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Jori Aguilar 

Tell us about yourself and how many books you have written.
Hello! I’m Jori. Over the past fifteen years, I’ve lived in five countries. This has expanded my palette and offered me plenty of material to write about. I studied medicine in university, which left me feeling empty-handed, so instead of reading medical books, I began to concentrate on writing. Since then, I’ve written over twenty books but I’m only just now breaking into the industry and giving it my full attention.

What is the name of your latest book and what inspired it?
I’ve set out to write a new series called Making Waves with the first book Making Waves on the Aegean. This story came about when I told some friends over dinner one night about my adventures living on a sailboat in the Greek Isles. I was supposed to be teaching people how to sail, but instead…I was just making waves!

My friends loved the story and told me I needed to write a book about it.

So I did!

I have other books too, with new releases coming out every few months. In 2021, I released four books and I have another one dropping in a couple of months, so if you love books, come explore my mind!

Create. Inspire. Repeat.

Do you have any unusual writing habits?
No. But I get easily distracted. So I do my best creating in solitude where I have nothing but time.

What authors, or books have influenced you?
I was so inspired by Tolstoy’s War and Peace and what he left behind that I wanted to write a book of my own. I’m also influenced by Dickens and his connection with the working class and what Austen did for women authors.

What are you working on now?
I’ve just finished my next novel called The Poet. It’s literary fiction based on a true story about an immigrant janitor that stalked me and wrote me poetry years ago. Soon I’ll be starting a fantasy trilogy, testing the market.

What is your best method or website when it comes to promoting your books?
I’m just learning the art of advertising and how to swim above water in this industry. It’s a numbers game. Trial and error.

Do you have any advice for new authors?
Keep writing and finding your voice. Write about what you know.

What is the best advice you have ever heard?
Keep writing and finding your voice. Write about what you know.

What are you reading now?
I’m not reading anything because I’m writing a book and I don’t want my writing style to be influenced and to change mid-book! I really enjoyed the last book I read, The Thread by Victoria Hislop.

What’s next for you as a writer?
I have plans to make an audiobook for Making Waves on the Aegean while I search for agents for The Poet and begin writing my fantasy novel. After that, I have two more series in the works. Both literary fiction, one historical fiction work, and a sci-fi. Besides writing books, I write songs.

If you were going to be stranded on a desert island and allowed to take 3 or 4 books with you what books would you bring?
The Bible
The Doorway Papers by Arthur Custance
The Count of Monte Cristo by Alexandre Dumas
Deep Thoughts by Jack Handy

Author Websites and Profiles
Jori Aguilar Website
Jori Aguilar Amazon Profile

Jori Aguilar’s Social Media Links
Goodreads Profile
Facebook Profile
Twitter Account

A. Nation 

Tell us about yourself and how many books you have written.
Retired and writing. I have published 20 novels and several novellas in the science fiction, urban fantasy, and travel mystery genres. I have 9 books in the Domino Sagas, Soon 3 in the Quest Series, 5 in urban fantasy, and 3 in travel mysteries. A lot of little parts are taken from what I know and my life experiences.

What is the name of your latest book and what inspired it?
The last book I finished was Annie’s Journey about my grandmother’s voyage across the ocean and her meeting my grandfather. I was inspired to write this after my cousin sent me details about her life.

Do you have any unusual writing habits?
I have to stand at my computer due to a back injury. Not to worry, it’s getting better. If you want a copy of my FREE monthly newsletter find me on my webpage or on FB at Current A. Nation Book Sales.

What authors, or books have influenced you?
Isaac Asimov, Agatha Christie, Heinlein, Diane Mott Davidson, and many others

What are you working on now?
I’m currently writing the third book to the Quest series, Eye of the Kingdom and working on a Kindle Vella mystery.

What is your best method or website when it comes to promoting your books?
awesomegang
justkindlebooks
facebook groups

Do you have any advice for new authors?
Read, read, read as much as you can. Remember the first thing you write is a draft. You can always go back and self-edit later.

