I love creating new tea blends for our customers; if I didn’t, I would just go make a LOT more money being an accountant (and most likely lose my soul in the process). I love that every week I get another chance to create something new, and potentially earn the love and admiration of our followers for something I created. I imagine that’s kind of what it’s like for a writer. [Brief indulgent aside: Once upon a time, yours truly wanted to be a writer. I wrote terrible science fiction stories and collected enough rejection slips to wallpaper the White House.] So it should come as no surprise that when author Joe Hill became an enthusiastic customer of ours, I kind of lost my poop (pardon my censorship). When he asked me to create a blend inspired by his most recent novel and actually sent me an advanced autographed copy of said novel… well, my friends and family can attest, I couldn’t shut up about it for weeks.

So, NOS4A2 (think Nosferatu’s creepy vanity plate) is about an soul-sucking supercentenarian with an evil car who “saves” children and takes them to place called Christmasland where every day is Christmas and soulless children play games like scissors for the drifter.

One of the key ideas expressed in NOS4A2 is the concept of inscapes. Christmasland is the evil Charlie Manx’s inscape. It’s a world of his imagination made real by the sheer force of his (evil) will. Fortunately, there are other, more noble characters in NOS4A2 who have also harnessed the power of inscapes, which power they ultimately wield to wage battle with the dark antagonist Charlie Manx.

NOS4A2 is a great ride of a book. It’s thoroughly entertaining and difficult to put down in its immersive 704 pages. You should head to your nearest locally owned bookstore and get a copy today. It’s also available on Amazon.

But I suppose you want to know about the tea this week. Inscape is my attempt at an artistic interpretation of Joe Hill’s novel. It is dark and mysterious with a roasted South American yerba mate base blended with almond slivers, marshmallow root, licorice root and a touch of peppermint. It is largely flavored with organic marshmallow and maple flavors and the cup tastes mostly like a rich vanilla/maple mate with a whisper of licorice and peppermint–like the ghost of Christmas, unexpected and strangely haunting. This is MY inscape, my re-imagining of Joe Hill’s novel manifested in reality and poured out for you. I hope you like it.

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