SPEAKER_00 0:00

If you want a rapid release, I recommend you have, if you're gonna do, say, three books, write them all at the same time, back to back, edit them at the same time, trap them at the same time, figure out what your cadence is for releasing them. Prepare as much as you can ahead of time because as you're releasing those books back to back, you're working on the next one and the next one.

SPEAKER_01 0:24

Welcome to the Write It Scared podcast. I'm your host, Stacey Fraser, a formerly repressed creative soul, turned fiction writer, story editor, and author accelerator certified fiction book coach. At Write It Scared, we tell the truth about why writing a novel is so hard by acknowledging that most writers grapple with two stories. The one they want to put on the page to the best of their ability, and the often subconscious internal story that prevents them from doing it. This show is designed to help you identify and rewrite the internal narrative holding you back while you discover and write the story you want to tell and learn all the tools to help you do that successfully. Join me each week for a new episode where we'll talk about writing to deepen our understanding of the craft and of ourselves as writers. Writing a novel is an inside job that we do not do alone. Welcome to Red It's Scared. I'm glad you're here. Let's dive in. Hey, hey, writer. Welcome back to the Red It's Scared Podcast. I'm your host, Stacey Fraser. Today we are diving into the big world of independent publishing with fantasy author Michelle Miles. Michelle has written more than 40 books. Yep, 40. And she is sharing what it really takes to build a sustainable indie career while juggling a day job, family, and a whole lot of creative passion. In our conversation, we talk about dealing with burnout, pivoting from trad dreams and small presses into indie spaces, and how to keep showing up for your stories even when the doubts creep in. You're also here, Michelle's hard-earned advice on building systems that work for your life, managing indie publishing from start to finish, and why discipline and desire are the only things you truly need. This is one of my all-time favorite conversations on the podcast, and my big takeaway was that there's no single right path to publication. What matters is persistence, purpose, and refusing to let anyone or anything stand in your way. So let me give you Michelle's bio and then we'll head into the interview. Michelle Miles believes every story should have a little bit of magic, a dash of danger, and a whole lot of heart. She writes fantasy, paranormal, and young adult adventures filled with fierce heroines, unforgettable heroes, and the kind of romance that makes you believe in happily ever after. From angels and demons to dragons, elves, and time travelers, her books invite readers into worlds brimming with epic quests, high stakes, and enchanting possibilities. When she's not crafting new adventures, Michelle lends her voice to other authors' worlds as a narrator and host of the Miles Beyond the Page podcast, where writers share the triumphs and challenges of their creative journeys. Hi, Michelle. Thank you so much for coming on the Write It Scared Podcast. I am so excited to talk to you today. I just absolutely adore all the books that you put out in the world. And I can't wait to hear more about your process and your journey in independent publishing and all of the things. So how are you?

SPEAKER_00 3:18

Oh, thank you, Stacey. I'm so excited to be here. I am I'm excellent. And I'm I'm really excited to talk about all the things the books, the writing, everything.

SPEAKER_01 3:29

Yes, yes. Well, before we dive into that, why don't you just share a bit of your writing journey? How'd you get here? How'd you wind up coming to writing and publishing?

SPEAKER_00 3:37

Yeah, it feels like a long journey. When I was in high school, in junior high in high school, I hated math. So I would sit in the back of the class and just jot down like little stories, fantasy stories, knights in shining armor, damsels under stress, and all of that. My mother was a big reader and I mean voracious. She read everything. And one day she handed me a Victoria Holt book. It was called The Road to Paradise Island. And I fell in love with it. I just I loved the historical romance of it. And I really wanted to write that. But, you know, you really have to be an experienced writer for me to kind of write those types of books. But then I found fantasy in my high school years and fell in love with that genre. And I really, really wanted to write fantasy. That's all I really wanted to do. And I dabbled with it a little bit here and there. And then, you know, life happens. I ended up kind of trying to write a novel, didn't really pan out. I then I had a baby and who is now 24. And so then things stopped for a little bit. And then I discovered Romance Writers of America. I was really looking for, you know, some guidance, help. How do I do this? I don't know anything about publishing. I mean, I read Writer's Digest, but you know, that's so high level and and doesn't really teach you anything about the craft of writing. And back then, I mean, things were so different. It was traditional publishing, it was your only path. So I discovered Romance Writers America. I joined them in 2004, and I completely went nuts. I'm like, I'm volunteering for everything. I wanted to learn everything. I wanted to know everything. I wanted to write all the things. I really wanted to write fantasy, but I just didn't have the experience as a writer to do that. So my first book was actually published in 2006, and it was contemporary, very spicy romance, which are that that series is no longer available because that's just not what I write anymore. And then I started kind of dabbling with time travel. I was published by a few small presses. So some of them are they're all gone now. Sam Hayne, Alora's Cave, Cobblestone Press. I mean, I had books with them. I got all my rights back. It was a struggle to get my rights back from Alora's Cave, but I, you know, I was right. I had written a fantasy romance series with them. So I really just, I really wanted the big traditional publisher. I really, I was like, I want to be published with Tor. You know, I had high aspirations. And it just didn't pan out. And so I got this idea for an urban fantasy series, and the whole series came to me kind of in a flash one day. And and I shopped it around and it was rejected over and over and over by agents and editors. And I just thought, you know what? I'm just gonna self-publish it. So that was 2020 when I finally published that book, first book in the series. And there was just something very cool to me about seeing the process from start to finish. Like I had the conception of the idea. I wrote the book. I think I rewrote that first book 12 times before I finally got it right, but I finally got it right. And in 2020, that is when I decided I'm just gonna forget traditional publishing right now. I'm gonna, I'm gonna go for it. I'm gonna go for the indie publishing. And so that's how I started my indie publishing journey. And here I am.

