⚠️ Trigger Warning: This post contains discussion of suicide, grief, and mental health struggles. Please read with care.

I’m releasing my first novella on Amazon as a paperback print.
It feels both exciting and terrifying.

I did have to set the price a little higher than I would have liked—just so I can actually earn royalties. In the future, I’ll look into publishing on other sites too. It isn’t live just yet (there’s a 72-hour wait), but I’ll post again once the paperback is officially available.

Still, I’ve managed to do something I never thought I could. For years I listened to people tell me my work wasn’t good enough—and I believed them.

I’ll be the first to admit, I am not the world’s best writer. I never will be, and honestly, I don’t want to be. My writing will never be perfect. My life will never be perfect. But what even is perfect? To me, perfection doesn’t exist. So why should I aim for it in my writing? Why can’t we see the beauty in imperfections instead?

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What Inspired Goodbye Jacob

I feel like I should explain, at least briefly, what inspired me to write this story. Out of respect for my friend and his loved ones, and also to keep my own identity private (for now), I’ll only share a small part.

Years ago, I had a close friend who tragically took his own life. Why he did it is a question that will never be answered.

There were rumours about us—that we had “got together,” even though he was in a relationship. The night before his death, something happened that has never left me.

I remember seeing him in my room. To this day I don’t know how or why. He hugged me so tightly, with such desperation, and his skin was icy cold. He tried to speak, but his voice sounded miles away, even though he was right in front of me. No matter how hard I tried, I couldn’t make out his words. Then, everything went black, like I had fainted.

I brushed it off as a dream—until the next morning, when I was told he had passed.

At the time, my own mental health was fragile. I wasn’t sure if I had experienced psychosis, or if I had truly seen his spirit. Maybe he was trying to explain why—but I couldn’t hear him.

He had once asked me not to tell anyone about his struggles. He insisted he wasn’t in a bad place, just “felt low sometimes.” If only I had known how low. If only he had told me the truth.

Everyone was shocked when he died. But I carried guilt—guilt that I still feel today. To the world, he was the happy, funny, talented guy who had everything. To me, he was also someone who confided in me when he was struggling. He supported me when I was at my lowest. He helped me more than he ever knew.

But during that time, I entered a difficult relationship, and my own mental health spiralled. It put strain on our friendship. We hadn’t spoken for three months before his death—or until that night, when he came to me.

It was a shock I never truly recovered from.

Some of the characters in Goodbye Jacob—the bullies who torment Lucy, the cruel things that are said—are inspired by real people I encountered, and real words I can still hear clearly to this day.

His death was almost fifteen years ago, yet I can still see him, still hear his voice. I began writing this story two years ago, loosely inspired by the rumours about us. Of course, I changed and shaped it into fiction—but the emotions are very real: the guilt, the unanswered questions, the blaming, the grief.

And so Goodbye Jacob was born.

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Goodbye Jacob is more than just a story to me—it’s a piece of my past, reshaped into fiction. It’s raw, imperfect, and deeply personal. I hope when you read it, you see not just the characters, but the emotions behind them.

Once the paperback is live, I’ll share the link here. Thank you for supporting me in this scary but exciting step into publishing! 💜

© 2025 Louise C Kay. All rights reserved. Please do not reproduce without permission.