The Worried Writer Episode #53: Aileen Erin ‘It’s A Craft’

My guest today is Aileen Erin, author of YA Paranormal and Science Fiction. Aileen has a BS in Radio-TV-Film from the University of Texas.

After working in commercial editing in Los Angeles for a few years, Aileen moved to writing novels. Since then, she’s hit the USA Today Best-Selling list twice, has shifted nearly five hundred thousand books in her Alpha Girl series and sold 1.5 million books to date.

 

We talk about publishing options, the pressures of success, and Aileen gives her tips on writing. I love that she emphasises that writing is ‘a craft and that craft can be learned.’

You can find out more about Aileen and her books by going to aileenerin.com.

Or find her on Facebook or Instagram.

Check out her publishing company: Ink Monster.

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WRITING UPDATE

The launch of The Silver Mark: Crow Investigations Book Two went really well. At one point, The Night Raven and The Silver Mark were hanging out at the top of the paranormal suspense chart, which felt great!

Also, more importantly, I’ve heard from fans of The Night Raven that they like the book, which is a massive relief. I really didn’t want to let anybody down with a disappointing follow-up. Phew!

I’m now busy working on the third Crow book. I’ve shelved my other book, for now, as the deadline is pretty tight and I’m also thinking about what else I might need to cut out in order to focus on my fiction. I’ve got so many ideas and plans and not quite enough time and headspace. Which, to be clear, is a wonderful position to be in and I’m delighted!

 

IN THE INTERVIEW

As I did last month, I’ve put a full transcript of the interview (below). I want to make the podcast more accessible for those who prefer (or need) to read, rather than listen. It’s pretty time-consuming to do, so I would love to hear what you think!

 

RECOMMENDED

 

Save The Cat by Blake Snyder

Freedom – internet cancelling app

Jim Butcher’s ‘path to publication’ story.

Lani Diane Rich’s Worried Writer episode featuring her ‘claim your awesome’ speech!

 

LISTENER QUESTION

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TRANSCRIPT OF INTERVIEW WITH AILEEN ERIN

Sarah [00:00:03] My guest today is YA paranormal and science fiction author Aileen Erin has a B.S. in TV film from the University of Texas. And after working in commercial editing in Los Angeles for a few years Eileen moved to writing novels. Since then she has hit the USA TODAY best selling list twice and has shifted nearly 500000 books in her Alpha series and sold one and a half million books to date. Welcome to the show Aileen. Thank you so much for joining us.

 

Aileen [00:00:34] Thank you. Nice to be here.

 

Sarah [00:00:36] I mean I could start waxing lyrical about that amazing success but perhaps we should start off with a wee bit about your Alpha Girls series.

 

Aileen [00:00:45] So I wrote my Alpha Girls series in my MFA. I wrote the first one, I mean. I went through so many revisions as you do when you’re in the writing process. But when I graduated I wasn’t sure what to do with the book or what I wanted to do with publishing and there were so many different avenues to go about it, right then. There was indie, there was small press, and I could do traditional, submitting to editors and and agents and everything. But the problem that I ran into was that no one really wanted to see a submission of a YA paranormal in 2013. So I just I decided to go Indie, it felt very low risk. I started a publishing company, formulated a business plan and I started working on making a series out of the one book, and did it every six months a new release. And by the third book I was on the USA Today list. So that was pretty great.

 

Sarah [00:01:45] That’s incredible. My next question was going to be to ask you about your path to publication, and I was going to say you’re published by Ink Monster and that I love the logo for the imprint, it’s gorgeous. It’s so cute! So you have a big hand in all of that then?

 

Aileen [00:02:04] Yes. Ink Monster is my company. I started it early 2013 and I just wanted to find a way to break in with my novel. I worked with another author who has since left but we built this company.

 

 [00:02:20] She had a marketing background I had more of a publishing books editing background and together it just really worked well for a while and I decided I knew exactly what I wanted if I was gonna be publishing and going indie, I wanted it to work with a distributor, I wanted to have the links to the next book in the series in the back of my current release, I wanted somebody that could really fight for me at retailers because as like just an individual it’s really hard to rise above from all the books and all the the people out there so, um, yeah.

 

 [00:03:02] Yeah. And then we started with branding, logos, website design. It took some time it took about a year to get everything really together looking like we wanted it to look, with a business plan and how we were going to reach our readers and and really break into the business. And it ended up working out really well for us.

 

Sarah [00:03:20] I should say so and it’s so so impressive. I mean I’ll be putting the links in the show notes and I urge everybody listening regardless of whether you’re thinking about hybrid or indie or traditional to go and look at the beautiful beautiful publishing website and the fantastic logo and the branding – everything about it is so impressive and you deserve every success. I’m certainly taking some tips for from my own publishing imprint from the level that you are working at. And so in terms of…I mean I think because this is the worried writer I’m always thinking in terms of mindset and I think we run a similar timeline. So my first book came out in 2013 and, like yourself, I’d gone to university for writing and I’d worked on it for many years before, but I didn’t have any confidence whatsoever in my own work. And I kind of needed that stamp of approval from an external source. So I so admire that ability to sort of choose yourself and to be business minded from the beginning. And what do you think what helped you to do that or is that just part of your personality?

 

Aileen [00:04:34] It’s probably not part of my personality. I still sometimes struggle with like I kind of went around the box, I didn’t really go the way that most people do this and I’m doing it all myself. So for a little while didn’t consider myself a real author. I was like ‘No I’m just kind of like putting out books I’m not really…’ But then I had the USA Today list and I actually didn’t know that I hit the USA Today list until the next book came out and I was like I wonder if this one will. And I was checking and I was like ‘oh wait a second’ I already did, because I was my own publisher nobody tells you – the publishers are looking at that and I was doing it myself so I didn’t even think about it. I was like ‘oh my numbers are pretty high I wonder’. I just had no context of what was doing well and what wasn’t, as in was this competitive with what was out there?

So I think it’s just something that you have to decide for yourself. You have to know that inner editor is in there for every single author out there, every single writer, and you do crave that validation from, you know, a big publisher or a big agent that would get you this great deal.

But I think having that idea that you don’t necessarily need that, that you can do it yourself is really like a freeing thing.

I get that validation from my readers who are buying the books and writing these really wonderful reviews from my superfans group who cheer me on while I’m writing and I just. Yeah. It’s just one of those things. You have to you have to tell it to be quiet, you know?

 

Sarah [00:06:22] Absolutely. And I think we’re so lucky to have these options now. It’s great. And like you say, getting that sort of validation direct from the reader and ultimately they’re the important people.

 

Aileen [00:06:36] Yeah. It made it very easy for me to go indie because I went to a lot of different conventions and sat in some agents and editor sessions and everybody was always asking like ‘what are you looking for? What are you not looking for?’ And you know different authors and writers trying to write toward whatever trend was hitting or what was coming up next and they were all across the board saying ‘please do not send us anything with werewolves or vampires’ and I was like ‘well, I’ve got this werewolf book…’ But they were just not going to take it. They were not going to look at it. They were not going to accept it. And so I was like ‘well, this is very low risk because nobody says they even want to look at it.’

 

Sarah [00:07:21] So it made it quite clear then?

 

Aileen [00:07:24] Yeah. I was like I could just throw it away or I can try this other thing. And if it fails and, you know, it turns out that I’m maybe not a good enough writer or can’t make it on my own then you know it’s not my only idea. I can go back write something else and then do that traditionally. It was just my time and energy if it was going to be a success or not.

 

Sarah [00:07:56] Fantastic. And then, you know, you obviously set everything up to give yourself the best possible chance of success, as I was saying you’re doing this incredible job with the with the publishing side. Was that hard to learn that side? I know you said you were working with somebody that had some marketing experience.

 

Aileen [00:08:14] It was all a learning process, you know. In my MFA I loved learning the writing from there but I wasn’t getting enough of the business side, so I got like a subscription to Publishers Weekly, to Writer’s Digest, and I started watching for trends and what agents were acquiring what to see what was happening and all of the indie stuff was really starting to take off. It turned from something that was like oh this vanity press thing, this horrible thing that writers that can’t cut it do, to something that like a lot of writers were making quite a bit of money and having success doing and I was like well you know what I’m going to try this. But I understood that publishing was a business and I had to have a business model and a business plan and a brand and a website and a whole the whole nine yards it had to be professional. So that was kind of kind of something that I think some indie authors miss. They’re just like oh well I’ve got the book and I’ve got the cover and it’s edited and I’m just gonna pop it up on KDP. But then how are you. How are you going to stand out?