SPEAKER_01 7:16

In 2020, you started your indie publishing journey. Gosh, that was only five years ago.

SPEAKER_00 7:20

Yeah, well, that's well, I had re-released my other books, my backlist, but they didn't do well at all. So I had all these books, and it was really kind of in the last 18 months that I really started thinking of it more as a business and not as writing. And so I rebranded myself. I ditched all the hot, spicy stuff that I just wasn't writing anymore. I unpublished all of those. So I those are about eight books or so that I just I took down and I won't be redoing. I won't be putting them back up because I just don't write that anymore. And then I just decided to go all in with my fairy tale retellings and my fantasy. And and so I yeah, I'm about to publish my 40th book next month, but that's to say that not all of those 40 books are available because I'm really I'm stream trying to streamline myself into just being that fantasy writer, and I'm really immersed in this what I call my enchanted realms series. That's my fairy tale retelling. I'm just I'm really immersed in that, and I love the stories, and I love making up, you know, different side things to to do with that and bonus material coming up with bonus material for the readers and everything. That was a long answer.

SPEAKER_01 8:42

Oh, it was great. I love listening. I I absolutely love hearing people's journeys. So you were really, it sounded like you were definitely interested in traditional publishing. You was you wanted tour. I I had similar aspirations when I wrote my first fantasy. And it also didn't go anywhere. Yeah. Thankfully, though, I mean, like I time and place, right? Yeah, I'm curious to know like how it felt to to want to pursue this avenue of publication for so long and to not have it work out and then decide to pivot. Yeah. Especially, you know, given the landscape of publishing of the time, because I mean, over the last 15 to 20 years, indie publishing has just, I mean, it really has blown up and flourished. And it's just amazing the the capabilities and the options that authors have now. So I'm just very curious, like, what all what all went into the decision to publish independently?

SPEAKER_00 9:47

It was a lot of things. You know, I I should back up a little bit. I will tell you that in 2015, I was ready to quit. I mean, I was ready to throw in the towel. I had had so much bad luck with the small presses, you know, it was not a good time when you have a publisher basically ripping you off on the royalties. That's really disheartening and it's frustrating. And you just feel like you're not getting anywhere. So 2015, I took a step back and I just was like, am I really gonna keep doing this? Am I really gonna keep throwing money at this? And I decided I'm just gonna take a year off and I'm gonna read craft books and I'm gonna take some courses and I'm gonna try to figure this out. And I guess really my first indie published book would be My My Epic Fantasy. And I decided to publish that myself in 2016. I mean, I I hired an editor, I hired, I got, you know, cover art. But that decision did not come lightly. I mean, I I really, really believe in my books, and I really believe that there's a place for them on the bookshelves in a bookstore. But when you get rejection after rejection from agents and editors, and you've exhausted all of those people that want to read your genre, fantasy is a very not really niche, but no, there's not a lot of agents and editors who are just were banging down the doors looking for fantasy authors back back then. Now, things made to be different though. I haven't looked at the market, I don't know. So I I was ready to quit. The only thing that saved me was a I took a workshop. I found this woman, her name is Holly Lyle, who sadly passed away last year, but she was a phenomenal writer and she was a phenomenal workshop teacher. And her workshops are still available on her website. But I took her how to think sideways workshop that sort of makes you get out of your own way coming when you're doing writing, right? So it makes you think about approaching your writing in a different way when you're stumped or you're blocked or you just don't know where to go. And so I took that and I started to feel the excitement of writing again. And that's how I wrote in the Tower of the Wizard King. As it came up, I wrote it. I was, I, you know, I thought, am I gonna shop us around again? Am I gonna go through that horrible waiting period of six months to a year to see if I'm gonna get any sort of response or just, you know, or a rejection or or anything. And at that point, I was like, you know what, I'm just I'm just gonna try it. I'm just gonna throw it out there. And then and then that's when I started the whole, oh, urban fantasy. And then I I was like, I'm all in. I'm all in with my urban fantasy series. I'm gonna self-publish it. And and that's how I ended up that. But yeah, it was a disappointing time in my life where I was just ready to throw in the towel and say, forget it.

SPEAKER_01 12:45

But yeah, yeah, I I completely get that. And I'm so glad that you didn't and that you found Holly and found what you needed, right? To rekindle that, to rekindle your spark. But I think that happens to a lot of us.

