(courtney's version)

The strange feeling of the books I wrote back in my possession, the strange thought that I was, to some extent, erasing my history from publishing. The knowledge that it needed to be that way. I’d meant to celebrate when the rights reversion on my first five titles was official, but didn’t. Maybe because what necessitated it was too heavy to make light. The present can’t unwrite the past. The future was unclear. But the books were mine again. I didn’t have any immediate plans for them. Then the election happened, and I thought of all those survival stories for girls, buried. Then the movie suddenly, wondrously, barrelling toward its first day of filming—soon to be a major motion picture based on a book no one could find?

So I talked with my literary agent, Faye Bender, who has been so incredibly stalwart and supportive and game throughout, who I couldn’t have done any of this without, and who I’m deeply grateful for. I was open to anything. Publishing the backlist in whole or part. Trad or indie. But not like before. Not like before. There was an electricity contemplating everything the books were and could become and so I shaped a proposal around that—the ‘could become.’ Something different, new. And maybe that’s when I started invoking Taylor Swift a little too.¹ Made a short list of people and places that felt interesting to me. We took a leap into the new year, then waited to see who would meet us there.

This is Not a Test will return to bookshelves in 2026, published by Bindery Books under Kathryn Budig’s Inky Phoenix Press imprint, which has already launched Susan J. Morris’s Strange Beasts, a gorgeous and unexpected collision of two very well-known worlds, and will launch KM Fajardo’s revelatory Local Heavens, a queer cyberpunk remix of The Great Gatsby this fall. To have This is Not a Test in the company of such exciting new voices under an inclusive, queer-friendly, feminist imprint like Kathryn’s, and the larger umbrella of Bindery Books and their author and reader-forward, community-focused approach to publishing—feels right.

The 2026 edition of This is Not a Test will feature fully revised and updated text, include the sequel, Please Remain Calm, in print for the first time, and an afterword from me reflecting on what it was like writing the book back then, and how I approached the changes I made for (Courtney’s version).

Bindery's mission statement, tastemaker communities and imprints support a diverse range of authors and books. It’s been wonderful to be part of and participate in such an innovative publishing environment. (All that and AI protections too.) Working with their team, who have been so enthusiastic, attentive, and refreshingly transparent throughout, has reintroduced aspects of being an author that felt very distant from me for a very long time, if not impossible.

In that time, I’ve been working to repair my relationship with writing, my belief in myself. That process, which I’ve chronicled so much of here, has completely transformed my approach to my craft. My voice and style have evolved to meet the author the last few years have turned me into.

I didn’t want republication to feel throwaway, a hollow punctuation on this journey and why I chose to go on it. I didn’t want the new edition to carry the weight of its reclamation, but the lightness. I wanted it to be meaningful, celebratory, and I wanted that for readers most of all.

Bindery was willing to republish the book as it was, but when I told Kathryn what it could be and what I wanted it to represent, she was all in and we returned to the manuscript together. For many reasons, it’s been wonderful to work with her. Her Phoenix community largely operates from a similar space of reclamation and empowerment and Inky Phoenix Press feels like a natural extension of that through its commitment to and belief in authors, in stories.

The rigorous attention she gave Sloane’s story, already so settled into itself, was innervating. It’s every author’s dream to work, editorially, with someone who is so engaged and so thoughtful, who sees past limits to possibilities. Kathryn asked the kind of questions that encouraged me to find the perfect balance between past and present versions. To live more in the details of its emotional and apocalyptic landscapes.

The revision comprised eleven total passes and I love what it has become. It was important for us to both preserve and transform the original text, and honor past and future readers by finding ways to give more to the experience. As I said in the afterword (a glimpse, just for you): “In revisiting This is Not a Test, I understood I was not here to prove I was a better writer now than I was then . . . The point was to go deeper into the world of the dead and use every tool in my kit to make it feel more alive. The writer I had become had to earn her place back into its story.”

Preorder info is forthcoming and all good and exciting things bound to a book’s release are on the way. The cover I can’t wait to share (designed by the immensely talented Charlotte Strick), ARCs, opportunities for early reads, exploring new and creative ways to share the publication process with you as we establish its unique place in the Inky Phoenix x Bindery Books community, movie news as it develops and it is developing . . .

This edition represents so much to me, and what it represents gives a lot back to me. Everything now is about how much it can give to you. This is for you. I hope it will earn a spot on—or back on—your bookshelves.

The value I’ve placed on my work and identity as an author was decimated by the creative struggles of the last few years. Returning to This is Not a Test asked me to look past the warped reflection of my damaged perception to something more true. And what I saw there, I was able to see, in large part, because of you. When it felt like there was nothing on the other side of my last release, I turned to my newsletter and readers were there. I couldn’t pretend. I couldn’t tell you it was any other way than how it was. You were astoundingly generous in your response. Your support, your kindness, your commiseration. The faith in which you approached me helped me commit to the question of my career despite my fear of the answer.

And while there’s still so much I don’t know about what’s next, and that I can’t guarantee, I can at least tell you I remain committed to seeing the question through. Thank you for your presence.

And to my mom, who was the first to tell me whether or not I succeeded in reclaiming my backlist, I had to try. Now she tells me she knew all along it would work out. She really likes all this phoenix symbolism, btw. Maybe a little on the nose narratively speaking but—feels right.

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