Bookcast Episode 134: Ima Letchu Finish...

Welcome back to The Bookcast. I’m DL White, and this episode is an easy, unstructured start to Season 7!  I’m talking through how I approach a new year, what I’ve been reading, what I want to write, and how I’m easing into 2026 without forcing goals before I’m ready.

Books mentioned in this episode: 

• Kin — Tayari Jones (ebook, ARC)
• No One Knew — Kendra Elliott (audiobook, ALC)
• Champagne Taste on a Bad Boy Budget — Zuri Day (audiobook, recent release)

Books by DL White referenced

• Calculated Risk (now wide; ebook, print, and audio)
• The Never List
• Missing Persons
• Hey Lover
• Elysium
• The Pearl

Shorts & Fanfiction

• A Misadventure in Cloudcroft, New Mexico
• Questions and Answers (coming up on Substack sook)

Writing Plans for 2026

• The goal is two & a possible.
• My first project of the year is in planning, anticipated to be ready before Black Romance Book Fest in May, which means drafting now and editing by late March.
• I’m using 20K in Five Days (Jan 21–25) to get a strong foundation in place.
• Continue producing shorter works to increase reader discovery 
• Writing new characters makes me more energized right now than forcing long-stalled series work.

Everything else is light and in-flux. My year really begins in March, so I'm ramping slowly. Strap in for the ride! 

Transcript

Hello, hello, hello, and happy good morning, good afternoon, good evening—Sunday, Monday, Tuesday—whatever day you might be listening to today’s podcast. I hope it is a good one.

It is a beautiful, cloudless, sunny Sunday here in Atlanta on the day of recording. I am your host. I am DL White, host of The Bookcast, and this is episode 134 of my platform for sharing short fiction and updates on life as a self-published author. I write Black love, a little bit of Black mystery, you know what I’m saying? Dipping my toe in some other stuff, and I’m just happy to be here.

I don’t have a rundown today. I am just rambling for a short time to basically kick off Season Seven. I don’t have a number of episodes, I don’t have time lengths as to what begins what season. I just need it to be a date and time that I can remember. So I think I try to start a new season on January 1 of every year. Anyway, welcome to Season Seven of The Bookcast.

This started out basically as a space to read my holiday shorts because they’re too short to pay someone to record them for audio. So I read them for The Bookcast, and that was basically to train me to read The Never List for the podcast, which is also available on this platform if you search real hard. I read that book here. It’s ninety-seven thousand words, and that’s a long book to read out loud, yes. But it did lead to me being able to voice a couple of audiobooks, which I jumped into last year.

That was last year. That was 2025. It is now 2026. And I’m basically on here to just yap about the year and what it might bring.

Do I have any goals written out? Nope. Not a one. Yes, it is January 4th. No goals written out so far. But they’ll be coming eventually. I treat January as a slow entry into the year. I don’t really know how it’s going to turn out or what’s going to pop up.

The title of this podcast is I’m Gonna Let You Finish. And we know where that’s from. We in the culture. We don’t have to mention the man’s name. If you don’t know, you’re not supposed to know anyway.

It’s the beginning of the year. A lot of people are making changes in how they operate—in a bookish way, an author way, a writer way. And there are a lot of people who are not doing things. I fully embrace people not doing things. I am a big believer in doing the work that matters. If it doesn’t matter, stop doing it. If it doesn’t push the envelope, put it down. If it doesn’t make a difference, make a dent, make a bang, don’t waste your time or energy on it.

If not doing things is what you have to do in order to do other things, then you have to be in that.

A lot of people are stressed about keeping number goals—how many books they’re going to read, how many they’re going to write, how many words they’re going to hit, how many blog posts they’re going to make, how many books they’re going to record. And I’m gonna let you finish.

But having something measurable makes me me. It gives me drive. It makes me happy to cross things off a list. It brings me joy to count things.

There are a lot of people who aren’t going to do the things I say I’m going to do this year, and that’s wonderful. I support you. Your goals aren’t my goals. Your wants aren’t my wants. The things you’re going to stop doing aren’t the things I’m going to stop doing.

Because your girl is all about a Goodreads goal.

I know everybody is switching over to StoryGraph. I believe in StoryGraph. It’s Black-owned. It’s not owned by Amazon. I believe in it. I just don’t like it. I’m a creature of habit. I’ve been doing the Goodreads challenge since 2008. It’s an institution. I don’t plan on leaving Goodreads ever.

Goodreads goals are part of my personality. I don’t read one hundred plus books to read one hundred plus books. I read one hundred plus books and I count them. I’m not letting a goal stress me out. When I feel behind, I tweak the goal. When life slows down and I read more, I tweak it again. That’s just how it works for me.

As usual, I set my Goodreads goal on January 1. It’s tradition. I usually set it at 100, and I’ve hit well over that for the past five years. This year I set it at 150. That’s very easy for me to hit.

So far I’ve read three books. The first book of the year was Kin by Tayari Jones. She’s one of my favorite authors. Atlanta-based. I adore her. When she has a new book, I grab it. Kin was delicious. Wonderful. Not an easy read, but a really good one. I’m holding off on reviewing it because I want to hear the audio, but my first impression was great. It feels different from her earlier work in a way I really enjoyed.

Then I read No One Knew by Kendra Elliott. She’s an auto-buy author for me. I didn’t read the blurb, which was a mistake. It leans heavily into militia and white nationalist themes, which I’m very tired of. But it was well written, well performed in audio, and I gave it four stars. That one’s on me.

Then just minutes before recording, I finished Champagne Taste on a Bad Boy Budget by Zuri Day. Super fun. Super steamy. Afterglow Books production. The audio was a little stiff at normal speed, but speeding it up helped. I really enjoyed it. It reminded me of Calculated Risk, which is now available wide in ebook, print, and audio.

As far as writing goes, I don’t have everything mapped out. I do have one idea I want to have ready for Black Romance Book Fest in May, which means I need to start writing now. I’m planning to use 20K in Five Days in January to get past the messy beginning. My goal for the year is two novels and possibly a third, plus shorter works and audiobooks.

Missing Persons needs to be in audio. I’d like Hey Lover, Elysium, and The Pearl in audio too. Self-narration is time-intensive, but faster and more sustainable than outsourcing. I’m not going into debt for audiobooks.

I’m still writing fanfiction when inspiration hits. On my Substack, I’m posting a chapter a day of A Misadventure in Cloudcroft, New Mexico through January 10. After that, I’ll probably post Questions and Answers.

Potter Lake Book 4 still isn’t ready. The story isn’t gelling, and I’m not forcing it. Right now I want new characters and new energy.

Outside of writing, I’m heading back to work after a long break, getting my house together, and focusing on making my home a place I prefer to be.

The world is wild right now. I hope you’re leaning into art. And if you’re choosing art, I hope you choose mine.

You can find my books at booksbydlwhite.com and my Substack at authordlwhite.substack.com. I’m around on Instagram, Threads, Bluesky, Pinterest, TikTok, and Facebook.

I hope you have a wonderful week.
 Talk soon. Bye.