SPEAKER_02 13:00

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 13:00

You know, we just get beat down. And and I know when sometimes I feel that way, I have to pay attention to where my focus is. If my focus is just all on the future, it's just all way out there, and it's just on the focus of what I don't have yet.

unknown 13:16

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 13:16

And I feel like shit. Yeah. And and I love what you're saying. It is you brought things back into your focus of control.

SPEAKER_00 13:25

Right. I tried, yeah, I really tried to sort of I remember, so I worked at this one place and I remember this so vividly. I was, it was on my lunch hour, I was reading Christopher Vogler's The Hero's Journey, which is a phenomenal book, especially for fan fantasy writers. And I was sitting there reading that and someone walked in and and saw what I was reading and very snarky said, Oh, are you writing a book? It was like, Look, yeah, I'm writing a book. But I didn't say that. I just kind of laughed and went, yes, yeah, maybe someday. You know, I just kind of blew it off. But that has really stuck with me for a long time. And, you know, it's those types of moments where you really question yourself, like who I think I am writing a book, you know, those types of things. Oh, yes. And then you just kind of have to you have to really get into a mental space of those people don't matter. Those people don't understand what it's like to sit in front of a laptop or a screen or whatever for hours upon hours and try to create something that will resonate, not only with yourself, but with readers. So that was a really that was a hard moment for me. And that was in my moment of, am I gonna quit? So I but I managed to pull it together and I finished reading The Hero's Journey, and I love that book. And I think it really helped me understand how to craft fantasy books, you know. So yeah.

SPEAKER_01 15:02

I love, I I love that. Yeah. I think the people that the people, you know, some of sometimes we get people who, well, I get people who ask, you know, people that are outside of my writer life, people that are non-writers, and they they ask questions like about writing a book or or, you know, what are you writing? Or they ask the horrible question, when can I read it? Yeah. And I I often feel myself shrinking back because of that, that feeling of who am I to to to write this, who am I to do this? And and like you said, you know, the people who matter, they they want to know. And the people who don't matter, you know, the people who are jerks and assholes, they don't matter, right? You're what you value, what you say is important to you, you make that.

SPEAKER_00 15:54

Yeah. That's absolutely. And I think that's just something that we have to embrace too, and just forget about those people. But it's really hard because they get into your headspace sometimes, you know.

SPEAKER_01 16:05

Yeah, and and all of this stuff that we see on social media, we're always looking at the end result, right? It's always like the book's out, the book's published, the right. And so we're very future focused, and that makes it hard to stay in the moment. I did you see Lee Berdugo's TED Talk recently? I haven't. Oh boy. It's called The Art of Discomfort, and it's 15 minutes and it is way worth it. But she just talks about how the thing that we've forgotten about as as creatives is just that the feelings that we get when it's not going well, those are actually good things because it's that discomfort is means that we're in it and it's it's acting like a compass, it's serving a purpose. It's not supposed to be easy. Doesn't mean we're miserable all the fucking time. Otherwise, we would not do this, right? But but anyway, it's really it's really good. So it's like what you're saying. It's like, yeah, there's gonna be, there's gonna be bumps, there's gonna be hard times, but that doesn't mean you're on the wrong track. Right, right. I I I'm gonna check that out. Oh, that sounds great. I mean, actually, I will link it in the show notes because I think all of us should listen to it several times. All right, thank you for sharing all of that for being, you know, transparent and vulnerable. So you have written a lot, a lot of books. A lot, a lot of books. I I don't know if it's accurate, but on Goodreads, I think there's 55 titles under your author profile. I'm not sure if that's accurate because you said the it was like 40. But so I'm really curious like, how in the hell do you balance life and all of that writing?

SPEAKER_00 17:40

Yeah, so the 55 books, yeah, that is what Goodreads shows, but a lot of those are not available.

SPEAKER_01 17:46

They're on, they're not on, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 17:48

Okay, they're they're not available anymore. Like the contemporary romance series that I wrote, gone. But you wrote all those dancers. But I wrote them, right? So I'll tell you what I've done for years and years. I when I decided I'm all in, I had to figure out a way to, you know, I was raising a kid, I was a single mom at some point. My current husband, he's amazing. He's 100% on board, he's so supportive, he's like my biggest champion. So what I decided to do was I'm gonna write at lunch at my lunch hour because I have a day job. So I'm gonna take, I had to figure it out, right? So it wasn't like do I schlep an extra laptop to work? No, I don't want to do that. So I had to really get creative about how do I do this. Now, when I first started doing this, they had those little HP minis. I don't know if you remember them. They were like this big. No, there it was just it was like a piece of crap. No, laptop. It barely ran word. It was those, it was so bad. But but it did what I needed it to do. And I lived off a thumb drive. So like I would put my my work in progress on a thumb drive, I would stick it in that little HP mini and I would write during lunch. I would eat my lunch and I would write. In the evenings, I would take my thumb drive and I'd stick it in my laptop at home and I would write from seven to eight. And so that was two hours of writing time. And and I got to where I could produce anywhere from 1500 to 3,000 words a day doing that. Now I didn't write every day. I did I didn't write on the weekends because I was just too busy when I was raising my son. But now my brain is so focused on that that when it's lunchtime during the week, it's like, oh yeah, it's time to go write. It's time to go write and and and eat and you know, figure stuff out. And every evening at seven o'clock, my husband's like, see you later. He knows that I come up to my office and I sit here and I will bang out the words. You know, it may not be the best book right then. It's just me trying to get the story down. I don't plot pretty much. I I mean, I know where the story needs to go. I know the ending. I have to have a blurb. But it's just me sitting here with my characters in my head, just trying to get the story out. So that's how I did it. And and I can typically turn out a book in about three months. Now now, my urban fantasy, those are super long books. They're like 90 to 100,000 words. It's major research. She is a relic hunter, so it's like, you know, trying to figure out the quest and the clues and the where does she find this and where is she going? So I spent a lot of time researching for those books, and those took a lot longer. But the fairy tales, yeah, I can usually bang them out in about three to four months.

