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Irene Te | Author

Author of cozy contemporary fiction

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- This Place is Magic
- This Song is Ours
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pre-order campaign

20.11.24 | Irene

Pre-Order Gifts: This Song is Ours

For Readers + This Song is Ours

Everything you need to know about the pre-order campaign for This Song is Ours!

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I’m Irene, author of This Place is Magic, a cozy contemporary novel about K-pop, found family, and waffles. Learn more about me over here!

Grab a copy of This Place is Magic, available in eBook and paperback from Amazon, Barnes & Noble, and more!

Signed copies are available through my local indie, Blue Willow Bookshop. Learn more on this page!

Sign up for my monthly newsletter to get all the latest updates and exclusive bonus content, including two extra chapters for This Place is Magic

irenewritesthings

Cozy contemporary author + honorary K-pop scholar

📸 Sunday Photos 3/22/25 ➡️➡️ 1️⃣ -

📸 Sunday Photos 3/22/25 ➡️➡️

1️⃣ - My desk for March 🌸 (and let's be real, part of April too 😂😂 I take forever to change it out)

2️⃣ - I have goals in life and one of them is to collect every vase ever sold by Ban.do 😌

3️⃣ - Waffles by @rainnrainy 🧇💖 Seen as a mini print here, but it's also a sticker that came with Blue Willow preorders of TSIO!

4️⃣ - Lots of friends watching me as I work... 👀🌞

5️⃣ - Some prints I grabbed from @lorazombie shop, thanks to Sky for telling me about the sale!

6️⃣ - Food styling courtesy of my 5-year-old 🍓

7️⃣ - It was Spring Break for us this past week! We did mostly nothing! I'm off 90% of my routines and I have no idea what day it is! But I did come in EARLY on my deadline for this section of TPIH 🏆

Does it feel like spring where you live? 💐

#irenete #sundayphotosbyirene

🌞🌹 Shine bright, it's Jungwoo's birthday! Do

🌞🌹 Shine bright, it's Jungwoo's birthday! Doesn't he look so sweet? Don't you want your heart broken today, Sunshines?? If yes, can he take notes for songwriting purposes...

Newsletter friends can hop on a call with Jungwoo at irenewritesthings.substack.com ✨ Please take the call at your own risk ✨ I am not to be held liable for any resulting clownery ✨ But you have to come tell me what happened on your call 👀🫖

Art is by @joe___lx 💖 Can you believe Joey made me choose between three beautiful cakes for this special occasion? And I did it bc I'll do anything for her 😤 LOVE U JOE

#thisplaceismagic #thissongisours #irenete #kpopbook #kpopreads #cozycontemporary #shinebrightapollo

Who else is 500% always ready for something cozy?

Who else is 500% always ready for something cozy? Sooooo excited to team up with my buddy reading + book buying bestie @magnoliapigeonbookblurbs for this post! We read a lot of translated fiction, especially from Asia, and today we're sharing some of our favorite cozy, comforting reads about books and bookshops ✨ Swipe ➡️➡️ to see our choices and some upcoming 2025 releases we're (impatiently) waiting for!

📙 What You Are Looking For is in the Library by Michiko Aoyama - follows five separate library patrons who are all searching for meaning in their lives. We follow their journeys after meeting with quirky head librarian Sayuri Komachi. Not only is she a talented felt artist - she also has the gift of knowing exactly what books will change someone’s life forever.

📗 The Great Passage by Shion Miura - This one is about a small team working to compile a dictionary, following them through a long but heartwarming journey that reaffirms the power of words to connect us - and heal us. (There's also a wonderful anime adaptation!)

📙 The Long, Long Goodbye of the Last Bookstore by Mizuki Nomura - “The bond between books and readers carries beyond the page.” When a beloved bookstore is closing for good a mysterious traveler shows up to reunite patrons with their most beloved books. Full of magic, mystery, rollercoasters of emotion and all things bookish - The Long, Long Good-Bye of “The Last Bookstore” is an absolutely enchanting read!

📗 The Morisaki Bookshop Duology by Satoshi Yagisawa - The Morisaki Bookshop series is a heartfelt love letter to books and bookstores! Beautifully exploring how even when the world feels like it is falling apart, books and the stories they hold remain as an anchor.

