything and everything. Come by and say hello!

The full Nebula programming schedule can be found here.

I haven’t been back in California since grad school, so I’m very much looking forward to the trip. If you’re a fellow writer of science fiction, fantasy, or speculative fiction, hope you can join us either in person or online!

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