Adventures of a Romance Author: Where My Writing Strengths Hide

 

Hello, lovely visitors. Welcome back to the blog. Fair warning for those of you who are new to my blog posts. I try to focus on a single topic, but sometimes I digress to a ramble. But back to the subject at hand. Today's post is going to be a small glimpse at all my past writing. My most popular books. Especially since I took a two-year break from writing romance.

Let's address the two-year break.

The break was both premeditated, but also unintentional. Contradiction, I know. But here's the thing. I was chest deep in my fantasy/sci-fi writing and I just didn't have the motivation to force myself into writing contemporary. I know myself. If I'm not feeling it, I take a break, and hopefully, I come back to it. Between all of you, amazing readers, and me ... writing is the one talent/hobby I have actually stuck with. Full-fledge. I tried playing musical instruments, mainly acoustic guitar, and I just lost interest after two years.

My writing strengths have always been in shorter romances stories. My short story, "Saved", was a hit from the get-go. It was meant to be a one-off. I had no plans of a sequel or even extending the story. But readers made the demand. I followed through.

RESCUED is a serialized Christian novella. It needs a lot of attention, but I still see the notifications of readers reading and enjoying the story despite the errors. I actually saw this story in a dream and it was like a movie. I have very few stories that came to me this way and even fewer to feel like a movie.

One of my favorite romance novellas is actually a historical retelling of Cinderella. Every one of my readers recognizes the title, Zvezda. I was partially inspired by Russian history and folklore, though I barely scraped the surface. I had seven (7) books planned for the series, but I've only managed to write/finish two (2) of them. Cinderella and Sleeping Beauty are also among the books that need A LOT of editing. I was working on the Snow White retelling right when the 2-year break started.

To this day, I still have readers commenting and asking if I will ever finish the series. I truly do not have an appropriate answer. I'm working on it.

Another book many readers enjoyed is my Romeo & Juliet retelling, Romeo's Sneakers. I wrote it during Camp NaNoWriMo, July 2016. It became a reader favorite. I think if you're into super sweet, cheesiness, you'll love Ren Michaels. I never intended for the book to become a series, but I do have outlines for a couple of short stories for side-characters. AKA, Ren's goofy, lovable cousins; Mitch and Ben. They were fun to have around.

There was a point when all comments just stopped and when I went back to individual comments to ask if they liked the later chapters, a few readers responded with "I was just so into the story that I forgot to comment." I have no reason to complain.

The final mention for this post is my YA/NA crossover romance, Nothing Between Us. I remember I had so much personal stuff going on. I wrote the book during Camp NaNoWriMo, April 2016. I started the book a week late, but I finished a week early. And I had passed my 50k goal by 16k! The final word count came out to just over 66,000. And the following month, I wrote a spin-off. The month after that, June 2016, I wrote a spin-off slash sequel to that book. I did start the third book, but it was July and I started Romeo's Sneakers. The third book took me just under two (2) years to write. What was the third book? It was Superpower.  2016 was a fantastic writing year for me.

So, this is a glimpse at past books and a small explanation of where my writing strengths are. I hope you enjoyed this post and will come back for the next one. I hope you all have a fantastic week. Stay awesome. See you in the funny papers!