 

Sarah [00:09:22] Yeah absolutely. And I mean all of this stuff takes so much work doesn’t it? It takes work and it takes time being the publisher as well as being the writer. So and I would love, I mean I’m looking for tips, so I would love to hear about how you manage to balance your business side with your writing side because you’ve also been impressively productive with your writing, so please give me your secrets.

 

Aileen [00:09:51] So, for a while it’s just you know writing as much as you can. I I tried different tricks and tips to try and kind of balance it. It ended up being a lot of work. I had other authors that I was publishing as well and I ended up giving those authors over to a friend who was starting her own publishing business because I was like ‘this is now getting into too much work’ as the publishing stuff is a lot of work. So I try to do whatever publishing stuff I need to do –  marketing, whatever is not writing – at the beginning of my day and then at lunchtime whatever it is that’s not urgent, it waits till tomorrow and then I the rest of it is like that’s my my writing time and I kind of hold that really sacred and true and I don’t try to bleed into the two. I find that can get like really tricky. And when I’m launching a book, it’s so much work I just say I’m I’m going to plan on not writing for these few weeks and then I will get back into writing that way. I’m not like beating myself up for not getting a word count in that day. But you kind of have to separate the two at least for me. I can’t switch back and forth all day from writing and publishing. It takes up, you know, two different parts of my brain so I’ve got to kind of segregate them. I also for a little while I was doing like one day a week of publishing stuff and then the rest of the week was writing. But I found stuff like bleeded over as I as I sent an email and stuff would trickle in and ‘oh can you do this?’ and ‘there’s an opportunity here’. So that’s why I decided to do all the mornings.

 

Now, I have someone that helps me so that’s amazing. So that’s kind of changed it a lot, so I’m writing even faster now,  but it’s a balancing act, so you kind of have to figure it out, what works for you how you’re going to manage like one day a week and do the rest writing in the mornings and the afternoons. Like when is your most productive writing time? When is your mind awake and and present enough to do the writing part? I’m not a morning person so that’s why I do the publishing stuff in the morning.

 

So whenever you you know your peak writing time is, hold that sacred that’s your writing time and the rest of it, you fit in the publishing stuff in the cracks.

 

Sarah [00:12:29] That makes a lot of sense. Do you aim for a typical word count when you’re having writing days or do you have any other kind of process things that you do?

 

Aileen [00:12:41] So I use Scrivener. I I know it takes me about six to eight weeks to get a first draft done. So I kind of put that into Scrivener. They have like a little word count per day to get to your deadlines. Now that I have a daughter, she’s three now, I don’t like to work on the weekends if I can avoid it so I mark off the weekends and tell it I’m only going to write Monday Wednesday. Monday Tuesday Wednesday Thursday Friday then that’s it. And it will count how many words I need per day to make that deadline. Some days you know I hit that word count easily and go way over it, some days I’m under it but it’s usually it’s steady. I can do comfortably twenty five hundred words a day, so that’s about what I try and aim for. Some days I get like 5000 words and some days I get a thousand.

 

Sarah [00:13:35] So it kind of works out. Writing sci fi I imagine involves a fair amount of world building and things, do you do all that stuff up front and kind of plan things out or do you dive in and work everything out sort of organically?

 

Aileen [00:13:52] So I do it kind of in kind of spurts because in the beginning I do a lot of the worldbuilding and then I think I’ve got everything how I want it to be and then I start writing the draft I’m like actually I need to know about this and that. So I usually write through to the first two acts. And when I’m about to do the third act I stop, I look at all the world building do I need more information, do I need something else? And I mark things in my in my document with a double X and then hit a find for x x . Like xx name here, x x fact here. And so that I don’t break my writing flow for something that I can google later or think about and world build later. So like ‘x x new religion here’, and then I’m like OK I need to think about how this is going to play into that and then when I do my first revision, I go through and I fill in those blanks and I fill in that worldbuilding and then I send it off to my editor and inevitably she’s going to be like ‘Yeah, but what about this and this and this?’ And that’s all the editing process I take about three rounds of revisions with my with my developmental auditor to really get it polished.

 

Sarah [00:15:12] Hmm. Excellent. And you mentioned that getting into the flow state and not breaking the flow of writing which I think is a great tip. Do you sort of shut off the Internet or do you have a particular place that you write? Are there any other things that you do to help you get into the flow and stay there?

 

Aileen [00:15:30] Yes I shut off the Internet. I use Freedom. It’s an app that you can either cancel your entire internet, it turns off your Wi-Fi and it makes it completely unusable for a period of time unless you shut off your computer entirely and turn it back on. There’s no off switch. You know I’m not going to turn off. It has to be pretty desperate and dire if I’m actually going to turn off my computer to look something up. So I use that and I also like to use Scrivener’s full screen function so it blacks out out the rest of my screen, and I have notifications off, I make it fill up the screen and I kind of just let it flow until I need a break to get up and grab a drink water or whatever and then I try and get really quickly back into the story.

 

Sarah [00:16:26] That’s great. And do you have silence or music or white noise?

 

Aileen [00:16:36] Music, but no words. So I have a few Spotify playlists with kind of relaxing ambient music so it’s almost like you’re at the spa.

 

Sarah [00:16:50] Because this is the worried writer I’m afraid I’m going to ask you to delve into any struggles. Do you have to suffer from a sort of creative block or is there a particular part of the process when you’re more likely to struggle? Like is it drafting or is in the editing, or do you never suffer from any?

 

Aileen [00:17:10] Oh man. Do you ever meet a writer that never suffers?

 

Sarah [00:17:14] No never. You could be the first though!

 

Aileen [00:17:21] The second act. For me the second half of the second act I’m always like there is no light at the end of the tunnel. This book will never be finished and is carrying on forever. I don’t think I’m ever going to finish it. This is horrible it’s all horrible life is horrible. And inevitably, I come in from my office and whine to my husband and he is like and ‘where are you at in the process, where are you right now?’. I’m like ‘oh I just hit the midpoint.’ He’s like ‘Alright OK why don’t you just have a glass of wine?’.

 

Sarah [00:17:53] We’ve been here before! You know it’s so funny isn’t it? Why doesn’t it get easier, that’s what I keep thinking? Why do I still suffer at the same point every time?

 

Aileen [00:18:08] It’s so funny. And I think every writer does this and I think I mean if if there was one I’m like… Good for you. Slow clap. What do you do? I want to know. But yeah, there’s always that one point where you’re just like oh this is a disaster. And every single time I’m like No this time it’s different, this is gonna be terrible it’s horrible. It’s all awful. Read it you’re going to see how bad and he’s like ‘uh-huh, uh-huh’.

 

Sarah [00:18:42] So, we have to have a glass of wine and we have to moan about it and then we kind of have to grit it out, but are there any strategies that you use for when you’re really stuck when you’re trying to grit it out?

 

Aileen [00:18:57] When I’m really really stuck, I know that there’s there’s usually something that’s wrong. It’s like my subconscious telling me there’s something not adding up correctly here. So I try and go back in and reread. If I’m stuck for more than like a day or two I know it’s something that my subconscious is saying hey hey go back. You need to go back. So I I try and be aware of that but if it’s something that’s just happening during like, each day, one trick that I learned somebody told me a couple years ago and I was like ‘this is so smart, I don’t know why I didn’t think of this.’ He told me never ever to end the day at the end of a scene or at the end of a chapter, always stop in the middle of a paragraph, middle of a scene, middle of dialogue. Even if you’re like Oh no I have no more time, just keep going for like five more minutes and get into the next something, so you have a place to start when you’re sitting down again. And it kind of keeps the flow rolling from one day to the next, so you keep that kind of that constant consistent writing going.

 

Sarah [00:20:13] That’s a great tip. And in terms of I know you mentioned the sort of second act there so and I’m guessing that you kind of know a fair amount about story structure. I mean not just from writing but from your education. And is that something that you find very helpful or do you have any resources or books that you recommend for anybody who would like to learn more about that?

