Sarah Zachrich Jeng
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Sarah Zachrich Jeng
@sarahzj.bsky.social
520 followers 200 following 92 posts
Speculative thrillers: WHEN I'M HER and THE OTHER ME (Berkley)
Rep: Joanna MacKenzie
Tech worker/tech skeptic
https://sarahzj.com/links.html
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sarahzj.bsky.social
💖📚 October reads 📚💖
Covers for the following books, over a background of a harvest moon and the words “October Reads”: Servant of Earth and Princess of Blood by Sarah Hawley; The Blighted Stars, The Fractured Dark, and The Bound Worlds by Megan E. O’Keefe; August Lane by Regina Black Covers for the following books, over a background of a harvest moon and the words “October Reads”: Falling in a Sea of Stars by Kristen Britain; The Queen of Saturn and the Prince in Exile by Errick Nunnally; The Wedding People by Alison Esbach; Not in Love by Ali Hazelwood; Warrior Princess Assassin by Brigid Kemmerer
November 8, 2025 at 11:12 AM
sarahzj.bsky.social
💖📚 September reads 📚💖
Covers for the following books, over a background of autumn trees reflected in a pond and the text “September Reads”: Bat Eater and Other Names for Cora Zeng by Kylie Lee Baker; The El by Theodore C. Van Alst Jr.; My Murder by Katie Williams; The Luckiest Lady in London, Private Arrangements, and His at Night by Sherry Thomas Covers for the following books, over a background of autumn trees reflected in a pond and the text “September Reads”: The Road of Bones and Kingdom of Claw by Demi Winters; Problematic Summer Romance by Ali Hazelwood; People Watching by Hannah Bonam-Young
October 10, 2025 at 1:37 PM
sarahzj.bsky.social
💖📚 August reads 📚💖
Covers for the following books, over a background of pool water and the words AUGUST READS: The Gilda Stories by Jewelle Gomez; Never Been Shipped by Alicia Thompson; Willing Prey by Allie Oleander; Daughter of No Worlds by Carissa Broadbent; Blood Over Bright Haven by M.L. Wang; The Friendship Study by Ruby Barrett
September 13, 2025 at 10:15 AM
sarahzj.bsky.social
I ❤️ my library
WHEN IM HER by Sarah Zachrich Jeng featured on a library’s overdrive page under “freaky Friday reads: body swaps
August 19, 2025 at 2:37 PM
sarahzj.bsky.social
I’ll be at Auk Market in Gainesville this Saturday for their 2nd annual book + art faire! Enjoy delicious treats and browse books and maker goods from 10-3. I’ll be inside the Protocol Gallery - come say hi!

More info: www.facebook.com/events/68414...
Graphic with the text: Auk Market Book + Art Faire - local authors - back to school items - art + craft cards. With The Lynx Books, Frenchmen Street Food. At Curia on the Drag, Aug. 23, 10am-3pm.
August 19, 2025 at 12:43 PM
sarahzj.bsky.social
Happy 4th birthday to THE OTHER ME (released August 10, 2021). I’ll always love my weird speculative domestic suspense novel about an artist who discovers that marrying your high school sweetheart may not, in fact, be the best idea!
hardcover and paperback cover images for THE OTHER ME, a novel by Sarah Zachrich Jeng
August 10, 2025 at 2:24 PM
sarahzj.bsky.social
The first draft of my “LABYRINTH in Florida” romantic fantasy is done! Now the real work begins.