SPEAKER_01 20:45

And they're retellings, so yeah, there is a little bit of a what do you want to call it? Uh a foundation there. Yes. I think.

unknown 20:54

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 20:55

So it's just kind of taking the tropes and twisting them up.

SPEAKER_01 20:58

Yeah. That's amazing. So what I got out of what you just said was you had a desire, you had to figure it out. So you had to use discipline. That discipline turned into habit. Yes. And that habit basically has turned into muscle memory for you.

SPEAKER_00 21:15

Right. Exactly. 100%.

SPEAKER_01 21:17

Yeah. 100%. I love that. And I think that's such a wonderful takeaway because I mean, that's all of us. We all have to figure it out. We all have to find the slices in our life to do the thing that we want to do. Yeah. And that often means that we've got to make some sacrifices.

SPEAKER_00 21:35

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 21:35

Um, yeah. And uh and and or we have to ask for help, which I hate. I just mean like, you know, like I have a child too. And it's like, I need, you know, to ask for time. Yeah. And I that means I have to value that time. I have to value the work that I'm doing, the creative work that I'm doing. And that's damn hard. It is hard. You know, when you just think of it as like, oh, you know. It's it's just I I don't know. There's like this fine line between taking it seriously and debt being dedicated to it. And then there's also like but then if you do that and you pit you can pigeonhole yourself into paralysis too. I don't know if that makes any sense. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 22:18

I just came to a point where, you know, yes, I have a day job, but I'm like, I am not letting anything stand in my way anymore. I let a lot of things stand in my way. You know, the job, the, the, the kid. Now, some things you just can't avoid. Like you've got to before he can drive, you've got to parent. You gotta be a parent. You gotta be a chauffeur, you gotta do this and that. But I got to a point recently, I was in a very high stress job. And I was like, this isn't worth it anymore. This is not what I want to do anymore. And this is killing me. It's killing my creativity, it's killing my sleep. I'm stressed out all the time. I'm having health issues. And I'm like, fuck this. I'm out. So I started looking for another job that I could, you know, that was a lot less stress that I could just kind of hate to say it, I'm just gonna coast.

SPEAKER_01 23:11

There's nothing wrong with that.

SPEAKER_00 23:14

Because I am not letting anything stand in my way anymore. This is what I want to do. This is what I'm going to do. I'm going to work my butt off to get there. And it took me a long time to get there. But it may be, maybe some other writers, it's a lot quicker for them. But for me, it was like, I, you know, I was, I think I was just afraid of success. I and I still am. It's terrifying to think that I could finally achieve all of my all of my hopes and dreams in a way.

SPEAKER_01 23:43

And that's a real thing. That's it's a real thing. And and I think everybody's path is going to be different. It's going to take a different time frame for everybody, you know. I think hearing other people's stories like yours can help inspire us. We'll hear threads that resonate with us and be like, uh, you know what? Michelle, she did that. We found a way. So yeah, I can too. I can too. My way will look different. You know, it'll be my way, but I I can too. So I love that. So I'm really curious about your independent publishing journey. And I'm curious about the process. So, what is it like for you to take your idea and write it and then roll it through? What what steps do you take? Everybody to post on the website that it, and by the way, your direct sales website is the bomb. Holy crap. Thank you. That's beautiful. It's so well done. Thank you. Anyway, so everybody should go look at that. Everybody who's curious about independent publishing and direct sales needs to go look at that. So yeah, walk us through the process of that.

