It is the perfect time of year for me to announce that I have a new book coming out!

It is not my trilogy, which still has several years on it before it will be ready. Rather, I have determined to release a novella length book once a year if at all possible. This is the first year that I am giving this a try. Thankfully, I already had an outline for a book ready, so in the first few months of 2026, I focused on finishing it up, pumping out a few rough drafts, and slowly editing it. Now we are in the final stretch and I can confidently say it will be ready in November!

What will this new book be? A murder mystery! Anyone who knows anything about me and my relationship with books is aware that Agatha Christie is one of my favorite authors. Her writing style, specifically in how she introduces her characters so well in just a few sentences, is a style I heavily drew inspiration from. I love how quickly she brings a character to life. Regardless of whether or not I like the character, or if they are even a good person or not, I see them so clearly and I understand their actions and motivations. More often than not, that is what I pay attention to when solving a mystery. Not just the logistics of who had the opportunity to do it, but who has the mindset to even go about the murder in this way.

I took that approach of character driven story to this book, my first stand alone mystery novella. Since it was going to be so character driven, I knew I had to do a dinner party style murder mystery. The trope of a storm or some other unprecedented event trapping a group of people in a house, and slowly they start dying off one by one is a well loved trope for a reason. I began by creating archetypes rather than characters, assigning them a role or occupation in the story, and I continued to weave the plot from there.

I did see a tip one time that said the best way to write a mystery is to first write the murder, and then work backwards to the beginning. Whoever suggested that and put it out there on the internet for me to find was an absolute genius. That really streamlined the process of crafting the murder. And as I did so, the motivations behind the who and the why began to form. Plot points started connecting, character backstories lined up, and I began to snip away anything that did not feed into the murder plot and its theme. Eventually, I had a murder mystery outline.

My original intent was to write a full length novel, but that was a daunting task, and it is why the outline of the story sat untouched for many, many years. Then I picked up an Agatha Christie book that was originally one of her plays written into book format. Since it was meant to be a stage play, the story was rather concise and rather brief for an Agatha Christie book, while not quite being short enough to be a short story. I adored it.

The book I’m referring to is Spider’s Web, by the way, and I highly recommend reading it. If I ever get the chance to see it in its original form as a play, I will. It is almost a humorous approach to the detective fiction genre, yet it still manages to be a well told mystery. In book form, it is amusing, delightful, curious, and a lot of fun.

When I finished that book, I realized that I did not have to write a full length novel for my first stand alone mystery. Rather than worrying about details and clues getting lost and tangled and leading to dead ends as I tried to stretch them out over a full novel, I could shorten it to an easy to read novella, and focus on all my writing strengths. I consider my writing strengths to be relationships between characters, how they interact in the story, and the perspective they bring.

Highly motivated, I dove right back into this outline, and it took only a few months for me to get a completed story to start editing and working with. Now, after several edits, re-reads, more edits, and some work on cover design, we are nearing the homestretch of this book.

I hope you are looking forward to reading a good murder mystery. It has become a story I can be proud of, and even if it cannot stand up to the best of them, my biggest goal was to write a book that was fun to read. Not the most clever, or the most fantastic, but a fun read with characters you’ll enjoy.

I will post updates on how the process is going and eventually have a determined date of release in the next few weeks. Keep an eye out for those and happy reading!

With warmest affections,

Brianna M. Hoyle