When the Threads Just Keep Intertwining: Building the Dianna-verse

I've recently added this little paragraph to the home page of my website:

"All of Dianna's paranormal fantasy series take place in what she dubs "the Dianna-verse". The rules of the Dianna-verse apply to The Witching Pen, Eye of the Storm, and the Blood Surge series, with characters getting mentioned across books, and some books/characters crossing over eventually. You won't get lost if you start any series you enjoy from the beginning. Start with Releasing the Wolf if you love werewolves, The Witching Pen for witches, demons, angels and magic, or Blood Surge for vampires and vampiric lore."

This is a big part of the direction my writing is going. I do, absolutely, have plans to also write standalones that are nothing to do with the Dianna-verse, but the universe I have created, certainly for these three series, have rules, and sometimes we might get to know vampires if we read a book about werewolves, or we might learn more about teleportation and angels, even if we read outside The Witching Pen series. You might learn a tiny bit more about vampires if you read Fathoms Deep, and what you learn about vampires will automatically apply to the Blood Surge series because the books are set in the same universe (the Dianna-verse).

Hopefully, you're still with me!

As we go deeper into 2026 and 2027, it's worth also reading the post I recently wrote called 

The Great Shift of 2026: How My Stories Are Changing

In this post I talk about challenging my writing and how I'm going forward with certain books.

All of this is very exciting for me because in the past I always struggled (drove myself into knots) over never being able to categorise my books properly for readers. They have always been too "fantasy-horror" for romance readers, and always too "romance" for dark fantasy readers. In 2026, I have decided I just don't care ... and that feeling is so freeing. The right readers will find the books and that's all there is to it. While the book market is over-saturated nowadays (when I first started writing-to-publish in 2010, I was among only 20,000 or so indie authors in the world doing it), readers are plentiful and always looking for something different. Not everyone wants another formulaic romantasy.

So, that is how I begin 2026: in my own stride and autonomy as an author, wherever it may lead.

I'm looking forward to bringing riveting stories to whomever is still reading my books for their character-driven arcs and action.

Dianna xx