 

Aileen [00:20:39] I use a screenwriting book for my story structure it’s super basic, super easy to digest and understand. They recently did a novel version but I haven’t read it yet my husband actually just gave it to me on Friday. He was like hey they made one for novelists, don’t you want to see? It’s Save The Cat by Blake Snyder. He talks in the beginning a bit about genre and high concept and that’s more movie kind of and so that doesn’t apply for novel writing but his 13 beats that are the key points in a story and the 40 note cards, I think that really lends itself well to an outline. So that’s what I do before I start anything, I have a little beat sheet and I write out the 13 key points and then I draw the little lines. How do we get from this beat to the next beat in the next one to the next one you know? And those are my 40 note cards. So it’s 10 note cards for Act 1, 20 for Act 2 which is why it always seems like a beast to write because it’s twice as long and then ten again for Act 3. So it’s it’s really easy to do. You just write like one sentence on each no card it’s just kind of the gist of what that scene is going to be. And that’s pretty much what you need to get started or what I need to get started on a book. It usually changes and like as I write it fleshes out and becomes something else a little bit. And I go back at the end of act two and I’m like Does this still make sense? Am I still writing this ending? Okay great. I’m gonna fix it or keep going. But yeah I really really love Save the Cat by Blake Snyder.

 

Sarah [00:22:29] That’s great. And I’ve had that book recommended to me and I haven’t actually read it but I did get the and Save the Cat Writes A Novel and I just I just finished it is super good.

 

Aileen [00:22:42] I haven’t I haven’t read it yet. It’s sitting on my on my desk and I’m really anxious to get to get into it because I’m curious how they changed it for novel writing.

 

Sarah [00:22:53] On structure, some people hate reading about it and some people find it useful and like all of these things you know, if it helps great, if it doesn’t throw it out the window. But in terms of self-doubt and that kind of thing, are there any parts of the publishing side of it, there’s being read which is great but can be scary. Do you ever suffer with fear or self-doubt around any of those areas?

 

Aileen [00:23:29] Of course, of course! You know I just launched Lunar Court, it’s book eight in the series and you know I had anxiety the night before it was coming out I didn’t sleep at all. Total insommnia, I was nervous. So so nervous, even though I had reviews already that said that they all enjoyed it, five stars everything… I was like Oh but you know once the fans get it they might not like it and I hate to disappoint them you know? I think it’s just part of it. Writing is such a personal thing you know and sharing it you want it to be enjoyed and accepted and everything and that’s always, no matter what art form you’re doing, it’s always scary. You’re putting a little piece of your your heart out there and you want it to be accepted. And it’s hard to do it, but it’s kind of you can’t be a be an author without putting it out there. You can’t reach any kind of success if you’re not doing it. So yeah it’s kind of kind of one of those things that you’ve just gotta kind of get through.

 

But you know the self-doubt it’s there. It’s that little inner editor and I think even non-writers and  non-artists kind of get that, it’s that thing that tells them that they’re not good enough. You know everybody can relate to that. Everybody’s got that in them. And it’s like how much power are you going to give that little voice? How much of yourself are you going to let that take over, and just kind of deciding you know what, it’s gonna be fine. It’s great. I’m actually doing a great job. And getting those people in your life that will support you and say ‘this is good, I would tell you if it was bad. This is good. You’re doing a great job. Keep going.’ Having those key people in your life is really helpful.

 

Sarah [00:25:24] Yeah. That’s great advice. That’s so true. And I was also thinking about how success, not to complain about it because it’s amazing and brilliant, but you kind of do feel that new pressure. Like you were saying about not wanting to let readers down, you’ve got this beloved series and then you’ve got that added thing of hoping that these readers that are so supportive of you, hoping that they like it. That must be that must be tough.

 

Aileen [00:25:55] You  know it’s really a good problem. It’s a sweet problem to have. But you know I wrote this book about some of the side characters and it was one that readers had been asking me for for years and until I wrote the last book I kept telling them I don’t know that they could be together I don’t know that these two characters can be together. They’ve got too much to overcome. And then I was writing the last book and I had this idea I was like oh wait. So it was something that readers had been asking me for and I’m like if I then give it to them and they don’t like it, it is going to feel horrible. I was like, I don’t want to disappoint them because they have been asking me for years for this. So. So I finally wrote it. Then I get an e-mail last night from a reader, you know all in caps about how much she loved it and how I made her ugly cry and I was like ‘yay! I can sleep again!’. Everything’s fine. It’s gonna be fine. So yeah it’s good. I mean it is part of the process.

But I think also having that little inner editor, sometimes it’s good it keeps you wanting to do better, to keep striving to be the best writer that you can be. And like questioning ‘is this a good draft?’. I’m going to have somebody else read it let me make sure I’m doing a good job, you know? So I kind of try and push it in that direction rather than you know something that’s really hounding on my shoulder. You know something really bringing me down.

 

Sarah [00:27:30] That makes a lot of sense. And lots of folk listening might be trying to finish their first book or they might be going through submission hell when they’re trying to get published. What advice would you give to a beginning writer or is there something that you wish that you’d known when you started out?

 

Aileen [00:27:50] I think for beginning writers I would say just keep writing and I think finishing that first draft, you’ve just got to finish it. If you got something that you’re just starting working on or you’re stuck in the middle and you keep going back and revising, let it all go. Your first draft isn’t going to be good. Your first book isn’t gonna be good. You have to like learn the process. It’s a craft and the craft can be learned but you have to welcome the revision process.

Get that first draft out and start working on revising the whole piece. There’s a great saying that I love to tell people you can’t revise a blank page, so you’ve got to just keep going and get the story on the page and then you can fix whatever needs fixing later. And if you end up not happy with that book, know that that is a great achievement just finishing that book, start on something new. Keep going keep writing because every book that you write will get better and better every time you revise it. You will get better at this writing process. It’s a craft, you know. And it just is learned and the more you do it the better you get. And I would say my writing has changed drastically from my first book to the one I just put out. I keep learning new things taking going new seminars there’s always more to learn. I think my writing is much improved even after my MFA like way drastically even more so than when I was in my MFA so. So yeah, just keep keep going keep writing and don’t give up.

 

Sarah [00:29:26] Fantastic. And it’s so true. The more we practice the better we get. But somehow we don’t always think that when it comes to writing for some reason. I don’t know why.

 

Aileen [00:29:37] Well it’s it’s hard when you pick up a book and you’re like wow this is really amazing. I bet they just sat down there and wrote that in one draft first try – gold! I’m like ‘No no everybody’s like trying really hard and rewriting and then going through the same thing.’ You’ve just got to keep going. Jim Butcher he’s a great urban fantasy writer. He has this little tale about how he first got published on his website and when I was first starting writing I would go to Jim Butcher’s page every day and read his page about how he got published and how not to give up and how to keep going. And I found it extremely inspirational so I was like No I’m just going to keep going. And it’s just really powerful to go to his website read it.

It’s so great, he really inspired me and before I got my MFA, when I was in my MFA, when I started publishing and every once in a while when I’m like ‘you know what, I don’t know if I’m going to make it’ I go back through to his website and I click on About Jim Butcher and go and read his his little piece about publishing.

 

Sarah [00:31:01] Oh that’s brilliant. And hopefully, you saying this now, that will be encouraging. And yes, like you say, you’ve got to keep on going. And I will put a link to that in the show notes. that’s fab. And so finally I’d love to hear about what’s next for you. Like what are you working on now will your next release?

 

Aileen [00:31:21] So right now I’m working on Off Balance. It’s the sequel to Off Planet which came out in March. It’s coming out St. Patrick’s Day next year, so I’m about 40000 words into that and really loving it. And then after that I’m gonna be writing Alpha Erased which is book 9 in my Alpha Girls series. That’s gonna be really fun. I’m finally doing the main POV character’s mate in it, and having her memory wiped. So that’ll be really fun for readers. They’ll get to fall in love all over again. Yeah. So, it’ll be romantic and I’m really looking forward to writing that one, too.

 

Sarah [00:32:04] And you’ve just reminded me, I wanted to ask what led you to writing in a slightly different genre. You’ve got sci fi and you’ve got paranormal with werewolves. What made you change genre a wee bit?

 

Aileen [00:32:19] Well I guess most people say write what you know but I don’t know anything about paranormal or going into outer space. I mean hopefully we’ll never go to outer space, although I did read an article that they’re accepting or will be accepting people into the space station soon. Just privately you can fly up there I’m like I don’t know how much it’s going to be, maybe a billion dollars… One day maybe it’s possible… No probably not.

 

Sarah [00:32:47] You never know.

 

Aileen [00:32:49] Crazier things have happened. I could win the lotto… So yeah, but I love the write what you love. I love space opera, I love sci fi, I love paranormal, I love werewolves, I love fairy tales, so I just kind of write what I love.

It was interesting making such a big change from werewolves to interstellar travel. So that was a big leap but I kind of worked you know really hard on it hoped it was going to be accepted by new readers who had never read me before and also encouraged my fans to go with me. I’m like ‘just give it a try’. Read a sample. I sent out a lot of samples, I posted it on my social media, I just said give it a shot and they did. And they were like actually we will read this too.

