Magiford World: Kwik Trip

In Gate of Myth and Power, I mention the gas station/convenience store "Kwik Trip," which is a Wisconsin franchise with a cult following and I realized with the final audiobook releasing later this month it would be a great chance to talk about this place more. (Note that there is an unrelated brand of stores called QuikTrip that aren't based in Wisconsin.)

Unlike a typical gas station Kwik Trip focuses on offering a wide variety of grocery items, and some of the buildings are so large they are more like small grocery stores that happen to have a gas station. They also have a wide variety of lunch-like deli items you can purchase that are reasonably fresh so many people will stop to just get food and not even bother to gas up their vehicles.

And of course they have cheap coffee (including flavored coffees) that you can purchase in extra large size which is why Leila paid them a visit. And lots of good donuts and treats too!

Here's a photo of an actual Kwik Trip donut display:

Why is Kwik Trip so popular?

Speaking as a Wisconsin resident I know from experience that the Kwik Trip gas stations tend to be cleaner (both outside and inside) than the average gas station. And they always have a free air pump in the parking lot that actually works!

They are also located everywhere in Wisconsin at this point and it's pretty common to find two of them across from each other at busy intersections, which has added to their popularity.

The company also has an over-the-top social media presence, and it's easy to find hilarious videos about them on social media. Beyond that, the cult like following of this chain is something else, and it's not that rare for average customers to do their own Kwik Trip social media posts such as wedding couples showing up for a quick photo shoot (no I'm not kidding!).

What gas stations/convenience stores are unique to your region?

Happy Valentine’s Day 2025

Happy Valentine’s Day, Champions! Valentine’s Day continues to be one of my favorite holidays–an entire day dedicated to sweets and showing everyone I love how thankful I am? Sign me up!

I do have a little gift for you, but before I share it I would like to plug a Valentine-ish short story from the vault, The Love Potion.

This story is from the Fairy Tale Enchantress series but you don't need to have read that series to enjoy this tale as it is a self contained little short story. However, you've read The Princess and the Pea or any of the Timeless Fairy Tale books there will be a few easter eggs/name drops you might notice!

And now for the gift!

Please enjoy this brand new coloring book page featuring Roland/Puss and Gabrielle's ... boots!

This coloring book page was once again drawn by the lovely @olena_shkavron and she used reference photos of the real life inspiration when she was drawing Roland/Puss, so if you need a reminder of what his coloring is you can check this blog post: Puss in Boots - Meet the Inspiration. Or you can color him however you like! I've really loved the parrot colored images I've seen of Emerys in bird form!

Here's the link to Roland and Gabi's story if this coloring page inspired you to start a reread.

I hope you have a wonderful day, Champions, filled with love from all the people you hold dear! (And maybe a few sweets and good books, too!) Thanks for reading!

2024 Wrap Up and Look Ahead

This past year (2024) was a busy time so I created this blog post as a quick reference of all the fun stuff that happened so you can make sure you didn't miss anything!

I will continue to be on hiatus for all of 2025 and probably all of 2026 as well but that doesn't mean there won't be any new stuff. I've left little notes below of what you can expect to see coming in 2025.

New ebooks and paperbacks

Last year saw the completion of the Magic on Main Street series, which is the fifth trilogy based in the world of Magiford. If you want to know how the series fit together you can check out this timeline blog post.

Book 1: Lies of Vampires and Slayers Amazon.com | Other Amazon stores

Book 2: Games of Enemies and Allies Amazon.com | Other Amazon stores

Book 3: Order of Blood and Ruin Amazon.com | Other Amazon stores

Did you catch all the bonus content related to the Magic on Main Street series? Games, recipes, and a look at the inspiration behind the story were all published as blog posts and you can find the full list on the Order of Blood and Ruin book page.

In 2024 I also released a new complete series ebook boxset for the Gate of Myth and Power series, so you can grab all three books for a great deal and they only take up one spot in your ereader library!

Gate of Myth and Power ebook boxset: Amazon.com | All other Amazon stores

For the first time ever I also had a book reach the incredible milestone of 10,000 ratings and reviews on Amazon (it was The King's Captive)! Wow!

Thank you, thank you to all my champions who take the time to review my books. Reviews help other readers decide if the story is something they are interested in so it each review can help readers and authors in a big way!

What's next for ebooks?

This year I will release a boxset for the Magic on Main Street trilogy which means all of the Magiford stories will be available in ebook boxsets. Have you read them all?