SPEAKER_00 24:58

For me, I get an idea. Like, I'll start with I had been wanting to write fairy tales for a long, long time. And the urban fantasy series took me five years to write. It was very dark. It was very, you know, it's angels and demons and good versus evil. So I was just really ready for a change. And I had been thinking about their the fairy tales. And I wanted something light, sweet, fun, different. And so as I was finishing up that series, I sat down and started writing a story Bible. Now I don't do this with every series, but this one felt different. And so I really wanted to get it right. I really wanted to figure out what the themes and the tropes were for each book that I wanted to write. And I wanted to do something different, and which has confused readers. So I have now added an afterword to each book because I have a prologue and an epilogue. And it they're like, this doesn't have anything to do with the no, it doesn't. But you know, stay with me, stay the course. So the prologue and the epilogue, I really sat down and I thought about it. I have Aunt and Aunt Hilde and her niece, Marigold. Aunt Hilde is a storyteller and tells Marigold a story every book. And that's how I start the book because I thought this is like a framing device, it's very Princess Bride, right? Oh, absolutely. And so that's what I wanted to do, but I wanted to take it a step further and map out a story for these two characters. So book 10, and this is kind of a secret, but I'm gonna, I'm gonna say it. Book 10 is her story. So you're gonna follow Marigold through these nine books, her prologue or epilogue story about how she's discovering who she is and how she comes to be. And and so I really had to sit down and think about that. And so I mapped out all of the books. Now I don't I don't always have the blurbs ready to go, but the first three books, I I decided I'm gonna write these back to back and I'm gonna do a rapid release. So I had to figure out that. I had to figure out the framing story. What does that look like? How what is her age? So it starts when she's five years old, and the book 10 will be when she's in her 20s, and it's her story. And so I had to sit down and figure out what was that, what did that look like? And I wrote it the tropes and I figured out the blurb and I figured out kind of a high-level story about how I wanted to retell it, what was the twist, how am I gonna do this different. I started with Cinderella, and I my first question that popped into my head was what if Cinderella fell in love with the prince from another realm? What does that look like? How does that work? And so I wrote the book and and I just loved it. I had so much fun writing it. And then as I was finishing that and putting it into edits, I started book two. And then, same thing. I mean, by the time I got it ready, book one, ready for publication, I was editing book two, two, and writing book three. So it was like I was constantly doing something in that world. I do all my own formatting. I have a beta reader that is invaluable to me. I have someone who does copy edits for me. I do a lot of self-editing. I've I use a lot of tools that help me self-edit. And, you know, stuff still gets missed, but you know, we're not perfect. We're human, right? So we make typos, we do, you know, we mess up. But but I do all of that myself. I upload all of my stuff myself. I have an incredible cover artist. She does my prints, she does my audio covers, she does all my ebook covers. And so I just start putting it together when I'm ready for it to go live. I kind of start mapping out, well, I want my release date to be X. So, you know, what does that look like for getting it uploaded and doing pre-orders and getting the arcs out? It's a lot of steps. And so it takes a lot of time. I'm I'm working on book five of the Fairy Joe series right now. It's coming out at the end of October. So right now I've got it formatted, I've got it ready to go. I'm I've uploaded it, I'm putting it ready, getting up the arcs ready to go. I'm I've got a sign-up sheet for people to sign up for the arcs. And and then I will I will release the arcs in early October.

SPEAKER_01 29:27

Is this once upon a midnight dreary?

SPEAKER_00 29:29

It is. Okay. Yeah, yeah. And so then, you know, I'll start looking at, okay, this is my release date. What ads do I need? How much ad spend do I want to do? And I will stack ads around the release date. I have a newsletter with about 6,000 people on it that I will I typically send a newsletter out. It's really twice a week because I have one for the podcast and one for my my, I call it News of the Realm. And so I have, you know, newsletters that go out weekly and I'll start pumping it up. And and, you know, here's a sneak peek. And I always write a bonus chapter for each one of these full-length novels. So I have to have that ready to go before release date. So I can link it to the in the back of the book. And all of my back matter, I have to really think about how does it all connect and how can I, how can I engage people and and keep them engaged in that series. So it's a lot. I don't know if that answers your question, but that's it's a lot.

SPEAKER_01 30:26

Well, that was the process, and I'm sitting over here going, holy shit. Yeah. But but I love it. And this particular example is probably pretty nuanced because it's a story within a story that spans over a series. Yes. Right. So that's and and you decided to rapid release the first three books. I actually know several authors who are thinking about something similar, not the story within the story idea, but they have a big, big world. Um and they're kind of and it's interconnected, and there's some interconnected timelines, and they're trying to figure out like how what's the best way to release this? What would you say to an author like that who has big plans to release a lot of books in an interconnected world? And it has never done this before. Where would you tell them to start? And they definitely want to go indie. Where would you tell them tell them to start?

