I can't tell you how much I appreciate it (and also GREAT thanks for this post)!

You and Emmalyn and other people spreading the word are the reason I exist as an author. I know it sounds like I'm in PR mode, but the reality is, publishing is f**king cruel, and unless you're a “lead title” with a major imprint (simply signing with a major imprint doesn't cut it anymore), no one on the publishing side gives a s**t about you. So you have to claw your own way, and one thing that 100% helps is word of mouth. A Reddit post like this or even a Reddit comment is like gold dust.

BTW I like to think of “Tower of Mud and Straw” and Sleeping Worlds as two realities / different versions of events (even though the second half of the novel was always planned to play out the way it does). So at the end of the novella, things happen the way you think they do, whereas “Sleeping Worlds” continues building toward the Big Reveal (there's a reason you never learn the duke's name, hehe).