What is the best advice you have ever heard?
Do it yourself

What are you reading now?
Kindle vella stories

What’s next for you as a writer?
Think of the next book in one of my series

If you were going to be stranded on a desert island and allowed to take 3 or 4 books with you what books would you bring?
Isaac Asimov’s books and maybe one of mine

Author Websites and Profiles
A. Nation Website
A. Nation Amazon Profile
A. Nation Author Profile on Smashwords

A. Nation’s Social Media Links
Goodreads Profile
Facebook Profile

Jasmine Luck 

Tell us about yourself and how many books you have written.
I’m Jasmine, I live in Wales in the UK. I’ve written 5 novels and 5 novellas, mostly romantic comedies and one space opera. I am obsessed with cats, especially cat memes. I am married and I have one son, who just turned 5. That’s a lot of 5s in my introduction….

What is the name of your latest book and what inspired it?
My latest novella is called One Minute to Midnight and inspired my new year’s eve – the whole drama of it all. What if you experienced the drama to end all drama on NYE and got dumped? What then?

Do you have any unusual writing habits?
I drink a ocean’s worth of tea.

What authors, or books have influenced you?
Nora Roberts was my first huge love and I buy all her books still. Other influences include Tessa Dare, Laura Griffin, Julie James and Milly Johnson.

What are you working on now?
A romantic comedy set in a small town in Kentucky, USA, about a heartbroken baker of Asian fusion goods, and an ex-army carpenter. He wears a henley, as all romantic heroes do

What is your best method or website when it comes to promoting your books?
www.twitter.com/jazzyluckwrites

Do you have any advice for new authors?
Write, write, write. Write it badly. Edit it later.

What is the best advice you have ever heard?
Your first draft doesn’t have to be good. All it has to do is exist.

What are you reading now?
Life’s Too Short by Abby Jimenez.

What’s next for you as a writer?
Finishing this book. I can only hope.

If you were going to be stranded on a desert island and allowed to take 3 or 4 books with you what books would you bring?
The first adult book I loved – Born in Shame by Nora Roberts. Also The Picture of Dorian Grey by Oscar Wilde, The Far Pavillions by M.M Kaye, and War and Peace by Leo Tolstoy because I’d have a chance at finishing it with no disruptions.

Author Websites and Profiles
Jasmine Luck Website
Jasmine Luck Amazon Profile

Jasmine Luck’s Social Media Links
Goodreads Profile

Anna Pulley 

Tell us about yourself and how many books you have written.
I was born and raised in the spiny desert arms of Tucson, Arizona, spent four years in Chicago, and then headed back west to the Bay Area, because as much as a piece of my heart will always be in the midwest, I cannot winter.

I’ve been a hot dog slinger, a shoe salesman, a PE teacher, and a waitress at a retirement home (among other things) before I figured out the best way to degrade myself was as a writer.

(I kid. I love writing. If I couldn’t write, I would perish.)

I’m also queer, multiracial (white/Native American/Latinx), and deaf/hard of hearing. You would never know these things just looking at me, as I pass mightily and my hair covers my hearing aids. I’m trying to be better and more vocal about the parts of myself that aren’t so readily viewable, but it remains a challenge.

I’m the author of The Lesbian Sex Haiku Book (with Cats!), (Flatiron, 2016), which Tegan and Sara said was “an adorable and hilarious way to start the day,” Cheryl Strayed called a “must-read,” and Bound actress Jennifer Tilly said was “thoroughly charming.”

In 2021, I released an erotic short story collection, called Transgressions under the pen name Anastasia Fleur. The name is an homage to my mom’s side, the Flores clan.

(There’s way more info about me in my bio, if you’re curious about my bonafides.)

Love Where You Work is my first (published) novel. I’ve written two others. One is a romance/mystery/paranormal tale about a young Native girl whose deafness enables her to hear spirits in other realms that help her solve a mystery. I still think it’s a good story but genre-wise, it’s a mess, so it may not ever see the light of day.

The other novel is an erotic romance and is with an agent currently. Fingers crossed!

What is the name of your latest book and what inspired it?
Love Where You Work is the title and I wrote it to impress a girl.

I’d like to tell you that I have loftier ambitions––and I do! I want people (especially queer people) to feel seen and less alone. I want to make people laugh and feel warm and excited and turned on and loved. I want to write books where queer people have happy, exciting, interesting stories instead of tragic ones.