SPEAKER_00 31:15

Get a story Bible. Start with your story Bible, figure it out, figure out your world. World building is huge in fantasy, and you really need to be good about it. I would say start with your world, start with your story Bible. I have a massive story Bible for this series, right? So I'm old school. I keep a word doc. A lot of people like Scrivener, Plotter, whatever. Whatever works for you, figure out all of the moving pieces. You know, what your characters, what they look like, you're not going to remember from book to book. So you need to write down what it what does my character look like? What is their backstory? What is their history? How are they related to my other main characters? Just you have to figure out how they're all interconnected because in anything in fiction, nothing is coincidental. Everything in fiction happens for a reason. But this is just my opinion. Everything in fiction happens for a reason. If you want to connect those worlds, if you want to connect those timelines, I did a dual timeline in The Tower of the Wizard King. I had the present day, I had the past and fairy, and they converge in the middle of the book. So I had to sit down and figure out. I actually wrote the past first, the present second, and then I dropped them in and figured out, you know, you have want to add Easter eggs, you want to add hints as to what's happening. So I would say write it all as much as you can. Anything can change later on. But if you can write the first, if you're like saying doing a, I don't know, a five-book series, write the first two books. Figure out what happens in those first two books and how they happen. If it's a dual timeline, if it's an interconnected world, how are they connected? Who are you connecting? Who or what? It could be, it could be a planet, it could be a world, it could be, you know, a setting, I guess is what I'm trying to say. It could be characters, it could be any of those themes, anything like that. If you're writing big world, specifically in fantasy and science fiction, if you're writing those bigger worlds, figure out what you're doing, get a story Bible going, and and figure out how to connect them. And then start writing. And if you want a rapid release, I recommend you have, if you're gonna do three, say three books, write them all at the same time, back to back, edit them at the same time, trap them at the same time for release, figure out what your cadence is for releasing them. You know, when am I gonna do arcs? When am I gonna do ads? When, you know, how do I engage my newsletter list? How do I engage social media? Prepare as much as you can ahead of time as you can, because as you're releasing those books back to back, you're working on the next one and the next one. So that would be my best advice.

SPEAKER_01 33:58

Yeah. So what I'm hearing is get as far ahead as you can, have as much prepared as you can, and have a solid foundation. Yeah. So that you can continue to write the next and the next and the next.

SPEAKER_02 34:13

Right.

SPEAKER_01 34:13

Okay. So let's say you did that, you've written these three books, you know. And so do you go through a developmental editor or do you skip that step now and just go straight to copy and then proof and or or beta? How how does it work for you?

SPEAKER_00 34:30

I, you know, I when I have written for publishers, and I and I do have I I do write for a publisher now, Dragonblade. I have a historical fantasy time travel series with them. I wrote those books back to back. I sent them in. There was no changes. There's no developmental changes for me. I don't want to sound like I'm boasting, but I know how to put together a story.

SPEAKER_01 34:51

Well, you got you got 55 books. You you you figured it out. No, I can't.

SPEAKER_00 34:56

You can trust your internal editor. I do, I trust my instincts, my gut. I don't really now that's not to say I've never used a developmental editor. I have in in the early stages, just to kind of figure out how to how you put together a story.

SPEAKER_01 35:13

You mean in the early stages of your career?

SPEAKER_00 35:15

Yes. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Fair. Now I I don't do that. I know what my journey is. I know, you know, what is the inciting incident, what is the call to action, what is, you know, what is the pinch points. I do different things for different books. Like sometimes I like the seven points story structure. Sometimes I just want the three acts. Sometimes I just want to wing it. I'm a weird writer. I like I said, I don't really plot. I do get to a point where I go, wait, I don't know what happens next. So I have to stop and think about it. But as long as I know the end, I can write to the end. So I don't really use a developmental editor once I finish the book and I send it off to my beta readers, and then I get comments back, you know, and and there's really nothing to change. Like even when I had the Dragon Blade books, she's edited my first two books with them. She's like, Yeah, it's just some grammar, just some word changes here or there. And I'm like, wow, okay, cool. I I'm good with that. That that makes it easy on me. So I feel like that I know how to put together a story now. I don't really need the developmental editor. And they're extremely expensive if you're just starting out. So my advice is learn the craft as much as you can through inexpensive means, workshops, online. I I watched a YouTube series about the seven-point structure. How that's how I figured it out and used Harry Potter, I think, as a example. I can't remember the guy's name, but I still have it. And I refer to that every now and then. I think there's just so many tools out there now available to authors to figure out how to put together a story that unless you just want to blow two, three thousand bucks on a developmental editor, just try to figure it out yourself. That will make you a better writer. That will make you stronger too as a writer, and you will understand how to put that those stories together.

SPEAKER_01 37:11

I come from a completely different lens. I get where you're coming from and and do agree. But for me, like using a development when I wrote my first novel, I didn't know my ads from a hole in the ground. I didn't know what I was doing. Right. I felt like the canon of information out there available was so huge. It is so, so huge. I didn't even know like where to start. And I and I hooked into a couple of mentor types. I mean, they don't, they didn't know who the hell I was at the time, but I really appreciated what they had to say on their podcasts and and so kind of got into their world slowly. And that's how I wound up with Author Accelerator and hired a book coach at the time because I didn't feel like I had the bandwidth or the brain space, right? To to be able to filter through it all and kind of try to figure it out so anyway, and I went that route and it was one of the most rewarding things to work with someone just one-on-one. Yeah. Because I didn't have community at all. Right. And then I later went and worked with a developmental editor and I did learn an incredible amount. And I was very and and and and if you do for anybody out there, if you go with a developmental editor, which lots of us use them, right? Definitely I recommend finding someone you vibe with. Yeah. You need to vibe with them. They need to like what you write. So this probably requires like uh somebody who's willing to get on a Zoom call with you and talk about your story first and even look at do a sample, sample edit of some pages and all of those things. But and then also if they're willing to look at the changes that you make and give you feedback. So that that was the experience that I had, and it was incredible. So I took it, and it was not cheap. It wasn't cheap, but it was an investment and it was the right kind of investment for me, and I wouldn't change it. So, and you have chosen to make your investments in different ways. So there's lots of different ways to do it.

