I apologize for being absent so long. Without getting into too many personal details, the last several months have been extremely rough on a professional, personal, and family level and I have been, as they say “going through it.” I am in the process of getting various projects back on track.

One of those projects is, of course, this website. Those of you who have been subscribed for awhile will notice the major overhaul to the website. I have officially transitioned from “Night Forest Books” to my official author name “Amanda Haimoto Rudd.” This is the name I will be working and publishing under in the future, and I decided it was time to stake my claim on the domain.

At the same time, I decided to gift myself with an author logo. I admit that this is a bit of “putting the cart before the horse” as I am not actually ready to publish any of my several WIPs yet. However, because I knew I wanted to overhaul the aesthetic of the website, I decided I wanted to finalize the style and look of whatever logo I wanted to use in the future – particular the color scheme and font choices.

And I am so happy to be able to unveil my official logo. The image is of a Japanese kirin (in Chinese: qilin), which is sometimes called the “Asian unicorn,” though they’re not really all that similar. The kirin is visually described as being part deer, part dragon. In Japanese lore the kirin is a symbol of nobility and purity, but also of justice and righteous anger. The kirin is gentle but fierce when protecting the vulnerable and fighting for what is right. I knew it was the image I wanted for my brand as a way to honor my Japanese heritage (as well as adopting my grandmother’s Japanese family name), and because the kirin is a good representation of the things I wish to embody in my fiction.

I commissioned the absolutely amazing team at Qamber Designs for the logo, and they did not disappoint. They were a delight to work with at every stage. I had fairly solid ideas of the look I wanted (the kirin, the purple/blue/pink “bi flag” color scheme), and they took those ideas and ran with them. They gave all kinds of great suggestions and many options to choose from as we narrowed down to the final look. The final logo is everything I hoped it would be. If anyone else is in the market for author branding (or book covers, they do those too), I cannot recommend Qamber Designs HIGHLY ENOUGH. They were marvelous.

Having received the logo design, reworking the website to match it was a fun project. There are a few things I still intend to tweak or add on later, but I figured it was close enough to final look that I could safely switch the site back from “coming soon” to “live.” I didn’t want to leave it down too long.

I have updated some information on my freelance editing services. I have also added new information on full writing coach services as well. And I tweaked a couple small things such as my about page and the contact page. I also hope to add a couple more bits and pieces to the “personal writings” tab within the next few weeks. And I will, of course, be getting the book review blogging back up and running soon as well.

If anyone has any questions or concerns, as always, please feel free to reach out! Thanks all, and have a good rest of your week.