Abbernathy and Magick's End |Trilogy Now Complete!

It's Over

☆

Like the title says it's over. It's really over.  Abbernathy's story has concluded, and I hope, to all the readers, to all the Abby fans, and the Margo and Lucy stans, the Sebbi sweethearts, and those few who came around on Axion, I hope this end has given you what you wanted. I hope this story has made you laugh, has made you cry, has made you audibly, "awwww," because, dang it, some of the moments are just that sweet. 

I'm going be real for a second, so trigger warning - parental death, abuse. 

I started writing Abby's story when my father passed away. It was hard for me, not because of how much I loved him (I did, but it's more complicated than that) but because I was afraid I hadn't loved him enough. That I was supposed to be this distraught, sobbing mess over having lost this man, my father, and I was to a degree, but I was also mad, so very mad that I wouldn't ever get the chance to yell at him, to confront him about all the horrible things he'd said and done to me and my mom and my brother. He took something that I needed, that would have been cathartic, away from me, and I would never get that chance again. He'd never know how much he hurt me.

He wasn't the best dad. I spent most days afraid of him. There used to be a wooden paddle hung up on the wall beside the back door and I was terrified of doing something bad enough to warrant its use on me. God, he was so tall and his anger was so scary and the words he yelled, the names he called my mother, weren't what dads were supposed to say. Some of the most hurtful words I've ever heard in my life came out of his mouth. 

I needed a way to deal with everything I was feeling. I hadn't written anything in a long time. And I never imagined writing being more than just a hobby, a hobby I wasn't all that good at. After working an overnight shift at Panera Bread one day, I just sat in my dark apartment, in front of my computer and opened a blank word doc. 

 I wrote a story about grief, and about two black cats, and I gave Abby the father I always wished I had. One that was funny and bright, imperfect, but always there should she need him. I infused her world with the whimsy and hopefulness mine lacked. I gave her mother, my mother's passion for gardening. And I tried so hard to make Abby's story and her world and her friends seem magical. 

The first draft was no more than twenty pages. Twenty horrible pages of awkward pacing, incorrectly formatted dialogue and verb tense changes. I got to where Abby and Crum talk in her mother's grove and that's where it ended. I stopped, gave up, and it became another incomplete attempt at writing a story, because, then I didn't have any idea how to write a story.

Fast forward a couple of years, and I stumble upon Wattpad. I signed up, decided my username, and started to post. This may surprise you, but Abbernathy and the Cat Kingdom wasn't my first story on here - it was Everything Included - a silly spoof story on everything Wattpad back then (thus its title). It was supposed to be about a bad boy vampire, an eight-pack having werewolf, a handsome, rakish pirate with a heart of gold, and a good, old-fashioned brooding, sexy villain.

 But boy, that was not how that turned out. I did, however, finish that story, and that made me realize I could write a novel. I could finish a novel. I had a better understanding of story structure and character arcs than I'd ever had before.

I realized, I could complete that story I started writing about a girl and her two cats and her grief. 

Three books in seven-ish years? Not bad, also not the fastest, but hey, I've never been a writer capable of churning out multiple books a year. Maybe someday, when I have a different job. 

But it's done. Not just Magick's End, but Abby's entire story. She's been with me for a decade, that girl I always wanted to be when I was a kid, but wasn't. Whereas Abby's more a Mary Kate Olsen, a Tamara Mowry, I was an Ashley, a Tia. 

I love Abby, she's one of my favorite characters to write. Lucy's full insanity, Sebbi's just a ball of my insecurities and anxieties and Axion, Axion is always trying his best. Margo's that best friend who always underestimates herself, despite everyone around her knowing how awesome, how deserving of cheese, she is. Leonora's a late addition to the roster, but I love a woman who's a little nihilistic, a little angry at the world, a lot hard to read, and just plain tired of working in a bakery. 

Thank you for reading Abbernathy and the Cat Kingdom. Thank you for enjoying it so much you wanted a sequel. Thank you for reading the sequel, Abbernathy and the Two Kings. And thank you for patiently waiting to read Abbernathy and Magick's End. 

There's not a lot of plot in this third book, just a sweeping arc, a surprise twist. It's nothing grandiose or complex, but that's because this book is mainly about Abby and Lucy and Sebbi and Margo and where they end up and how they get there. I didn't cry as much finishing this book as I did the others. I thought that meant that it wasn't as good, but I think now, it's because I knew going into it, that it was the end.

I hope it's a worthy finale.

I hope this story was worthy of your time.

I hope you know how much it meant to me, to have strangers off the internet look at my animal covers and say, "Yep, I choose this one," and start reading. 

I hope you know when I say thank you, it's because it's true and I can't think of a better way to put it (sometimes simple is just plain better).

Thank you for reading. Thank you for supporting me. Thank you for giving me the courage to complete this journey. 

All the love, 

Octavia