But mostly I wrote this book to impress Vika. It was conceived originally as a sexy birthday present, a short story called “HRotica.” (It bookends Transgressions.) We had been dating for two months at the time, and she works in HR, hence the title and subject.

Vika loved the story, and we brainstormed a plot together to make part 2, which we cheekily called “HRotica: The Age of Cumpliance.” After that, I was genuinely curious how the story of Julia and Clare would end, so I kept writing.

Do you have any unusual writing habits?
What’s “unusual”?

I only know how I write, which is in bed, trapped under a cat, usually. Is that common?

I’m a night owl who lives a 9-5 schedule, so I try to write in the morning now, which is … interesting.

I wrote my first novel exclusively from midnight to 4am, but that was mostly because a family member was sick and I was on the east coast taking care of them. My body refused to adapt to the time change, so I figured why not write?

What are you working on now?
The relentless, tireless slog that a savvy sadist rebranded as “marketing.”

I’m also plotting the second book in the Love Where You Work series, which is going to focus on Julia’s best friend, Paula. Expect geekiness, cos play, and lots of sex.

What is your best method or website when it comes to promoting your books?
I can’t say that I’m super great at promoting my books, but I rely on my newsletter A LOT, (annapulley.substack.com) and frankly I love to connect with readers that way, so it’s been invaluable.

Do you have any advice for new authors?
Keep going.

That sounds like a brush off, but it’s not.

Keep going.

As a writer, you’re going to fail. You’re going to be rejected so many times you’ll lose track, by agents and publishers and reviewers and fans and possibly yourself most of all. It’s going to hurt, and no one will reward you for your suffering. Keep going anyway.

Give yourself every opportunity to fail big and often––this is how you succeed.

As Sam Altman put it, “The people who say ‘I am going to keep going until this works, and no matter what the challenges are I’m going to figure them out,’ and mean it, go on to succeed. They are persistent long enough to give themselves a chance for luck to go their way.”

As Denzel Washington put it in his great commencement speech at UPenn, “If you’re not failing, you’re not even trying.”

And as my talented friend Sarah Hepola wrote, at the end of the day, “this career is for those who claim it.”

Claim it unapologetically. And keep going.

What is the best advice you have ever heard?
See above.

What are you reading now?
The Proposal by Jasmin Guillory

The Queen’s Gambit by Walter Tevis

A Year to Live by Stephen Levine

A Thief of Time by Tony Hillerman

Whatever Love Means by Christine No

and American Indian Myths and Legends edited by Richard Erdoes

What’s next for you as a writer?
Imperial glory. Obviously.

If you were going to be stranded on a desert island and allowed to take 3 or 4 books with you what books would you bring?
Sarah Manguso’s Ongoingness

Lorrie Moore’s Birds of America

Ocean Vuong’s Night Sky with Exit Wounds

And Maggie Nelson’s Bluets

Author Websites and Profiles
Anna Pulley Website
Anna Pulley Amazon Profile

Anna Pulley’s Social Media Links
Goodreads Profile
Facebook Profile
Twitter Account

Scott and Ashley Roepel 

Tell us about yourself and how many books you have written.
We have published three books in our fantasy series, Thread of Souls. We absolutely love the fantasy genre, and these books are based off a TTRPG game we play at home. We fell in love with these stories and characters we created, so it only felt right to turn them into a book series! It’s definitely been a passion project.

What is the name of your latest book and what inspired it?
The most recent installment in the Thread of Souls series is Path of the Spiders. It was about three years ago that we played this plotline out at the table. We really loved the darker turn the plot took, and the heavier decisions character had to make.

Do you have any unusual writing habits?
Turning a TTPRG game into a book series is definitely unusual! We keep very detailed notes at the end of every game we play. And then, years later, we go through those notes to transform them into what is appropriate for a book format. This ends up giving us a highly detailed outline.

What authors, or books have influenced you?
We’ve always loved the Bartimaeus books by Jonathan Stroud. The style of writing, the rich world, and dynamic characters have stuck with us as some of the best work we’ve ever read.

What are you working on now?
We are currently working on the fourth book in the series! Asunder will be out in December of this year. We are so excited to tease it throughout the year!

