Plot Points #64 💌

Catechism, resolutions, and BIG book news!

Plot Points is a weekly newsletter where I share my favorite books, links, words, and more. If you enjoy what you find here, please consider subscribing or buying me a coffee.

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Happy New Year, friends! I’m so encouraged to have almost one hundred new faces here since the beginning of the Christmas season. Thank you all for subscribing ❤️.

I decided a few weeks ago to seriously buckle down in 2025 and study the historical traditions of my Anglican faith, alongside listening to The Catechism in a Year podcast with Fr. Mike Schmitz. (Plus a bunch of book reading and some serious prayer.) I have some long-held questions about Catholicism, and, at this point in my life, I’m looking to understand why I should be Anglican/Protestant when the Catholic Church is the trunk of the Christian tree, as it were. (Jesus being the roots, obviously. It’s an imperfect metaphor, just go with me.) This is an intellectual pursuit as much as it is a spiritual one and I’ve been having some truly lovely conversations with Catholic Substackers here on Notes lately. I suppose that explains the rapid increase in subscribers! I’m excited to see what comes from my study over the next year.

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In other exciting news…

My latest novel, The Bluestockings, will be released on January 21st! 🎉

A magical bookshop, a long-lost novel, and two daughters searching for the truth...

Everyone in Hawthorn, Georgia believes Vera Black is dead. Everyone, that is, except her twelve-year-old daughter, Eleanor. Six years have passed since Vera vanished after work one day, and Eleanor, who helps her father run the family bookshop, secretly believes that Vera abandoned them. When she discovers a draft of an old novel hidden in a secret desk compartment, a story tied to the strange death of another Hawthorn woman, Eleanor finds herself caught up in a mystery that causes her to rethink everything she believes about her mother.

At eighty years old, Ruby Hurst has lived under the shadow of her mother Alice's mysterious death since she was a child. What she witnessed on the day Alice drowned has cast a shadow over everything Ruby loves, and she looks forward to the day when she will leave Hawthorn, and everyone in it, behind. Until one day, when Eleanor Black shows up with a long-lost novel and breaks apart the carefully constructed world Ruby has hidden within for decades.

A warm, tender novel exploring the bounds of family, community, and love in unexpected places, The Bluestockings is a story for everyone who has ever hoped, even when all hope seemed lost.

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I started working on this novel at the beginning of 2022, and it has undergone some major transformations in the three years since that first draft. After the release of my last book—an intensely personal spiritual memoir—I decided to go back to writing fiction for the sake of my heart. While Good Enough was the true-life narrative I simply had to tell, The Bluestockings is the magical story I want to tell.

Since I’m self-publishing this time around, I’m happy to share that this book release will be a bit different than others.

On January 28th, I will share the first chapter of a 27-part release of my novel in serial form, with one chapter being published here on Substack every Tuesday.

These posts will be completely free for everyone to read. In addition, paying subscribers will receive a complementary digital copy of The Bluestockings as a thank-you for your support of The Nook.

This is a project I’ve wanted to undertake for quite a while and I’m thrilled that it’s finally here! Serialized novels are how some of our favorite stories came to be (Dickens, anyone?) and I’m excited to share in that tradition.

I’d love for you to head over to Goodreads now and add The Bluestockings to your TBR. You can also pre-order the Kindle version right here, which helps put the book in front of new reader’s eyes.

Thank you for spending some of your time with me today! Have a beautiful weekend.

Wendi

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Word of the Week ✍🏻

Philocalist: (n.) a lover of beauty; one who appreciates or finds beauty in all things.

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Point #1: New Year’s resolutions can be overwhelming.

This post, however, is not. It’s chock-full of take-them-or-leave-them ideas to help you start fresh in a variety of areas without feeling like you’re already behind.

Point #2: History matters.

Fourth Branch Christendom is basically another phrase for “large, nondenominational churches with little to no hierarchy,” and this essay on its emergence as a Protestant tradition entirely distinct from the Reformed traditions of the past struck a chord. I spent many years growing and learning within the so-called fourth branch, so I don’t want to disparage it now, but more and more I see how much Christians are missing when we forgo our history in favor of radical individualism.

Point #3: “Do not teach your children to strive.”

As we begin a new homeschooling semester, I’m going to keep this tucked away in my back pocket.

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Reading in The Nook 📚

For Christmas, I received a number of lovely novels as gifts. Right now, I’m working my way through The Thirteenth Child, a dark fantasy about a young woman blessed by her godfather—The Dreaded End, or god of death—with the ability to diagnose and heal any illness. Unfortunately, she’s soon called upon to heal an evil king, a man destined for death, and this puts a big ol’ wrench in the works, especially when his son enters the picture.

The Thirteenth Child was one of Book of the Month’s December picks and I completely understand why. It’s deliciously engrossing and, as far as I can tell, limited on the spice 👍🏻.

What are you reading right now?

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“Embrace uncertainty. Some of the most beautiful chapters of our lives won’t have titles until much later.”

—Bob Goff—

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