📙 Welcome to the Hyunam-dong Bookshop by Hwang Bo-reum - Yeongju takes a leap of faith and decides to leave her corporate job, opening the small bookstore of her dreams. As she navigates the ups and downs of running the shop, she creates a haven for fellow readers and befriends others whose lives have been changed by books.

#translatedfiction #cozybooks #bookstagram

"What inspired you to write This Place is Magic?"

📸 Sunday Photos 2/23/25 ➡️➡️ This is a

📸 Sunday Photos 2/23/25 ➡️➡️

This is always my favorite post to put together every month. Also, hello 👋🏼👋🏼 to all the indie authors I've met through Indieverse recently!

1️⃣ - February desk 💖🌹

2️⃣ - I can't even tell you how fast I ran to take pictures while the sun was actually shining. Houston weather has been almost nonstop dismal for weeks 🙃🙃 Pls let me unsubscribe 🙃🙃 (Nicky's on my windowsill thanks to @joe___lx 💋💋)

3️⃣ - If you don't think she was an absolutely necessary purchase, you're wrong 🐰

4️⃣ - Writing is so wild because all the ways you tricked your brain into writing previous projects may be useless for the next one. I'll be in major revisions for TPIH for a while yet and I'm relying on all kinds of strategies I never needed with the other two. I mean, I'm out here shuffling index cards every day. Index cards! Like, since when?? Have never used these to keep my plot straight in any other story 🤪 but it's working, and you do what works, you know? Also I found this little binder where I keep the cards I've finished ✨

5️⃣ - Eunjae and Jiyeon (plus their third wheel, Max; not pictured bc Jiyeon tied him to a rocket and fired him at the sun) came with us to Space Center Houston while my editor was here for a visit! Don't miss a visit to NASA if you're ever in Houston 🚀 Be like me and pay admission mostly for the amazing gift shop 😌💸

6️⃣ - Waffles with @indigoblu3 before we dropped her off at the airport!

#sundayphotosbyirene #irenete #thisplaceismagic #thissongisours

✨🧇 THIS PLACE IS MAGIC has been nominated for

✨🧇 THIS PLACE IS MAGIC has been nominated for Book of the Year and Best Debut Author & Novel at the @indieverseawards 💫 And it's so exciting! And I need to go lay down!

TPIM is the first book in a cozy contemporary fiction duology featuring...
✨ K-pop
🧇 Found family
✨ K-drama vibes
🧇 Light romance
✨ Too many brothers
🧇 And waffles!

I'm proud to be an indie author and grateful for this chance to connect with more amazing people who read, write, and support indie books. Please swipe ➡️➡️ to check out my fellow nominees for Book of the Year! (They're all going to be my friends and they have no idea yet 😌💖 Somebody warn them...) Be sure to follow the Indieverse Awards, too! It's such a vibrant and interactive community. What an honor to be part of it!

#thisplaceismagic #irenete #cozybooks #kpopbooks #contemporaryfiction #indieverseawards

🌞🦅 Shine bright, it's Nicky's birthday! Supp

🌞🦅 Shine bright, it's Nicky's birthday! Supposedly! It's very possible that he just wrote February 14th on all the documents because he thought it would be so funny 😌

I'm posting later than planned today becauseeeee

✨ My editor @indigoblu3 is here for a visit this weekend and I went to pick her up from the airport!

✨ I said I would write a birthday bonus for Nicky that was no more than 600-700 words long and I wrote double that amount bc I'm delulu for him NICKY ONE CHANCE ONE JAIL CELL

Newsletter subscribers can go read Nicky's birthday livestream at irenewritesthings.substack.com 💋💋 Happy Valentine's Day!

💖 Art by my one true love @joe___lx

#thisplaceismagic #thissongisours #irenete #kpopreads #kpopbook #cozycontemporary #shinebrightapollo #irenesfakekpopmen2025

Apollo's here to spend Valentine's Day with you 💖💐

Good luck, Sunshines!!!

🥀 PS My condolences to anyone rolling Jungwoo today

#thisplaceismagic #thissongisours #irenete #kpopreads #kpopbook #cozycontemporary #shinebrightapollo #irenesfakekpopmen2025

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