 

Sarah [00:33:48] That’s really good. And I think from a creative point of view I can imagine it’s it’s I mean I like writing across genre because I read across genre and I love across genre. And so I can imagine that it’s kind of creatively refreshing.

 

Aileen [00:34:01] It is. After so many werewolf books it got to be you know a little bit like I didn’t feel like my ideas were fresh anymore. I was like I need sort of like a palate cleanser. And that’s what Off Planet it was for me.

 

Sarah [00:34:14] I love that you were following your passion with your writing and, as I say, doing it so well and being so successful at it. Very inspiring. Thank you so much for your time. Just before we finish, where can listeners find out more about you and your books online?

 

Aileen [00:34:32] You can find me at Aileen Erin dot com on Facebook and Instagram. I’m also on Twitter but I never checked that and my Alpha Girls Series and Off Planet are at all major retailers.

 

Sarah [00:34:46] Brilliant. Well as I say I will put all the links in the show notes but thank you so much for your time. It was lovely to speak to you.

 

Aileen [00:34:52] So nice to speak to you. Thank you for having me.

 

The Worried Writer Episode #52: Sacha Black ‘I Go To The Extreme of Geekery’

Sacha Black writes YA fantasy – the Eden East series, and non-fiction for authors.

Her writing guides include 13 Steps to Evil: How to craft Superbad villains and 10 Steps to Hero: How to Craft a Kick Ass Protagonist.

Sacha is a proud indie author and recently went full-time with her writing.

Find out more about Sacha and her books at

sachablack.co.uk

or find her on Twitter, Facebook or Instagram.

THANK YOU

Become a PatreonMassive thanks to new patrons and to everyone supporting the show. Thank you so much!

Join our growing Patreon community at The Worried Writer on Patreon.

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WRITING UPDATE

I have been busy with the launch of The Silver Mark: Crow Investigations Book Two.

In the introduction, I give an update on the launch, read the blurb and talk about my recent writing retreat.

Also, I mention my non-fiction writing mindset book, Stop Worrying; Start Writing: How To Overcome Fear, Self-Doubt and Procrastination.

It’s available in print, ebook and audiobook formats (and I read the audio book!).

Click here to buy it on Audible (get it for just £3.49 if you buy the Kindle edition, or listen for free with a one month Audible trial!).

IN THE INTERVIEW:

We discuss tips for writing compelling villains, antagonists, and heroes, as well as Sacha’s own writing process and publishing journey.

I’m trying something new this month, with a full transcript of the interview (below). I want to make the podcast more accessible for those who prefer (or need) to read, rather than listen. It’s pretty time-consuming to do, so I would love to hear what you think!

Recommended by Sacha (and me!):

Deep Work by Cal Newport

 

 

 

 

 

TRANSCRIPT OF INTERVIEW WITH SACHA BLACK

 

Sarah: Sacha Black writes YA fantasy the Eden series and non-fiction for authors. Her writing guides include 13 Steps to Evil How to craft super bad villains and ten steps to hero how to craft a kick ass protagonist. Sasha is a proud Indie Author and recently went full-time with her writing. Welcome to the show. And congratulations on making the leap to full-time writing.

Sacha: Thank you so much. It’s an absolute honour to be here. I’m really really excited to be on your podcast.

Sarah: You’re so kind. I would love to hear more about making the leap into the full-time writing. Was that a goal that you set for yourself?

Sacha: Absolutely. I kind of meandered my way to making the decision that I wanted to write full-time. I’m not really one of these people who was overly self-aware as a child so it became a goal as I started writing more but I didn’t really enjoy my day job. So I worked as a project manager at a very corporate quite conservative environment, and they didn’t really allow for much creativity. I mean they wanted to they tried really hard but you know you come up with these creative ideas and it’ll be a no we can’t we can’t do that.

So about I would say probably five or six years ago I started writing with the intent to publish. I had written prior to that but that was kind of the, you know, the pivotal turning point where my mindset shifted and I and I kind of got this obsessive tunnel vision, you know kind of single-minded. This is what I want to do. I want to do this full-time and the more I write the more I wanted it. So yes it was definitely a goal.

Sarah: So you mentioned there about and sort of the beginnings of your writing so was it something that you’d always wanted to do?

 

Sacha: Yeah I think if I’d been more self-aware I’d have realised that’s what I wanted to do. But you know when I look back on my childhood all of the signs were there. You know I would carry around notebook and pen and scribble little sentences. And I think my mom also had to move libraries once, I remember because we were sort of in this local library which was sort of quite small but I’d read everything. I mean literally everything. And we had to go to like this larger library… So you know when I look back I think, actually, you know I should have realised that that’s what I wanted to do. But I was also brought up knowing that I had to get a proper job and I had to wear a suit or, you know, have some kind of a qualification. So I went to university and I probably should have done creative writing or something or English even just because I loved it and I didn’t.

 

I did psychology because I thought ‘that’s a career’. It’s kind of on the peripheries of medicine. And then I did a Masters and I sort of fell into being in my students union as president. And then I got onto a graduate scheme, a fast track management scheme because that was a proper job and that’s what you do. And it did not take very long for me to realise that was really not what I wanted to do. So I started blogging. I kind of just needed like this platform or this place to just vomit out rants about things that annoyed me. As you know writing is so cathartic, so many people say that, and that’s exactly why I came back to writing.

 

And then I got out my notebooks and kind of remembered, and I found one of these stories that I had written when I was nine. And that was the story that I always wanted to turn into a novel. So I decided to do NaNoWriMo and I took that novel and that was the novel I wrote in my first NaNo and the rest is history. You know I that was it. Once I got the bug and the habit in NaNo it was game over for me I realised very rapidly this is what I wanted to do exactly as you say the more you write the more you want to write or the more you get obsessed with it it’s your thing.

 

Sarah: So were you doing non-fiction about writing alongside writing fiction or which did you publish first?

 

Sacha: Okay that’s a great question. So I am one of these super geeky nerdy people. So no matter what I’m obsessing over I just I go to the extreme of geekery when it comes to it.

 

So I started this kind of obsessive journey to develop my craft and the other thing I am is very senile. Literally, if I don’t write something down, usually by hand, there is no way I am going to remember whatever it is I need to remember. So what I do is every book I read I add – this is sacrilege, so people please forgive me if you think I’m a kind of heathen – but I have a pencil and little sticky tabs. And every time I see something that I think is well written whether it’s description or dialogue or foreshadowing I’ll underline it very lightly in pencil and stick a sticky tab in and then when I get to the end of the book I go back and review all of the sentences that I’ve underlined. I started out by hand writing them up and then I quickly moved in to using my blog and what I would do is I would copy and paste them down and then I would look for patterns and trends and what I tended to find is that particular authors had you know really good skills in one particular area whether it be description or dialogue.

 

And so then I would go down to kind of sentence level detail and look at why it was that they did so well and I would write those lessons that I was learning up into blog posts and I did, I think it was a post on female villains, which just I mean it didn’t go viral but you know I think it had quite a lot of hits. And so I wrote I think three or four more.

 

Collectively, I think they garnered me you know 50000 or 100000 hits something like that on my website which to me at the time having not been blogging for that long was just an enormous amounts of hits. So I dug a bit further and I looked into whether or not there were kind of books on this and there weren’t. So I was like well, hey, you know, there’s obviously a market for this. I’d already started writing up my lessons. Why not do a bit more research and compile it into a book? So that’s what I did. So my 13 Steps to evil was the first book that I published which I know some people like ‘well, you know, what validity do you have?’

 

Sarah: Well I think teaching creative writing is different. I mean some people will say ‘I’ll only ever take class with someone who is a bestseller in my particular genre.’ And I’m not criticising that opinion, that’s a perfectly valid opinion, but speaking as someone who has done a Masters in Creative Writing and been taught by very very talented writers, not all of them are great lecturers, not all of them are great tutors. They don’t necessarily go hand in hand. So I’m not sure I completely agree with that.

 

Sacha: I completely agree and that’s why I wrote it, because I’d learnt these lessons. You know, one of the things that I was really keen to do, because I was also reading a lot of writing craft books at the time, was create something that wasn’t dry because so many of these writing craft books, forgive me, they are incredible fountains of knowledge, but they’re also so dry and I am a very sweary, very sarcastic author – I’m on my best behaviour today – so I just I wrote in my voice. So my writing craft book is sarcastic and it is sweary, but people like that. Well actually that’s not true. People either love it or they hate it. That’s fine. But you know I kind of I had a goal of making writing sarky and fun and not dry. And I think actually not necessarily having those years and years and eons of knowledge enables you to craft non-fiction in a way that’s slightly innovative I suppose.