SPEAKER_00 39:10

There are, but I will tell you that in when I when I very first started back into the writing world, writers digest had this novel writing workshop where you could work one-on-one with someone. And I did that for a long, you know, this was God, it had to be like year 2000 or something. It was a long, long time ago. So I did work with someone one-on-one and I did get feedback on that. So I think that was the first learning experience I had with how to put together a book, how to put together a story, what is, you know, how does that work? So I I'm not, I don't think that you should not use developmental editor if you don't, you know, if you think you need it, absolutely go get one, find one. You're absolutely right. Find someone who gets what you're writing, especially if you're writing genre fiction like fantasy science fiction and all of that, romance, whatever.

SPEAKER_01 39:56

Yeah. Don't give your fantasy novel to someone who likes hard-boiled crimes. Yes, exactly. Do that. They won't get it. They won't, they won't get it. They will not get it. Yeah. Absolutely. Well, I mean, I think we're saying the same thing. It's just like, yeah, you know, find, find, find what you need. Right. It's individual to to you. And as you go on your journey, the author's journey, right? Your needs are gonna change.

SPEAKER_00 40:23

Exactly.

SPEAKER_01 40:24

Right? So just like you, you don't need a developmental editor anymore because you've internalized that process. Yeah. And I hope to high hell I get there someday too. Because that's what I want. Fantastic. Gosh, well, you have shared so much wisdom, so much knowledge. And you know what? You should do a course on independent publishing. Like getting one more thing, right? Yeah. One more hat to wear. But I I would take it. I'm just saying, if you ever put it down, I would take it. So just a couple more questions before we wrap up. I mean, you're very accomplished. You've been at this a long, long time. So, do you ever have doubt? Does doubt ever creep up for you?

SPEAKER_00 41:02

Oh gosh, yes. Every day, every single day. I'm like, why am I doing this? Maybe I suck. Maybe my books are terrible. Yeah, every day you fight those doubt demons every single day. And it's hard. Yeah, I've been going through a phase of when I sit down to write, I'm like, oh, I don't know. Maybe I should just not do this anymore. And then I have to remind myself, look, you've written how many books? You got this, you know how to do this. But it's, yeah, it's a hard thing to shut that voice up in the back of your head that tells you, you know, well, I don't know, you're probably not going to do anything.

SPEAKER_02 41:36

What do you think helps you shut it up?

SPEAKER_00 41:38

I'm really determined. Like I'm, I have this completely overwhelming determination and drive to make this my career. And I'm really working hard to get there. You know, I launched the store. It's been kind of lackluster. And so, you know, I've been trying to think of ways that I can get people more engaged with that, the direct sales. And then I'm like, well, maybe I did it too soon. And maybe I shouldn't have set up the LLC and maybe I shouldn't have done this. So, you know, there's a lot of that, maybe I shouldn't have stuff going on in my brain. And then I just really have to stop and think about the future and what does that look like for me. And and I know this is gonna sound kind of corny, but you just really have to manifest that within yourself. You just have to really stop and think about what do you really want? I don't want to work for somebody for the rest of my life. I don't want to be in the trenches of corporate America for the rest of my life. And I have at least another 20 years to work. And when I sat down and realized that, I went, ugh, I don't want to do that. I don't, I don't want to be at somebody's beck and call for the next 20 years. I want to be author Michelle. I want to, I want to kick ass at running my own business and engaging with readers and talking about my books and writing these magical stories. And that's what I want to do. So I really have to stop and think about that a lot and tell myself, you got this, but it's hard. It's hard, especially when you go on social media and you see all the Debbie Downers out there going, you know, with the one-star reviews and that this book sucked, and I can't believe she wrote this book, and I will never read one of her books again. I mean, that's happened to me. So and I you just have to ignore that. And it's hard to do that. And and really, I just have to really believe in myself and know that I can do this. But it, you know, every day's a challenge.

SPEAKER_01 43:31

I love that. Thank you. Thanks for being real, because I'd rather hear that than I'd hear, oh you know, I meditate.

SPEAKER_00 43:40

It's not sunshine and rainbows, that's for sure. It's a lot of in the trenches digging yourself out of shit.

SPEAKER_01 43:46

But yeah, I would rather hear it the real and the raw, and the fact that it is hard. And you know, I I mentioned this on the last podcast interview that I did. Amy Bernstein wrote a book called. Oh gosh. Embracing the doubt monster? I can't remember if it's embracing. And I'm sorry, Amy, if I botched your book's title, I still love you and I still love your book. But anyway, her book is about how to embrace that doubt as a part of the creative process. And there's a line in her book that says creativity and doubt are two sides of the same coin. One cannot exist without the other. Oh, yeah, I believe it. Yeah. So it is not a sign that things are going wrong. It is not a sign that you're doing the wrong thing or that you're on the wrong path. Actually, the fact that you have doubts is probably a sign that you are right where you're supposed to be, even if right where you're supposed to be feels fucking crunchy.