What is your best method or website when it comes to promoting your books?
As indie authors, we are still learning that, haha. But it seems people can’t easily resist free ebooks!

Do you have any advice for new authors?
Write what you want to write. At the end this project, if you don’t like it or feel moved by it, then the promotional part won’t be any fun at all. But if you pour your heart and soul into it, then it won’t matter if it gets a million sales or none at all, you still will love it.

What is the best advice you have ever heard?
We can’t remember where it came from now, but it was about not worrying about what is trendy in the moment. The truest and best stories transcend trends.

What are you reading now?
Recently finished Six of Crows and currently are working out way through the older Dragonlance books.

What’s next for you as a writer?
We have an eight-book series planned for Thread of Souls, which we call the Spider Octology. Beyond that, we have many more prequels, supplements, and other stories to tell within this world!

If you were going to be stranded on a desert island and allowed to take 3 or 4 books with you what books would you bring?
Wow, what a good question! Probably all four of the Bartimaeus books, haha. We can never grow tired of reading those.

Author Websites and Profiles
Scott and Ashley Roepel Website
Scott and Ashley Roepel Amazon Profile

Scott and Ashley Roepel’s Social Media Links
Goodreads Profile
Facebook Profile
Twitter Account

Zariya Grant 

Tell us about yourself and how many books you have written.
I’ve published one book called “I See You,” I started it in high school and revamped it in 2021. I have started other books and ghostwritten a book for a friend. I usually write screenplays, but overall, I just enjoy making a world where I, and others like me, can escape to. So, if you read any of my other writings, they’ll have nods to other works I’ve done.

I want my characters to be people everyone can relate to, so I draw from my own experiences as a woman, a Pagan in a family of Christians, a member of the LGBT community, a person of color, and I listen to others and how they want to be seen by the media. Some of my characters will have anxiety, but that doesn’t make them weak, and some of my male characters will be in touch with their nurturing side, which doesn’t make them girly. I can’t wait to share my writing with others.

What is the name of your latest book and what inspired it?
“I See You” is my latest book. It started off as a fun concept about witches, in the original draft, there were a lot more comedic moments that maybe I’ll share with the world one day. I ended up revamping it once I saw that witchcraft was becoming popular, but not only was it becoming popular, but a lot of misinformation was being thrown about. I realized: I have a book about witches, I’m a Pagan who dabbles… why not use my book to create the magic I loved from reading books like it when I was a kid, but with a more accurate representation of what magic really is? I also wanted a book where the protagonist was a person of color.

Do you have any unusual writing habits?
I’ll start writing my story, then go to the last chapter and write how I want it to end. Sometimes I imagine myself as each character to see exactly how they’d respond or act in a chapter. I might look crazy acting everything out, but I feel it’s the best way to keep my characters consistent throughout the story.

What authors, or books have influenced you?
There was a book I read called “Beautiful Demons” that heavily inspired the sisterhood you see between the female characters in my book. I read the story a long time ago, but I vaguely remember the chapter with the sleepover where the girls went outside and did magic. That inspired the chapter in “I See You” where Marlowe and Fiona are using magic to spice up their sleepover and Fiona gives Marlowe a tarot reading.

What are you working on now?
I have two ideas related to “I See You” but I don’t know which to start first. I’ll decide when I get more feedback on the first book. For now, I’ll brainstorm and work on my screenplays.

What is your best method or website when it comes to promoting your books?
Right now, social media in general. My target audience is there, and it’s the best way to circulate information right now.

Do you have any advice for new authors?
Just write, don’t worry about what other people think. If you worry about any feedback you ‘might’ get, you’ll hold yourself back from writing what you want to. Everyone will have something to say about your work, it just matters if you’re happy with your work.

What is the best advice you have ever heard?
Just write now and edit later. Don’t focus on typos and errors yet. Worry about those when you reread your work to edit it. It helps me keep focus and write all of my ideas out without getting sidetracked.

What are you reading now?
Right now, I’m too busy to read anything.

What’s next for you as a writer?
After promoting my book, I’m focusing on more books and screenplays.

If you were going to be stranded on a desert island and allowed to take 3 or 4 books with you what books would you bring?
I See You, and the Beautiful Demons series.