 

Sarah: And another thing you said there about your voice and writing it in your voice I think that’s so key. And again it comes down to the teaching thing when I said that some of the lecturers maybe weren’t so good. They weren’t good for me. And what matters is your teacher is right for you and that’s why you know when writing craft book or business book or whatever it is will speak to a particular reader and it makes it the perfect match.

 

But  if you don’t write your blog post or your teaching book or record your podcast then those readers out there who would respond to your voice don’t get a chance. And so I’m aware that we’ve sort of gone a wee bit into whole non-fiction antagonist, we’ve uses the word antagonist and I love a good antagonist so I was instantly drawn to that title but thinking in terms of protagonist and antagonist doesn’t always come naturally to everyone. So I thought before we go any further we should maybe just have some basic definitions.

 

Sacha: Yeah absolutely. So I kind of think and talk about villains and antagonists as being on a continuum. So a villain is somebody or a character who is inherently evil and by evil I mean perhaps they perpetrate acts of violence.

 

They might murder lots of people, their mindset is very dark. An antagonist, the similarities with the antagonist is that an antagonist gets in the way of the hero. So they are a blocker or an obstacle. They they want to prevent the hero from achieving his or her goal but they aren’t necessarily evil at the core.

 

So a good example of this would be Harry Potter. You have Lord Voldemort who is a villain. He is evil. He you know he kills people freely. And one of the, I mean there are many antagonists in Harry Potter, but one of the most obvious ones would be Draco Malfoy. You know he’s just you know he does step in the way of Harry. A lot.

 

But at his core he’s just a bit of a weak coward. He’s not necessarily evil and violent. And so with a protagonist and a hero the protagonist is typically who the story is about and a hero is somebody who will have you know magical powers or they would be Superman somebody who tends to have you know unnatural amounts of strength or skill or power.

 

Sarah: Okay. So what makes a good antagonist?

 

Sacha: Another great question. So there are so many things, so many things! I will try and summarise I think, I could be here all day because I just love it and I obsess about it, but I think I think one of the most common mistakes with villains or antagonists is not having a sound motive. We all do things for a reason, even villains. And I know that somebody is going to come and argue ‘well you know look at a psychopath they don’t necessarily have reasons or justifications for doing things’ and okay, sure, sometimes that is the case, but that’s the difference between writing truth and writing fiction. We we are writing fiction we are not writing truth, and in order to convey fiction effectively and make your characters believable you do need to have reasons and justifications for your characters doing things.

 

Sarah: So I know from my own experience that sometimes I get stuck in my story because I haven’t thought through my antagonist and their goals or their point of view properly. Is that something you’ve found?

 

Sacha: Yeah I think so and the thing that I always come back to is making sure you have the why behind that behaviour. This is a bit from my psychology background, but as children we build these things called heuristics in our brain. And they’re kind of a set of rules by which we categorise things so a square, as a child you learn that a square whether it’s big or small or red or blue or patterned is still a square.

 

And one of the things that we learn about people is that, you know, 99.9 percent of the time people do things for a reason which is why to make your villain believable, you have to come back to them having a why and a justification and a motive for doing something. And even more than that is having a cause or a driver behind the motive. And this is probably one of the key tips is to go further than just saying why your character is doing something.

 

For me, I try to link my villain’s behaviour to something that happened in their past.

 

So we always talk about heroes and how they have a wound that creates the flaw but actually your villain ought to have the same thing. You know they are perpetrating things that are bad or they’re doing these negative actions that are getting in the way of the hero. And and why is that? Go create a motive and then go back into their past. I’m not saying that you have to have reams of background and information dumps in your story but you knowing why your villain is doing something will help you naturally convey more believability and depth in your villain.

 

And the last thing that I do is that I try to connect that flaw or wound in your villain to the theme. Your hero obviously embodies the theme itself and your villains should embody the ante theme so the opposing kind of force to whatever your theme may be. And I try to derive something that happened in their past that is connected to that. So say if your theme is sacrifice perhaps your villain failed to sacrifice something back in their past, and perhaps they lost somebody that was really important to them and that then would be the why and the drive and cause behind the motive for why they’re behaving the way they are now.

 

Sarah: So, developing your hero and your antagonist kind of in tandem is a good idea, then?

 

Sacha: Absolutely and I talk about this in, I think it’s my heroes book, but I actually try to develop all of the characters in tandem and I know that’s really overwhelming and it sounds ridiculous, but bear with me. So often we just concentrate on the hero, but if you’re a smart author you will look at the hero and the villain as kind of a yin and yang with each other.

 

But actually if you can take that one step further and look at how all of the characters are an embodiment of your theme.

 

A good example of that would be the Hunger Games. So Katniss embodies the theme of sacrifice. She constantly sacrifices herself for others. The villain, President Snow, embodies the anti theme in that he constantly sacrifices other people for his own benefit. But when you look deeper at the story and you look at the other characters they are all reflections on that theme. So Rue for example is a good portrayal of this, in that she is also a tribute. For those who don’t know what the Hunger Games is it’s essentially a dystopian novel where lots of these children have to go and fight each other to the death. And Rue is one of these children fighting against Katniss and instead of fighting and killing Katniss which because she has the opportunity to she decides to save Katniss. So Rue in herself makes a sacrifice and is a reflection of that theme in a different way and all of your characters should do that. They kind of mesh together on different representations of the theme. Does that make sense?

 

Sarah: Absolutely. And while we’re on heroes, what do you think makes a really good hero – is it that link to the wound that you mentioned?

 

Sacha: Absolutely. My favourite types of heroes are heroes who aren’t perfect. I think heroes who are perfect are boring. And I think your readers are going to think that they’re boring as well.

 

So you know I think the best kind of heroes are the messy dirty ones who make bad choices and poor decisions, but they learn from them. For me, having a hero who does have a bit of a moral greyness to them I think builds depth because it makes them more of a reflection of humanity. We are not perfect beings. And I think when you when you can kind of embody that in your hero it makes your reader connect much more, and on a much deeper level your hero because they can see parts of themselves in your in your characters.

 

Sarah: And it’s seeing them struggle as well, isn’t it? I know when I first started I found it quite difficult to be mean enough to my characters because I like them. I wanted them to make the right choices because I knew they were a good person and I like them. But, as you say, making sure that they do fail, making sure that they don’t always make the right decisions, is super important. What you said about the yin and yang thing reminded me that one of my favourite types of antagonist is the doppelgänger antagonist, where they start out very similar to the hero and then you see them make different choices throughout the story.

 

Sacha: Absolutely. I think I think you can always see the difference between a hero and a villain when they are forced to make a choice in a difficult situation because the hero will make the right choice for the right reasons or, okay, sometimes they make the wrong choice but for the right reasons. But that’s more going into the anti-hero realm, but the villain will more often than not make the wrong choice or you know they’ll make the wrong choice for what they deem to be the right reason. And this is what I’m talking about, that moral kind of greyness. Sometimes, in the villain’s mind they’re making it for the right reason, which means morally they are on the right side of the line in their eyes.

 

Sarah: Do you develop your characters before you start writing, or do you just dive in and then get to know them as you write?

 

Sacha: So my writing process is still in fluctuation and kind of going through this process of change. When I wrote my first book I was very much a plotter, but what happened was I plotted for an entire year before I even wrote a word.

 

I was like ‘what are you doing? It’s going to take me 20 years to write this book unless I get on with it!’

 

I am moving away from that and I am actually now trying to write completely as a pantser. I haven’t quite found the right balance yet, but I think I am probably going to end up more on that continuum more towards the pantser side than I am the plotter side. I quite like to let the characters develop on the page because if I don’t they’re just going to do what they want anyway. You know I spent all of this time doing character interviews and development and, actually, they never ended up anything like what I thought they were going to end up. Yeah. I don’t know whether it was a newbie mistake or I was just delusional about what my process really was, but I stopped trying to control my characters and we all get along much better now.

 

Sarah: That’s fantastic. I think it is, as you say, a case of just learning what your own process is, and you don’t know that without doing it and trying things so that makes a lot of sense. Because this is the worried writer I do like to ask about blocks and things, so do you have any tips for writers who are maybe trying to come up with a really good antagonist or they’re trying to round out their characters either while they’re writing or in the planning stage? Do you have any methods that you would offer people to get unblocked on that.