SPEAKER_02 44:45

Yes.

SPEAKER_01 44:47

I love that. And you know, one of my dad's favorite sayings. He says, you know, the only thing constant is change, right? So this two shall pass kind of mentality. Like it feels not so good right now, but that's gonna change. That's gonna change. And I love just how much strength and passion you can hear it. You have such strength and passion in your compass. You know where it's pointed, you know where you're going. And I think that's half the battle.

SPEAKER_00 45:15

It is. I think you just really have to get to that point of, like I said, nobody's nothing is going to stand in my way. Not this day job, nothing. And I'm gonna do it. I'm gonna get where I want to go.

SPEAKER_01 45:27

I'll drink my Starbucks to that. All right. So last couple questions before we wrap up. What do you think the best piece of writing or creative advice is that you've ever received? What's something that you've held on to that, you know, maybe you use as a North Star? Write what you don't know.

SPEAKER_00 45:46

You know, I've always we've always heard the maze. You know, my every every writer has always received that. Write what you know. I'm sorry, that's bullshit. I'm gonna write what I don't know. I'm gonna sit down and figure it out. I'm gonna sit down and write something. I don't know what a what it feels like to fly in a spaceship. I don't know what it feels like to be uh a princess that's a lost heir locked in a tower. I don't know what that feels like, but I'm gonna figure it out. I'm gonna sit here and and get into the head of that character and figure out what that feels like. I don't know what it's like to use magic. I don't know what it's like to use a magic wand or say a chant or, you know, any of that stuff. But you you sit and figure it out. So write what you don't know is one of my best advice that has always hung around in my brain.

SPEAKER_01 46:37

Yeah, I I love that. And I think that advice gets really misconstrued too, the whole write write what you know. Um I think it can it can mess with people's permission slips a little bit. Yeah. The way I like to frame it is like write what you know emotionally or can can tap into emotionally as far as like the human experience and the human condition. We all know loss, we all know fear, we all know anxiety, we all know the fear of judgment, and then go have fun with the shit you don't know, like the spaceship and being a lost heir and meeting a smoking hot, like caretaker guy. Yeah, exactly. Of your manner, which which it sounds like that's the premise for it is yeah, for the curse Once Upon a Midnight Dreary, which that just sounds like such a fun book. I'm I'm so excited. You said that's coming out in October.

SPEAKER_00 47:32

I come as October 28 is my pose, The Raven slash Rebecca mashup gothic romance with a cursed caretaker and an heiress who is grieving after the loss of her parents, and she's inherited this manor, and she moves back to it. She was there as a child. It's haunted. I'm just gonna say it right out loud. It's haunted. And they have to figure out how to get rid of the haunting. It's uh it's it's really it's it's a short book, it's only around 60,000 words. So it's an it's not really novella length, it's it's a little bit longer than a novella, but there's a lot of emotion packed into that. And yeah, I read it with the lights on. Wow, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 48:16

I get bronte, I get po, I I get all kinds of delicious gothic vibes. That's awesome.

SPEAKER_00 48:23

It's very gothic. Yeah, it was sounds amazing. It was the hardest book I've ever written. I will never write another gothic romance again. But it was, I think I hope I did it justice. I hope it could I hope it's good.

SPEAKER_01 48:34

See, write the shit you don't know and see what happens. Yeah, exactly. All right. And then what is your wish to your fellow writers out there who are just beginning and thinking about pursuing an independent publishing journey? What's your wish to them?

SPEAKER_00 48:51

Don't ever give up. Be perse, you know, persevere. Just keep going. Don't listen to those doubt demons. And if this is something that you really want to do, that is just burning in your soul, do it. And don't let anyone stand in your way. And don't let the people say, When are you gonna write a real book? Or, you know, or are you writing a book? Just don't listen to those people. You if this is something that is really inside you, your stories have to get out. The world needs good storytellers. God knows we need it right now more than anything. Just keep going and don't ever give up. And and into publishing, I'm not gonna lie, it is hard. It is so hard. But if you can build a team around you of people that that can help you, be it you're taking a class or you find a really amazing cover artist that will do anything and everything for you, you find an editor who can help you, you find a beta reader that will help you, you start building your newsletter list, do it. Get those people, hold on to them, hug them, love them, don't ever let them go.

SPEAKER_01 50:03

Fantastic. Michelle, this has been one of my favorite conversations, I think. Oh, thank you. You are just a you're a delight and you're so honest. And just thank you so much for your time and sharing your journey with me and our listeners. So I can't wait for to see more from you. Thanks. I I really loved being here. I appreciate it. Thank you for listening to the Ride It Scared podcast. If you enjoyed today's show, please make sure to hit the follow button so you never miss an episode. And please leave a review. Reviews help other writers like you find the voices and messages they need to hear to continue to write their stories. Let's lift each other up. Remember, you can be scared and still be unstoppable. I'll see you next week.