After another brief hiatus, mostly promoting my books among other things, EA: Creatively Creative returns with an interesting international interview. From England, I introduce author, Elise Noble.
EA: What sparked your desire to become a writer? Where did it all begin?
EN: Why did I become a writer? There were two reasons. Firstly, I’d read a bunch of really ropey books on Kindle and figured that surely I could do better. Newsflash—I couldn’t. Writing was actually a lot harder than I thought.
Secondly, at that time, I was working in a beautiful old manor house, and I figured it needed a story. I began my first book in my lunch hour. The building didn’t make it through editing, but I’ve since written another book about it—a paranormal romance that’ll be published towards the end of 2018.
EA: What is approach to writing your books?
EN: I have a big list of books I’d like to write, spread over seven series at the moment. Once I’ve picked what to write next, I do the initial research and write a loose outline – usually about two thousand words. Then I sit down and write the story, mostly on my iPad mini. I like to write between two and four thousand words a day, going faster towards the end of a book, and that gives me about a novel a month.
EA: Who, would you say are the biggest influences in your life and career?
EN: Life in general? My parents. They taught me the importance of working hard, being a good person, and living within my means.
In my writing career, I’d have to say my readers. A lot of them have been with me since the beginning, when I was posting my hot mess of a first draft of Pitch Black on Wattpad. I chat with them every day in my reader group, and they help me to shape my stories.
EA: Would you say that writing a novel is easy?
EN: That depends. My first novel took me the best part of a year to write, and at times I almost threw in the towel because there were plot holes everywhere and I didn’t have a clue what I was doing. But I’m stubborn, which can be a good thing or a bad thing depending on who you talk to, so I persevered.
But once I learned how to write, and more importantly, how I write best, it got a lot easier. Thirty-seven books on, writing a novel isn’t so difficult anymore.
But publishing a novel? That’s a different story.
Writing is the fun part, and then the real work starts—liaising with my beta team, editing, more editing, even more editing, coming up with cover concepts, writing a blurb, formatting, proof reading, marketing, organising my ARC team, accounting… I’ll stop there because it’s just depressing.
TLDR: Writing a novel is easy, publishing a novel is not easy.
EA: What is the concept of the Blackwood Security series?
EN: Blackwood started with one woman—Emmy—an assassin who has a nervous breakdown after the murder of her husband. I was sick of reading about weak heroines, and I wanted to write a bitch. Emmy’s smart, streetwise, and funny, but she’s still a bitch, and she’ll always be my favourite character.
The first three Blackwood books tell her story, and after that, I carried the series on with interlinked standalone novels about her friends. She knows a whole bunch of interesting people.
EA: What advice would you give to aspiring writers?
EN: Work out why you want to write. Do you simply want to hold a book with your name on it, or do you want to make money? If it’s the latter, you need to treat it as a job. That means putting in the hours and paying attention to admin, finances, and marketing from the very start.
EA: Finally, tell the readers why the Blackwood Security series is a must-read.
EN: I’d actually describe my Blackwood books as a bit Marmite— you’ll either love them or hate them. I think I’ll hand over to one of my readers to elaborate…
“If you don’t like strong women, don’t read this. If you can’t stand books so funny that you laugh out loud, don’t read this book. If you don’t like characters you can quote, don’t read this book. If you don’t like twists and turns, don’t read this series.” – Amazon reviewer
Epilogue
A couple of points Elise made that I want to touch on: from my personal experience, the writing process, though not rocket science, can be challenging, particularly if or when you have writer's block, not to mention the editing, and so on, but the most challenging of it is marketing/promoting, getting the books into the hands, kindles, or book apps (i.e. Kindle Kobo) of readers.
For me, I write for the love of it, and the money as well-- I won't lie about that. However, having a passion and dedication for what you do should overcome the money aspect, that's where things such as research and doing your due diligence comes into play. I would like to thank Elise for speaking with me tonight. A final word from Elise:
If you’d like to find out more about me or try one of my books, here’s where you can do that:
FREE books: https://www.elise-noble.com/free
Team Blackwood reader group: https://www.facebook.com/groups/Blackwood.EN
Facebook page: https://www.facebook.com/EliseNobleAuthor
Twitter ramblings: https://twitter.com/EliseANoble
If you’d like to find out more about me or try one of my books, here’s where you can do that:
FREE books: https://www.elise-noble.com/free
Team Blackwood reader group: https://www.facebook.com/groups/Blackwood.EN
Facebook page: https://www.facebook.com/EliseNobleAuthor
Twitter ramblings: https://twitter.com/EliseANoble