 

Sacha: Yeah absolutely. A few actually. So that the first thing to say is to just stop what you’re doing and write something completely different. So I play this game with some of my friends and we call it the one word game or the one sentence game and somebody will pluck a random word out of thin air or out of the dictionary or out of something they are reading, and we will just write a sentence. Or a paragraph or sometimes we end up writing a whole page, it really just depends.

 

The point of that is to just get you writing because, so often, the answers to block come when you are not brow furrowing and concentrating on trying to find the answer, but when you’re in the shower or, if you’re me, when you’re driving and have no pen. So that would be the first one. Write some flash fiction – something that doesn’t have to be part of your story or whatever.

 

 The second thing would be to take your character out of your story and put them in a high stress situation and just write it completely out of context. Put them in a different story or a different situation, because people as a whole tend to show their truest self when they are under high stress or high pressure. So that’s something that I quite like to do. And another thing to do would be to either add in an obstacle or throw in some conflict. Now for me conflict comes at kind of three levels. So you have a macro conflict which is you know usually kind of in dystopian it’s like wars it’s world battles or societal issues or you have micro conflict which is between characters.

 

That’s often the best unblocker for me is to put an argument or a problem between two of the characters because that will lead you to generating more plot, and then you have inner conflict and this is one of my favourites. So inner conflict is where your characters have emotional battles. So a good example of this would be Ned Stark from Game of Thrones. And actually George R.R. Martin generally does a lot of this, but Ned Stark has kind of two personal values. The first one is that he values wisdom and the second one is that he values loyalty and he is very loyal to the king who asks him to go and work for him in the palace. But Ned’s wisdom leads him to realize that he’s probably going to die if he does that. That puts his two most valued values against each other. What does he go with? Does he go with his wisdom or his loyalty? And that butts up against each other and gives him this inner conflict that he has to kind of turmoil over and that will also usually unblock for me or if it doesn’t necessarily unblock me it will unblock the characters who will then tell me what I need to write.

 

Sarah: While we’re on the subject, we’ve been talking about quite big stories with real villains – the examples of Game of Thrones and The Hunger Games – but something that sometimes people ask me is what to do if you were writing a romance or a quieter story that doesn’t have a serial killer as the villain? I’m aware that you still need an antagonist; are there things in your book about crafting super bad villains that are applicable to people who are trying to write those quieter or non-crime-driven stories?

 

Sacha: Absolutely. So talking about that kind of inner conflict, that’s often what you see in romance stories. So you’ll see a character conflicted against what they think they should do versus what their heart wants them to do. And I talk about that kind of turmoil and how to create that conflict and that is genreless, almost. Also, one of my favourite topics in there is around mental health, because so often villains are given a mental health issue and it’s the reason why they’re doing their thing that they’re doing. And actually that just creates stigma, it creates discrimination, and it’s just wrong. Mental health does not cause you to behave badly. You being a bad person causes you to behave badly! There’s that chapter as well which spans genres. There’s also a chapter on clichés and clichés tend to span genres. So yes I have tried to make my book as genre-less as possible and I have got examples from lots and lots of different genres as well. I also have a book on endings and I talk about which endings most suit which genre.

 

Sarah: That’s brilliant because I know that sometimes it can be a wee bit trickier to get a handle on conflict or villains or antagonists when you are writing those kinds of stories. So that’s fantastic. Now I want to move on a wee bit to your writing process and so on, and your head space and time management particularly since now you have gone full-time which is great. You’re writing and publishing in two separate genres, and that of course requires lots of different tasks. And I just wondered how do you balance the various parts of your professional life both in terms of the head space and the time management?

 

Sacha: Really badly!

 

It’s hard for me to answer how I am going to be doing that because I’m really literally only in my first week of being fully self-employed. So, I mean how did I manage it before when I was working full-time? I have a five year old and I have a wife and a house and I managed it really badly.

 

I was essentially working two full-time jobs. And it’s not healthy, it’s not clever and I ended up suffering from burnout all of the time. I had really bad imposter syndrome all of the time, really bad doubt, because of course all of these things derive from being exhausted and not treating yourself very kindly not giving yourself any self-care. I mean the biggest thing that I did was to make lots of sacrifices. So I gave up TV about four years ago, I think. I will binge watch something on Netflix once I’ve finished a project or once I’ve hit a goal. But, of an evening, I wasn’t watching TV anymore and you would be surprised quite how much you are capable of achieving if you don’t watch TV. You know I kind of gained four hours every evening. People like to say they don’t watch TV. Trust me you are watching TV! I gave that up.

 

I kind of withdrew a bit from my social circle. So I would go out less so that I had more time to write, I would get up early sometimes, I would also write on my lunch break or I would do marketing and admin on my lunch break at work and when I was walking down corridors at work I would write a sentence or two on my phone. I had Dropbox and iCloud sync up so everything was accessible everywhere, and you’d be surprised, I would go home sometimes with 1000 words because people had been late for meetings or I had to walk further for a meeting. So, I say badly, but I was just acutely aware of how I spent my time and I tried to maximize every opportunity to write or do marketing that I possibly could.

 

Sarah: Do you think it’s key to know why you’re doing that or to have a goal, as that sounds quite full-on?

 

Sacha: Yes, I don’t really recommend it. I did suffer some quite intense burn-out and that’s just inefficient as it stops you from working essentially.

 

Sarah: Do you have plans, now that you are full-time, for making sure you have boundaries and self-care?

 

Sacha: While I’m transitioning, I’m still doing some freelance work, so I’m trying to time-block so that I have calls or freelance work related time on some days and great swathes of time on other days so that I can do deep work. There’s a book called Deep Work by Cal Newport which is fantastic and it really helped me to set clear strategies for deep work.

 

One of the other things I gave up was exercise which was really bad… So, I’m planning to get back to that.

 

One of the other things is I have a Fitbit and that shouts at me every hour, if I haven’t moved enough, so that’s good, and there are some woods near my house so I’m planning to walk there.

 

Sarah: I also love Deep Work! Just to finish up what you working on at the moment or what’s next for you?

 

Sacha: I have three things. I want to finish my YA fantasy series, which is about a third done. The next is to finish my next non-fiction book. I don’t quite have the pitch down yet but it’s something along the lines of the anatomy of prose. I’m not looking at grammar, but sentence level word choice. It’s right down at the deep sentence level, on the exactly how you convey emotion, how you use juxtaposition to foreshadow etc etc. It’s my piece de resistance. And the last thing is creating some mini writing courses.

 

Sarah: Where can we find out more about you and your books?

 

Sacha: I have a website sachablack.co.uk. And that’s Sacha with a ‘c’. I have a blog and I’m on Instagram, Facebook and Twitter. I’m pretty much everywhere, please come and say ‘hi’. I don’t bite unless it’s a Tuesday!

 

The Worried Writer Episode #51: B.P. Walter ‘I Need A Map To Follow’

My guest today is Barnaby Walter, who writes under the name B. P. Walter. His debut novel, A Version of the Truth, is a dark psychological thriller published by Avon.

It has been called: ‘Beguiling, surprising and sometimes shocking.’

Barnaby is an alumni of the Faber Academy and currently works in social media coordination for Waterstones in London.

Follow B.P. Walter on Twitter, Instagram or Facebook.

 

 

 

IN THE INTRODUCTION

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LISTENER QUESTION

I answer the following listener question…

Holly asked:

I’ve now got a ‘finished’ manuscript and I know the next steps will be to send it out to readers, agents and ultimately publishers. However, I can’t bring myself to let anyone read it – even my very supportive husband!  I just seem to have a real worry about anyone reading my fiction (which is a bit of a contradiction in terms for someone who wants to be a novelist…) The fear of being judged or finding out I have no talent is really holding me back, but I know I won’t improve my draft or my writing generally unless I get some feedback. Do you have any strategies for getting over this wall?

If you have a writing, productivity or publishing question that you’d like me to tackle in a future episode, please get in touch via email or Twitter or leave a comment on this post.

I’ll answer it on the show and credit you (unless, of course, you ask to remain anonymous).

WRITING UPDATE

This month I’ve been editing The Silver Mark and I sent it out to my ARC team last week. I’ve already had some feedback – good feedback – which is, as always, a massive relief!

Those who have been listening a while may already know this, but my Crow Investigations series is something I decided to do independently, another step along the hybrid publishing path and, so far, it’s gone really well. Far better than I hoped, I’ll be honest, which is very exciting indeed. I’m in the process of signing a deal for the audio rights, too, so The Night Raven will be truly hybrid with a traditional deal for the audiobook.