There won't be any other new ebooks or paperbacks in 2025 but keep reading to learn more about the other new stuff coming this year!

New Audiobooks

Last year also saw the completion of the Magic on Main Street series in audio on Audible. The audio team really, really, loved these narrators and I highly recommend you listen to the samples I've posted on Instagram. I'm not normally much of an audio listener myself but these are just sublime!

Book 1: Lies of Vampires and Slayers Audible

Book 2: Games of Enemies and Allies Audible

Book 3: Order of Blood and Ruin Audible

In 2024 I also published several of my short stories as free audio on YouTube! Most of them use an AI voice but one of them: On the Observations of Sir Kay is narrated by the same person who did the audiobooks. You can find the whole list on this Youtube playlist.

What's next for audiobooks?

The Gate of Myth and Power series is currently in the audiobook production phase. The first audiobook, The King's Captive, will release on January 24th and the next two books should be in February (book 2) and March (book 3). For the first time ever we will be using the Audible pre-orders option for the second and third books so you will know weeks in advance exactly when each audiobook will be released!

After the Gate of Myth and Power audiobooks are finished the audio team will jump right into the Elves of Lessa series which we are crossing all our fingers and toes will be finished by the end of 2025! We are waiting to plan any other audio projects until these thee books have finished production.

New Short Stories

I released some new short stories in 2024 as part of the release of the Magic on Main Street series, but there were two other bonus stories that you might have missed! The list is below and you can find all my short stories on this page.

• A Vampire Visit

• Family Bonding

• The Annoyed Eminence

• Committee Chaos

• King Arthur Character Interview (newly rediscovered!)

• The Christmas Wolf

What's next for short stories?

My team is working on something really special and later this year you will be able to download a complete collection of all the Magiford short stories! It will be exclusive to my website (not on Amazon) but just like the Princess and the Pea novella it will use Bookfunnel so you can add it to your ereader device!

New Fun Stuff

The Magic on Main Street series was packed with cameos from the other Magiford series and we launched the Spot It game to make it easier for you to track the character and location overlaps! I love dropping these hat tips to the other trilogies and it was fun watching the Champions piece through the clues in the Spot It tracker (thanks to Discord Admin, Vin, for making this for us!) This blog post has the links to the easy and hard versions of the Spot It trackers if you want to test your knowledge!

In the summer of 2024 I ran my first ever audiobook promo code giveaway and it was a huge success! Thanks to all the Champions who participated in the games! I loved hearing the stories of how the audiobooks were everything from a fun summer vacation listen to a way for an existing Champion to be able to bond with an audio-only family member. I'm so happy you've enjoyed reading my stories in this format!

In 2025 I will also be once again doing a audiobook promo code giveaway in the month of June. And this year the Champions subscribed to my Author Newsletter will get to impact which audiobooks are part of the weekly giveaway (there will be a newsletter poll later this year).

I also released a few new Coloring Book Pages in 2024 (and you can expect to see more coming in 2025). My website also went through a major upgrade and the revised freebies page had as ton of awesome stuff for you to do and read beyond the coloring book pages!

New Community Events

In 2024 the Facebook Group also started doing a Featured Book of the Month with themed games for you to participate in as part of the read along. They have more fun events planned for 2025 so if you use Facebook consider joining the group so you can participate!

The Discord community is going strong and if you want more of a chat type atmosphere it is the best place to join! This group is the reigning champs of memes and also love discussing movies, tv, and other pop culture topics! For instructions on how to join the Discord community see this webpage.

The year 2024 included French Fry Appreciation Week which was a blast and it was packed with Champion created memes, artwork, and french fry related photos! I re-posted a lot of the Champion works on my social media and the French Fry Week Wrap Up blog post has been updated to include links to all of them!

SheaCon 2024 and Future

SheaCon is a weekend of K.M. Shea themed fun held on a private discord server different from Kitty’s main server. It's planned and run by readers and they put a lot of thought into making it the best time possible!

The last SheaCon was in July of 2024 and the event is currently on hiatus since I am not currently writing new books.

But don't worry, if you missed the live event there is still a ton of fun stuff available for you to see and do! Most of the panels have audio recordings available, and many of the activities have been published as separate blog posts (with more coming - there were so many fun things I had to split them up into multiple posts). You can find the full list of fun things on the SheaCon website page.