Today I released the 37th book in my Haunting Danielle series, The Ghost and Christmas Magic. It is now available in eBook and paperback format. The audiobook version will be released by Tantor on February 10, 2026.
Yesterday one of my readers reached out to me. She told me she had been checking to see when the current book was being released when she noticed a mention of the next book—The Ghost and Family Secrets, slated to be released May 5, 2026.
She asked…very nicely…if I might give her a bit of a teaser about the book, obviously wanting something beyond the vague book description of book 38.
I couldn’t give her a teaser. Not because it is some grand secret…but because I have a secret.
People often ask writers, how do you get your ideas? I get that question a lot, especially since I have a long series.
In my last blog post, I wrote about my writing process, and how I often rely on automatic writing to get ideas flowing. But there is something else I do, that I did sort of mention, yet not fully.
My father’s mother, Madeline, was an artist. Occasionally I would stay over at her apartment if my parents needed a sitter. When I was very young, one thing she used to do to keep me entertained, she would take a piece of blank paper, write a squiggle on the paper, and tell me to draw a picture from it.
I enjoyed that game. I’d look at the random scribble and try to figure out what I could make from it.
I sort of do that now with my books. As I may have mentioned in my previous post, I always come up with a title for my next book when releasing the current one. That way, I can include a pre-order in the back of the new release.
Often, I have an idea what the story is going to be about. In fact, sometimes I know what is going to happen in the next four or five books.
Yet other times, I have absolutely no idea what I intent to write about. So, I try to come up with an interesting title—and that title is like the squiggle my grandma used to draw me. And from it…I will come up with a story. Basically, the title becomes my inspiration.