I think a large part of The Night Raven’s success is down to the amazing cover and, in case you are hybrid or independent (or thinking about it!), I want to recommend the agency I used. It’s called Books Covered and the art director is Stuart Bache who has many years of experience in the traditional industry. He has designed covers for authors such as John Le Carre and Stephen King and he is absolutely brilliant to work with. www.bookscovered.co.uk

 

RECOMMENDED

Barnaby plans his books and recommends the following book for getting to grips with story structure.

Stealing Hollywood by Alexandra Sokoloff

Barnaby also did a creative writing course at the Faber Academy and he recommends it highly. His tutor at the academy was Rowan Coleman.

 

 

IN THE INTERVIEW

On his book industry day job and how it affected his dreams of becoming an author:

I started for Waterstones as a weekend bookseller when I was fifteen or sixteen years old… Now I work in the head office doing social media coordination… Surrounded by the industry, the traditional publishing world, being surrounded by a lot of success… And on the other side of it, knowing that some books don’t do very well…

Knowing the astonishing the highs which are possible – and it’s very exciting to see a book catch fire like that, I think in part inspired me. Not that I thought I could achieve that, but seeing people be so passionate about story was amazing.

The other side, it meant I knew how difficult it was for any book, even once it’s published, to even make it to a bookshop shelf… Simply there’s just not enough space… It’s a fight, really. It didn’t stop me, thankfully, I didn’t shrink away in fear.

 

On the Faber Academy:

I had an idea for a third novel, but I was conscious that I had never been taught creative writing… So I read in the back of a lot of books, I quite like reading acknowledgements in the back of novels, particularly if you’re trying to get published… The things they say are often really interesting and the Curtis Brown and Faber Academy courses kept cropping up… I was so lucky, my employer made it possible for me to got to the Faber academy and change around my working schedule to make it possible for me to attend on Thursday mornings… I felt I needed some kind of guiding hand, a route through the darkness.

The Faber Academy was a very important turning point when I was trying to do this thing we call writing. It gave me tools, almost like an armoury, to approach it in more of a methodical way… It helped me realise that it wasn’t this strange potion making, this mystical magical thing that nobody knows how it works… It helped me to find my formula, my own mystical alchemy. And by sharing it with other writers and by being guided by a brilliant tutor, I had the wonderful writer Rowan Coleman…  She’s such an incredible inspiration to her class because she really, clearly loves what she does and the art of storytelling and that really helped me get to grips with the story I wanted to tell. The WIP I did while at the academy was the one that ended up getting published.

I can’t even say how helpful it was because it’s so buried in the fabric of what I do… If anyone is considering it I would say go for it.

 

On the submission process:

So many times in this industry you are ready for the next step or for things to get better, or you think ‘my God this is the next step, this is it’ … Each time you get an email which says can we have the full manuscript or can we have an exclusive on this title or whatever, you think ‘oh wow, it’s really going to happen’. And then it doesn’t. It’s hard not to feel as if you’re back to square one.

 

On writing when working full-time:

I find it really difficult… Trying to cram in the thing that’s most important to me, but squeezing it into little bits of time here and there is quite upsetting really. Because it’s the thing that you want to devote your full attention to and to do the best you possibly can… but you really have to slot it in.

I try to write a little bit in the evenings and I write every lunchtime for an hour.

The main hassle for me is that I spend my entire day in front of LED backlit screens so when I get home the last thing I want to do is spend more hours in front of a laptop screen.

Weekends are when I’m most productive because I can do bits and have breaks… I would struggle to give tips because I don’t have it figured it out.

I would say do what fits in the rhythm of your own life and don’t get too hung up on trying to get a routine if your current situation doesn’t lend itself to a routine yet.

I don’t focus on the amount of words I’m doing or pages or anything like that. A lot of it can be research or thinking which doesn’t lead to a thousand words a day… I do try to think about the book each day and think about how it could progress and to think about any of the nitty gritty problems in the plot and try to untangle them.

 

On plotting:

I need a map to follow. When I have an idea for a book… I then have to write it down step by step. I normally write down a chapter breakdown, with a plot synopsis.

Just having it makes me feel in control of the process rather than the process being in control of me.

I quite often cast my characters with actors. I cut out their pictures from publicity stills or whatever and I copy that to a cast list with every character and their age, job, where they figure in the plot and have their picture next to that. It helps me visualise them when I’m laying it out and that probably comes from my film studies days.

 

On writing process:

I can write at home, I can write in a coffee shop, I’m not too sensitive or particular, really. Complete silence would probably be the worst thing. If there’s nothing, I put on rain sounds or something in the background. Something to generate white noise so it’s not pin drop silence which can create an echo chamber in your head.

 

On the three act structure:

‘Once you’ve got structure to build on, the building on it becomes a lot more enjoyable.’

 

On life post-publishing:

‘It introduces a new level of consciousness and anxiety into the process’

‘It’s very strange… When you’re writing you think of it as the dream. You think something really stupid, you think once this happens all my problems will be solved and I’ll be forever happy.’

‘You just collect other problems and stresses… Which isn’t to diminish the wonderful feeling of having done it. It is wonderful but it’s not a one-sided thing.’

‘The feeling of anticlimax… Your life, quite often, doesn’t change.’

‘The week of publication when there’s a lot of focus on you and your book, I actually found that trickier than I expected… I’m a natural introvert and I’ve spent decades making sure I’m not the focus of attention in a room full of people.’

 

 

Thanks for listening!

If you can spare a few minutes to leave the show a review on iTunes (or whichever podcast app you use) that would be really helpful. Ratings raise the visibility of the podcast and make it more likely to be discovered by new listeners and included in the charts.

The Worried Writer on iTunes

[Click here for step-by-step instructions on how to rate a podcast on your device]

Also, if you have a question or a suggestion for the show – or just want to get in touch – I would love to hear from you! Email me or find me on Twitter or Facebook.

The Worried Writer Episode #49: Kate Harrison ‘I Still Get Imposter Syndrome’

The Secrets You Hide book cover

My guest today is writing coach and bestselling author Kate Harrison. Kate has written contemporary women’s fiction, the YA Soul Beach trilogy, and has recently moved into adult thrillers with the dark and twisty The Secrets You Hide, under a new pen name Kate Helm 

She has also got a successful non-fiction brand with a range of diet and lifestyle books based on the 5:2 intermittent fasting method and regularly teaches other writers through courses, events and her consultancy service.

You can learn more at Kate-Harrison.com

Or find Kate on Facebook, Instagram or Twitter.

IN THE INTRODUCTION

Plan, Pitch & Sell Your Book Course

**SPECIAL OFFER**

Kate says that writing pitches (or ‘hook lines’) for books is her ‘superpower’, and she shares her knowledge – and enthusiasm – on the subject in her online course: Plan, Pitch & Sell Your Book.

The course covers much more than writing a compelling pitch, though. I’ll let Kate explain:

In seven steps, you’ll learn how to attract an audience and overcome rejection by identifying what is unique and irresistible about your work. It’ll help you to  hone your story or concept – without losing the excitement. 

The course is reasonably-priced at £99, but Kate has generously offered a SPECIAL 50% DISCOUNT for Worried Writer listeners. Thank you, Kate!

I give thanks for the wonderful Patreon support and a shout-out to new patrons.

I love the ‘community within a community’ that we’ve created over on Patreon and I really enjoy making the audio extras (which go up in the middle of every month).

Thank you so much to everyone supporting The Worried Writer in this way – it means so much to me.

To become a Worried Writer insider and to support the podcast – for as little as $1 a month – head to The Worried Writer on Patreon.

LISTENER QUESTION

If you’ve got a question you would like answered on the show, contact me via email or Twitter or leave a comment on this post.

IN THE INTERVIEW

On writing:

I have a butterfly mind

It’s always all about the idea for me… An idea either grips me or it doesn’t and once it’s gripped me, I have to do it.

Process:

I do aim for a word count… I wrote part time for the first four years, and switched full time in 2007. I imagined I would get loads done, but it didn’t quite work out that way… So, I have a word count… I tend to sent a lowish goal and then exceed it because I’m a bit of a girly swot.’

I try to write really quite quickly because I like the bright shiny thing and if an idea is knocking around my brain for too long, it gets stale for me… I try to get it down fast and then go back and edit it later. But it can vary from book to book, too

‘I do find that 25 minutes on a novel, to start with, is quite hard work. We’re just so addicted, now, to getting distracted by things around us. And I will give myself a bit of talking to with that and say ‘look, if you can’t write for 15 minutes without checking your email you’re a bit of a lost cause…’

On self-doubt:

Although I have written a lot, now, I still get imposter syndrome, I still get the doubts in the saggy middle or near the end and I have no concept of whether a book is good or bad until I have a bit of distance

When I’m very stuck I consciously change my environment.

