for a friend.

Today is your birthday.
It will always be your birthday.
Whether you're here or there, it's still the same.
It's still your day.

I tend to forget a lot.
It's not that I don't care.
It's that it still feels like a bad dream.
Like something that happens in movies and television,
but not to us.
Not in this life.
It does though.
Every day.
And it hurts just the same.
Whenever I think about something you'd enjoy -
consider sharing something or asking your opinion -
that's when it comes back,
and it's worse than before.

I can only think about the many things you've missed.
All of the good and terrible things that have happened since you disappeared.
I wonder what you'd think of it all.
Plenty of it would have deserved your smile.
Plenty of it could have broken your heart.
But you weren't here to see it.
And that is the greatest disappointment of all.

I hate to think that you've been missing everything.
But maybe you haven't.
Maybe you've seen it, wherever you are.
Is it beautiful there?

I'm asking for a friend.






Happy Birthday, Laura-Lisa.

2016 Moonshine Awards

This is completely fandom oriented, so if you're not a fan of The Walking Dead... or you think fan-fiction is beyond you.... please don't look any further into this post. I'm sharing this merely because it has to do with something I wrote, and well... that's what this blog is about, right?

When I stepped away from publishing, I burrowed into a little hole known as fandom. Most of you know this because I posted about it here on my blog, as well as on all of my social platforms. It became a bit of a refuge for me, and for that I am forever grateful - not only to the relief writing about Beth and Daryl gave me, but to the dozens of new friends I've made in the process.

As such, I've written several stories surrounding the ship famously known as Bethyl. Stories about what could have been, and stories about what was. Their relationship latched onto me in so many ways that I'm pretty sure despite them not being characters of my own, I could write about the two them for the rest of my life. It's that tragic. So, because I wrote so many stories, I now have six - yes, SIX - of my fan-fictions nominated in a little something called the Moonshine Awards. This is an annual fanfic awards celebration thingy hosted by a girl known as sillymommy2010 on Tumblr. She runs a blog called Ultimate Bethyl Fic List, where it is what it states: the ultimate list of all Bethyl fan-fiction.

This year (2016), I was nominated in the following categories:

Best ZA
Best One Shot
Best Multi-Chapter 
Best Reunion Fic
Best Fix-It Fic
and Best Work in Progress.

The reason why I'm sharing this is to encourage you to vote. I know that most of you don't care about the The Walking Dead, much less read fan-fiction inspired by it, so here's my pitch.

I know you've been deprived of new books from me in the last year, and I've explained the reasons behind it as much as I can by this point. Now that you're going to be able to read Negative Spaces & Instead of This online, I hope that the void I create will be filled in some fashion. However, the time I spent away from publishing was not wasted in my opinion. I still wrote almost every day, and by doing so I honed my craft. These fan-fictions are some of the best work I've ever done, and I'm extremely proud of them, in spite of the content. So please, if you are a fan of my writing and want to support me, show some love and vote.

My username is "rednecksaints".
You can vote once a day and choose up to 3 stories per category, so anything you see by that username you can vote for.
Here is the link: https://ultimatebethylficlist.com/2016-moonshine-awards/
Just click on each category individually to vote.
Voting is open through Feb. 8th!

The New Plan

Hello and welcome to the new MEGAN DUKE BOOKS.
Now known simply as REDNECKSAINTS.

Yes, I've changed the name of this page because I'm changing a lot of things. Facebook being a very small, very insignificant part of that plan. However, it is still important that I share those changes here because most of you that follow this page are following because you enjoy my work. You read my stories and you have been anxiously awaiting the next book in two series that I've been promising for quite some time.

Well folks... I'm here to say that I am giving you a little taste of BOTH.

Yep. Starting today, I will no longer be publishing in print. All future publications will be written serially, and posted on Wattpad... FOR FREE. I am branding myself as a strictly digital author with zero profit, and I know that it's the right decision.

This past year has been hard on me mentally, and I've had to face some pretty enlightening facts about myself as a person and as an author. In light of that, I discovered that the real reason I write is to make other people (all of you) happy, so that's why I'm choosing to step out onto a new platform that will make it more convenient for all of my readers to hear my words.

This page will be a hub of sorts for all of my work, both original fiction and fan-fiction alike, so look out for new posts featuring updated chapters from all of your favorite stories, including The Mind Breaker Accounts, Negative Spaces, and Never.

First on that list:

Carter's short story from Negative Spaces - https://www.wattpad.com/361453229-negative-spaces-part-1-carter

and the first chapter of Instead of This (Book 3 in TMBA) - https://www.wattpad.com/361451337-instead-of-this-book-3-of-the-mind-breaker

I'm so excited about this, and I hope that all of you will be excited for it as well <3 span="">