Image is one of Kay Nielsen’s illustrations for a 1914 edition of a book of fairy tales including East of the Sun, West of the Moon. The story and illustration both capture some relevant vibes ✌️
1914 Kay Nielsen illustration for East of the Sun, West of the Moon, captoned: ‘And then she lay on a little green patch in the midst of the gloomy thick wood.’ Illustration is layered over a sunlit forest and the words “THE END”
July 15, 2025 at 3:09 PM
sarahzj.bsky.social
💖📚 June reads 📚💖
Book covers for the following books, on a background of blurred greenery and the words “June Reads”: The Legendborn Cycle by Tracy Deonn (Legendborn, Bloodmarked, and Oathbound); The Teller of Small Fortunes by Julie Leong; Fan Service by Rosie Danan; All Systems Red by Martha Wells
July 1, 2025 at 4:57 PM
sarahzj.bsky.social
💖📚 May reads 📚💖
Book covers for the following books, on a background of blurred wisteria and the words “May Reads”: Faebound and Cursebound by Saara El-Arifi; As Long as You’re Mine by Nekesa Afia; The Heiress by Rachel Hawkins; Emily Wilde’s Compendium of Lost Tales by Heather Fawcett; When the Tides Held the Moon by Venessa Vida Kelley
June 17, 2025 at 7:02 PM
sarahzj.bsky.social
Technology is so shitty rn that I started writing fantasy instead of sci-fi. sarahzj.substack.com/p/writing-sf...
Composite image of Sam Altman, Jeff Bezos, Elon Musk, and Mark Zuckerberg. Text says “Writing SFF in the age of crap technology: AKA that time I wrote a novel about Neuralink. Read post at sarahzj.substack.com”
June 4, 2025 at 8:30 PM
sarahzj.bsky.social
The recent (and recurring) discourse on whether authors should post critical reviews of others' books got me thinking about professional relationships, creative insecurity, and nostalgia for well-loved media properties.

Read at sarahzj.substack.com
A person skips in a carefree manner across a field under a blue sky. The superimposed text reads: Should authors review books? Shutting up is free. Read article at sarahzj.substack.com.
May 6, 2025 at 11:11 AM
sarahzj.bsky.social
💖📚 April reads 📚💖
Book covers for the following books, on a background of blurred wisteria and the words “April Reads”: Deep End by Ali Hazelwood; The Favorites by Layne Fargo; Wooing the Witch Queen by Stephanie Burgis The Briar Club by Kate Quinn; In the Shadow of the Fall and At the Fount of Creation by Tobi Ogundiran
May 4, 2025 at 2:02 PM
sarahzj.bsky.social
Excited to be at Thrillerfest in June! If you're going, bring your coffee at 8am on Friday, June 20 to listen to me and these amazing authors talk about writing satisfying endings. (And if you're not a morning person, I'll see you at the bar!)
Graphic showing author photos for authors on the “TEAR-JERKER, HEA OR CLIFFHANGER? Writing Satisfying Endings” panel at Thrillerfest 2025. The panel authors are Anne Burt, Audrey J. Cole, Sarah Zachrich Jeng, Matthew Sullivan, and Tony Wirt, with Allison Brennan moderating.
April 17, 2025 at 12:22 PM
sarahzj.bsky.social
The ebook of THE OTHER ME is only $4.99 at all ebook retailers!

This is my debut! It's the story of an artist who is transported to an alternate life in which she never followed her dreams, and it's about the choices we make for love...and those that are made for us.
Graphic showing the cover of THE OTHER ME by Sarah Zachrich Jeng with the text: ebook sale $4.99, all ebook retailers.
April 12, 2025 at 2:53 PM
sarahzj.bsky.social
In which I do a deep dive on adolescent rebellion, romantic longing, and the ways in which a 35-year-old movie about a mostly-obsolete technology connects to our current era.