On writing pitches:

My one superpower seems to be to listen to someone’s book idea and go ‘okay, that’s what you need to put in your pitch, and this is your hook or your elevator pitch… It’s just something I’ve got a knack for.
All my writer friends ask me to do this… Partly, I think, it’s my background in journalism and television.

You can’t expect everybody to love your book but you must have a clear idea of what you’re offering them.

Thanks for listening!

If you can spare a few minutes to leave the show a review on iTunes (or whichever podcast app you use) that would be really helpful. Ratings raise the visibility of the podcast and make it more likely to be discovered by new listeners and included in the charts.

The Worried Writer on iTunes

Also, if you have a question or a suggestion for the show – or just want to get in touch – I would love to hear from you! Email me or find me on Twitter or Facebook.

The Worried Writer Episode #48: Kerry Barrett ‘Just Keep Swimming’

My guest today is author and editor Kerry Barrett. Kerry Barrett is the author of eight novels, including the Strictly Come Dancing-themed A Step in Time, and The Girl in the Picture, about a crime novelist who solves a 160-year-old mystery. Kerry’s latest novel is a time slip called The Hidden Women.

For more about Kerry and her books, head to kerrybarrett.co.uk

Or find her on Twitter or Facebook.

Kerry’s editing services.

IN THE INTRODUCTION

I give thanks for the wonderful Patreon support and a shout-out to new patrons.

I love the ‘community within a community’ that we’ve created over on Patreon and I really enjoy making the audio extras (which go up in the middle of every month).

Thank you so much to everyone supporting The Worried Writer in this way – it means so much to me.

To become a Worried Writer insider and to support the podcast – for as little as $1 a month – head to The Worried Writer on Patreon.

THANK YOU!

WORLD ANVIL INTERVIEW

I talk about my recent live interview on the World Anvil Twitch stream (video now available on YouTube HERE).

And here is the link to World Anvil – an app which helps you to create and organise your fantasy world for book-writing or RPG gaming.

LISTENER QUESTION

If you have a question you would like answered on the show

contact me via email or Twitter or leave a comment on this post.

IN THE INTERVIEW

On making time to write:

‘I wrote a lot on the train, I kind of squeezed my writing in wherever I could.’

‘My son is a swimmer so I do a lot of writing poolside, watching him.’

On transitioning to full-time writing:

‘It was quite lucky as soon as I finished at the magazine, I was stright into edits on the The Girl in the Picture… I didn’t really have time to think which was brilliant… The edits on that kind of got me into the swing of things.’

‘If I hadn’t had those edits with the deadline, I might have been a bit floaty… I did watch quite a lot of Netflix, I have to be honest. It was quite funny to have all that time and it almost made me less productive,

Kerry’s writing process:

‘I’ve been a journalist for a long time so I thrive on a deadline.’

‘I aim for a chapter a day… I consider it a triumph if I write more.’

‘I just write on Word.’

‘I do write down my word count every day and I cross it off and write the new amount.’

‘Head down, keep going.’

On getting blocked:

‘My mantra when it comes to writing is I’m very inspired by Dory and how she says ‘just keep swimming’… I wear a charm bracelet that’s a fish which reminds me… Just keep going, it will happen eventually.’
 
‘Just keep swimming!’
 
‘I write an outline initially with a beginning, middle and end, on an A4 sheet of paper, and I print it out and then I start writing. And as I write, things change and I realise things that won’t work… I’m very old school and I scribble on my outline and stick post it notes and write in different colours and draw arrows…And when it’s got to the point when I can scribble no more I type it up again and print it out. And then I staple the new one on so by the end of the novel I will end up with 12 or 15 outlines that have all come from that initial outline.’

On self-doubt:


‘I can always write something… When I was preparing for this podcast I started thinking about what worries me and it’s not the writing…  Maybe because it’s been my job  for a hundred years… I just write… But once I have that’s when – oh my – I’m just so scared…’
 
‘For me it’s not the process, it’s the aftermath – I just want to hide.’
 

Recommended:

Save The Cat by Blake Snyder

On Writing by Stephen King

Into The Woods by John Yorke

Thanks for listening!

If you can spare a few minutes to leave the show a review on iTunes (or whichever podcast app you use) that would be really helpful. Ratings raise the visibility of the podcast and make it more likely to be discovered by new listeners and included in the charts.

The Worried Writer on iTunes

[Click here for step-by-step instructions on how to rate a podcast on your device]

Also, if you have a question or a suggestion for the show – or just want to get in touch – I would love to hear from you! Email me or find me on Twitter or Facebook.

The Worried Writer Episode #47: Adam Croft ‘Just Crack On’

My guest today is Adam Croft. With more than a million books sold to date, he is is one of the most successful independently published authors in the world. His psychological thrillers include the hugely successful Her Last Tomorrow and Tell Me I’m Wrong, and his Knight & Culverhouse crime thriller series has sold more than 250,000 copies worldwide. Adam’s Kempston Hardwick mystery books are being adapted as audio plays and he has just stepped into non-fiction with The Indie Author Mindset. Adam has been made an honorary Doctor of Arts by the University of Bedfordshire in recognition of his achievements and he runs a crime fiction podcast with fellow author Robert Daws.

For more head to AdamCroft.net or find Adam on Twitter or Facebook.

Adam’s podcast for crime fiction fans: Partner’s in Crime

IN THE INTRODUCTION

I recorded this introduction on 20th December 2018 when I wasn’t quite ready to set my 2019 goals. They will go up in a blog post next week and I will discuss them in February’s episode.

Also, I reveal another new novel! My supernatural thriller, THE LOST GIRLS, is out this month. Huzzah! If you are interested in my fiction, do visit sarah-painter.com and sign up for my reader newsletter.

I give thanks for the wonderful Patreon support. 

I love the ‘community within a community’ that we’ve created over on Patreon and I really enjoy making the audio extras (which go up in the middle of every month).

Thank you so much to everyone supporting The Worried Writer in this way – it means so much to me.

To become a Worried Writer insider and to support the podcast head to The Worried Writer on Patreon.

THANK YOU!

 

LISTENER QUESTION

If you have a question you would like answered on the show

contact me via email or Twitter or leave a comment on this post.

 

IN THE INTERVIEW

On the pressures of success:

‘When I’m writing a book and when I finish it, the thing I always ask myself is is it better than the last one… So I think for me I’ve always had that pressure that I put on myself.’

‘I was an overnight success between my eight and ninth books, I guess, as it was my ninth book that really took off and did anymore than just paying the bills.’

On staying fresh:

‘It’s one of the reasons I dipped into non fiction and I write plays…

 

On self-doubt:

‘They all cause me trouble… I always thought that once I’d written more books I would get more confident at it… But I still get that sense of dread on release day. I still think this is the one where I will get found out… Those things don’t change, the only thing that’s changed is the amount of money that comes in from the books.’

 

On The Indie Author Mindset:

‘I get lots and lots of emails from authors asking for help and advice which is great and I’ll always help if I can, because when I started that help simply wasn’t there… I think we should all help each other. But one of the things that struck me was that a lot of the questions had their root in mindset…

 

On being professional:

‘It’s the attitude you have… You’re turning up, you’re getting the job done… You are focusing on the task.’

 

On writing life:

‘I wish I had a typical day, to be honest with you… I’m releasing normally four books a year so when I’m gearing up to a release, which is regularly, things change completely and I do a lot more of the marketing. I spend hours a day on Facebook ads and tweaking those.’

‘It moves in waves, but there’s not a typical day… I’m an author and I run the publishing company.’

 

Coping with overwhelm:

‘I’m currently working on a machine which turns 24-hour days into 43-hour ones, so that’s gonna help!’

If you can, outsourcing stuff is vital… It’s also focusing on what’s most important. Writing is what’s most important… There’s only one thing which is guaranteed to make you more money and secure your future as a writer is to get more books out.’

‘If you learn too much beforehand, things like Facebook advertising can seem like a really big and scary thing but it’s not… If you dive in and learn as you go along it seems much easier… Just crack on and do it.’

 

Thanks for listening!

If you can spare a few minutes to leave the show a review on iTunes (or whichever podcast app you use) that would be really helpful. Ratings raise the visibility of the podcast and make it more likely to be discovered by new listeners and included in the charts.

The Worried Writer on iTunes

[Click here for step-by-step instructions on how to rate a podcast on your device]

Also, if you have a question or a suggestion for the show – or just want to get in touch – I would love to hear from you! Email me or find me on Twitter or Facebook.