Latest / The Daily Writer / Tips for Writing & Marketing Historical Fiction | Melissa LaShure

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Tips for Writing & Marketing Historical Fiction | Melissa LaShure · The Daily Writer

• 0:06
  SPEAKER_00: Hey friends, welcome back to the Profitable Writer Podcast.
• 0:09
  SPEAKER_00: If you're new here, my name is Kent Sanders.
• 0:12
  SPEAKER_00: I'm an author and ghostwriter, and this is the show that helps you grow your impact and income as a writer.
• 0:18
  SPEAKER_00: You know, most of what we discussed here on the show is centered around nonfiction.
• 0:23
  SPEAKER_00: That's what I write, both for myself and for clients, and I would say most of our guests are focused on nonfiction as well.
• 0:30
  SPEAKER_00: However, today I'm really honored to feature a guest who is here to share tips and advice on writing and marketing historical fiction.
• 0:38
  SPEAKER_00: Melissa Lachure is the host of the Literary Escape podcast, where she discusses and recommends books in the historical Christian romance genre to readers around the world, as well as offering writing tips, tricks, and tools for aspiring authors.
• 0:53
  SPEAKER_00: Melissa is also the creator of HCRW, which is the Historical Christian Romance Writers.
• 0:59
  SPEAKER_00: That's a membership group where authors of historical Christian romance can learn and grow together.
• 1:04
  SPEAKER_00: You can connect with Melissa at her website, which is literaryscape.com.
• 1:09
  SPEAKER_00: Today our conversation focuses on a variety of topics, including Melissa's journey as a writer, how to find and target your reader, what makes a historical Christian romance novel memorable, what she's doing this year to market her fiction, and tips for authors who are just getting started.
• 1:27
  SPEAKER_00: Now, I do want to say this before we get into the conversation.
• 1:49
  SPEAKER_00: This is honestly one of the reasons why I do this show, is because even if you're doing a particular kind of client work or a particular kind of writing or whatever it is, a lot of what other people are doing are things that you can learn from.
• 2:02
  SPEAKER_00: And there's always tons of value in feeling inspired and motivated and encouraged when you listen to other successful writers doing what they love and making an impact and of course being profitable as they do those things as well.
• 2:15
  SPEAKER_00: So with that said, I'm super excited to bring you this conversation.
• 2:18
  SPEAKER_00: Melissa is a lot of fun.
• 2:20
  SPEAKER_00: She's really smart and just a real joy to chat with.
• 2:22
  SPEAKER_00: So here's my conversation with the talented and insightful and amazing Melissa LaSure.
• 2:29
  SPEAKER_00: Melissa, welcome to the Profitable Writer Podcast.
• 2:31
  SPEAKER_00: It's great to connect with you, and I'm so honored to have you as a guest today.
• 2:35
  SPEAKER_00: So thanks for joining us.
• 2:36
  SPEAKER_01: Thank you.
• 2:36
  SPEAKER_01: I'm excited to be here.
• 2:38
  SPEAKER_00: So we're here today to talk about writing and marketing historical fiction.
• 2:43
  SPEAKER_00: But of course, there are a lot of things that go into any topic related to writing, including not just the fiction and the creative part of it, but marketing part and business side of it and all those things.
• 2:54
  SPEAKER_00: Let's maybe start here.
• 2:55
  SPEAKER_00: Take us on your journey to how you got into writing fiction and what that was like for you to start that journey and how that's led you up to today.
• 3:04
  SPEAKER_00: I know that's kind of a big question, but take us on your journey if you would, and then we'll get into maybe some specifics after that.
• 3:10
  SPEAKER_01: Sure.
• 3:11
  SPEAKER_01: Mine is maybe typical or maybe not typical journey for authors.
• 3:15
  SPEAKER_01: So uh I was young and thought I knew what it took to publish and sell a book successfully.
• 3:22
  SPEAKER_01: And so in 2020, I self-published a young adult book uh and then fell flat on my face, to be honest.
• 3:29
  SPEAKER_01: But it's a good thing because I learned a lot through that process.
• 3:33
  SPEAKER_01: And I just kind of stepped away, took time to take some writing courses, ended up changing genres.
• 3:40
  SPEAKER_01: I found out young adult really isn't my genre.
• 3:43
  SPEAKER_01: I prefer historical Christian romance.
• 3:45
  SPEAKER_01: Um, so that was something I learned out of that that was great.
• 3:48
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, I started a podcast in the meantime, too, where we read and discuss books in the historical Christian romance genre.
• 3:58
  SPEAKER_01: And then I started a writer's group for aspiring authors in that genre as well.
• 4:07
  SPEAKER_00: Okay.
• 4:07
  SPEAKER_01: And that was really just because I had this desire to help other authors who were coming up behind me avoid the same mistakes that I had made.
• 4:16
  SPEAKER_01: So just taking what I had learned and passing that on.
• 4:20
  SPEAKER_01: Still building that, I then took a uh business mentorship uh program that I went through as well, because being a full-time author, in my opinion, goes beyond just writing books and selling them.
• 4:34
  SPEAKER_01: There's other uh pieces to run that business successfully.
• 4:38
  SPEAKER_01: So my goal is uh in case you look me up, uh I don't have a historical Christian romance book out there yet, but my goal is to get one published this year.