sarahzj.substack.com/p/pump-up-th...
Still from the 1990 film Pump Up the Volume. High school students converse in a group while Nora, a central character, listens or watches something with a serious expression on her face. All the characters wear quintessential 1990s fashions like retro dresses, flannel shirts, and combat boots. Superimposed over the image is the title of a newsletter article “Pump Up the Volume is about resistance: Words are like, weapons, or something.” and the URL sarahzj.substack.com.
April 10, 2025 at 5:03 PM
sarahzj.bsky.social
💖📚 March reads 📚💖
The words “March Reads” on a background of calm water, with book covers for the following books: The Blue Castle by L.M. Montgomery; Bitter Medicine by Mia Tsai; Under the Earth, Over the Sky by Emily McCosh; Villains and Virtues series by A.K. Caggiano; Apples Never Fall by Liane Moriarty; Paladin’s Faith by T. Kingfisher
April 6, 2025 at 5:36 PM
sarahzj.bsky.social
Happy first birthday to WHEN I’M HER, released March 26, 2024! This book challenged me more than anything I’ve ever written (second book syndrome is real, y’all). A year after publication, I’m still proud of it, which I count as a win! Here are a couple of my favorite (spoiler free) excerpts.
A paperback copy of WHEN I’M HER by Sarah Zachrich Jeng sitting on a stone railing on the River Thames in London Spoiler-free selection from page 32 of WHEN I’M HER, describing what it’s like just before one of the characters transfers into another character’s body: She can feel every molecule of air that hits her skin, shifting the tiny hairs, drying the sclerae of her eyes. She can feel blood cells beating through her veins. The minute creaking of her skeleton as if holds her upright. Electrical impulses traveling between the neurons in her brain, making everything else happen, forming thoughts into words and pictures. How strange is that: that a lump of flesh can make art? That it creates reality, moment by moment, for the being that owns it? Her mind struggles to take conscious control of her involuntary functions, like when someone carrying a stack of boxes trips at the top of a flight of stairs and automatically, foolishly, reaches for the falling items rather than keeping their balance. Spoiler-free selection from page 267 of WHEN I’M HER: I sit frozen, the car growing colder. The strip lighting on the overhead canopy is a sickly greenish white, the old bulbs flickering. I can hear them buzzing through the window glass like the ghosts of summer cicadas. The light above me flares and flickers out. The next one over does the same, and the next, until I’m in darkness. The shadows feel hungry.
March 26, 2025 at 1:19 PM
sarahzj.bsky.social
Just chilling in my dystopian timeline
Screenshot of a LibGen search, which allows users to search for books that have been pirated and used without author or publisher consent to train Meta's AI. The search shows WHEN I'M HER and THE OTHER ME by Sarah Zachrich Jeng.
March 20, 2025 at 6:42 PM
sarahzj.bsky.social
We’ve sprung forward and it’s raining. Could be 7am, could be 6pm, who knows, what is time
March 9, 2025 at 3:09 PM
sarahzj.bsky.social
Not me waiting to post my December reads until January is almost over 🫣
Cover images for the following books: Asunder by Kerstin Hall; I’ll Have What He’s Having by Adib Khorram; The Safekeep by Yael van der Wouden; Artefacts of Ouranos series by Nisha J. Tuli; Velvet Was the Night, The Beautiful Ones, and Signal to Noise by Silvia Moreno-Garcia
January 22, 2025 at 2:27 PM
sarahzj.bsky.social
Coming in late (but better than never) with my books as Golden Globes looks!

WHEN I'M HER x Cate Blanchett
THE OTHER ME (paperback) x Dakota Fanning
THE OTHER ME (hardcover) x Kerry Washington
Cate Blanchett at the 2025 Golden Globes, with the cover of WHEN I'M HER by Sarah Zachrich Jeng Dakota Fanning at the 2025 Golden Globes, with the cover of THE OTHER ME by Sarah Zachrich Jeng Kerry Washington at the 2025 Golden Globes, with the cover of THE OTHER ME by Sarah Zachrich Jeng
January 7, 2025 at 8:04 PM
sarahzj.bsky.social
November was a month of comfort reads for sure (and yes, ON TYRANNY was strangely comforting!!)
Covers for the following books and the words “November Reads”: Nightwatching by Tracy Sierra; The God of the Woods by Liz Moore; On Tyranny by Timothy Snyder; Daughters of Shandong by Eve J. Chung; Swordcrossed by Freya Marske; Indigo by Beverly Jenkins; Piranesi by Susanna Clarke
December 7, 2024 at 12:24 PM
sarahzj.bsky.social
Is Facebook Marketplace okay
A Facebook Marketplace ad selling "Life Size Stitched Stuffed People Dolls" with a truly horrifying tableau of cloth dolls in various costumes posed in someone's living room. The listing says "Life Size Stitched Stuffed People Dolls. Good condition. $795 for everything. These “pillow people” need a good home. They have been in storage and may need a little TLC."
December 6, 2024 at 11:59 AM
sarahzj.bsky.social
Found this cleaning out my downloads folder and it seems both evergreen and extremely timely
A marquee for El Arroyo in Austin reads: YA JUST GOTTA TAKE IT ONE "ARE YOU F***ING KIDDING ME" AT A TIME
November 24, 2024 at 8:44 PM
sarahzj.bsky.social
My debut is THE OTHER ME, about an artist who is transported into an alternate reality where she never followed her dreams, and the truth of what happened to her is terrifying. bookshop.org/p/books/the-...
Cover image for THE OTHER ME by Sarah Zachrich Jeng. The image shows two women (who are actually the same character) walking in opposite directions
November 17, 2024 at 5:56 PM