Here you'll find the comic fantasy stories of author Meri Greenleaf. The Unexpected Inspiration series is lighthearted high fantasy set in a contemporary world, with a focus on lgbt+ characters, magic, and found family. With the cast filled with artists, inventors, and carnival performers, you can expect lots of mischief and misadventures.

If you'd like to be alerted about new content (like short stories and moodboards), as well as get updates about my writing, I'd love it if you followed me on Facebook or Twitter. You can also sign up with your email to receive either a monthly newsletter update or email notifications when I share new content to this site.

Latest Short Stories:
While the books are still being written, I also write lots of short stories about the characters and world. I share these here, as well as on Wattpad and Tumblr. If you're interested in sweet, funny stories about artists, carnival performers, and the mischief they get into, I have you covered with more than 20 that you can read for free. You can find the full list of these on my story index page. Here are the five most recent ones:

• "Roasted"
  An insult contest gets wildly out of hand.
• "Bottled Spirits"
  Three friends have an encounter with a ghost.
• "Family of the Heart"
  Sometimes a fake family can be a real family.
• "Meren's Tranquility"
  An overworked wizard tries to find peace, finds magic gone awry instead. (This story is about the Hidden Magic characters and takes place in a different world than Unexpected Inspiration.)
• "Stuck With You" (Novella)
  The Dorks discover that despite all their differences, pranks, and misunderstandings, their soulmate markings belong to each other. Watch as a dopey inventor, a protective goth, a bewildered artist, a frazzled healer, and a snarky dancer try to figure out how to be a family.

Sol | Etri | Adair | Blythe | Dray

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Latest Moodboards:
Moodboards are a fun, colorful way to learn about the series. Along with every moodboard collage is a blurb about a character or place, some tidbits about history or mythology, or an excerpt from a story. Visit the moodboard page to see all that have been shared so far.

The Place of Shadow

Sol's Bio

Dray's Bio

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Latest News:
Current Projects (as of November 2022)
Writing some short scenes and short stories to ease my way back into creating content. I'm also planning on working on more moodboards about the characters and series, as well as updating some backstory moodboards/posts with updated character information.

Coming Soon(er or later)
Future plans for this site include a glossary page filled with who's who, where's where, and what all this talk about Muses, Creators, and sentinels is about. I would like to make some maps of different locations and more art for the series, too. If I can get the short story ideas from my head to the page or edit some of the ones that are mostly done, those will also arrive here at some point. For more info about current and future projects, check out the latest Monthly Musings post!

If you enjoy my stories and content, please consider tipping me on Ko-fi to help support my creative endeavors.

~Meri