• 4:47
  SPEAKER_01: So okay.
• 4:48
  SPEAKER_00: So let's I'm curious of something that you mentioned.
• 4:52
  SPEAKER_00: Um, you said that you fell on your face back in 2020 when you put your first stuff out there.
• 4:58
  SPEAKER_00: Um I'm curious why you feel like you failed in that regard and what went into that.
• 5:03
  SPEAKER_00: Let's dig into that a little bit.
• 5:05
  SPEAKER_00: I'll put on my therapist hat here for a second.
• 5:08
  SPEAKER_01: Okay.
• 5:08
  SPEAKER_01: Well, I have to say my the biggest thing, uh I rushed it for one.
• 5:13
  SPEAKER_01: I did not give it the editing that it really truly deserved to be above and beyond.
• 5:20
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, but really the marketing side of it is where I fell down because I didn't have a platform to launch it.
• 5:27
  SPEAKER_01: Uh I hadn't built up a readership to sell to.
• 5:31
  SPEAKER_01: And so I mean, I I think I lasted on Amazon for like 60 days or so.
• 5:38
  SPEAKER_01: And I didn't I didn't sell very many books.
• 5:41
  SPEAKER_00: So But it's still up there, right?
• 5:43
  SPEAKER_00: Like, did you take your book down?
• 5:44
  SPEAKER_01: No, it's gone now.
• 5:47
  SPEAKER_01: It's one of those that I kind of just think like, if I could just put that in the closet, learn my lessons from it, and let's move on.
• 5:54
  SPEAKER_01: Okay, so I don't know if that's the right thing or not.
• 5:56
  SPEAKER_00: So you kind of wanted to do a uh have a do-over, in other words.
• 5:59
  SPEAKER_01: Yes, yes.
• 6:00
  SPEAKER_00: So then based on that experience, what would you what advice would you give people who are thinking about doing their first book based on that?
• 6:09
  SPEAKER_01: Oh my goodness, there's so much I would tell you.
• 6:12
  SPEAKER_01: I the first thing I would say is you need to get into a writer's group that offers critique meetings.
• 6:18
  SPEAKER_01: You need to start there because in our own minds, our writing is amazing, right?
• 6:24
  SPEAKER_01: But we need to get another pair of eyes on it.
• 6:26
  SPEAKER_01: You definitely want to go through the entire editing process.
• 6:30
  SPEAKER_01: So you're you're gonna want to do a developmental edit before you go into the line editing and all that nitty-gritty um stuff as well.
• 6:37
  SPEAKER_01: You're gonna want beta readers, and you're going to want to, while you're working on this, build up an email list so that you have readers to launch your book to.
• 6:49
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 6:50
  SPEAKER_00: So totally agree with all that for sure.
• 6:53
  SPEAKER_00: Uh particularly with fiction, which is I think its own obviously fiction and non-fiction are two completely different things.
• 7:00
  SPEAKER_00: But um, I think some people uh I would say most people, unless you're working with maybe with a coach or somebody who can help you with the content of the book, or unless you've done it before, that having having a developmental editor is really, really helpful.
• 7:16
  SPEAKER_00: Especially if you don't if you're not really confident in what you're doing.
• 7:19
  SPEAKER_00: Because man, they can save you literally years of time with a book because you're just jumping ahead, you're leapfrogging everybody who's just sort of trying to figure it out and and make it up as they go along.
• 7:33
  SPEAKER_01: Yep, I agree.
• 7:35
  SPEAKER_00: Um, let's talk a little bit about the business side of this.
• 7:38
  SPEAKER_00: So you mentioned that you went through a business mentorship.
• 7:40
  SPEAKER_00: What did that look like?
• 7:41
  SPEAKER_00: And what did you feel like you learned from that?
• 7:44
  SPEAKER_01: Oh my goodness.
• 7:45
  SPEAKER_01: Just the marketing piece alone that I learned that I can then turn around and apply to selling my books was amazing.
• 7:52
  SPEAKER_01: But really, it was all about setting up a sales funnel.
• 7:55
  SPEAKER_01: How do you even get people into the door, right?
• 7:58
  SPEAKER_01: Uh so looking at like a magnet reader, okay.
• 8:02
  SPEAKER_01: Uh I right now for my business have a free webinar for authors that gets them in the door, right?
• 8:10
  SPEAKER_01: And then as soon as you have their email address, they're on your email list.
• 8:14
  SPEAKER_01: And that is the number one way to market your book, is to your email list.
• 8:19
  SPEAKER_01: Um so and and a lot of that again came down to how do you use email to market?
• 8:25
  SPEAKER_01: Okay.
• 8:26
  SPEAKER_01: So how do you structure that?
• 8:27
  SPEAKER_01: How do you start promoting before your book even comes out?
• 8:31
  SPEAKER_01: Uh so there was just a ton of wonderful things in there that I learned.
• 8:36
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, email is one of those things that I think a lot of people avoid because it maybe seems too complicated or overwhelming or whatever.
• 8:44
  SPEAKER_00: But you know, even though email has been around for decades, literally at this point, it's still such a vital part of our business.
• 8:50
  SPEAKER_00: We all think of kind of social media and and other kinds of things as something that maybe is hipper or newer or more exciting.
• 9:01
  SPEAKER_00: But man, everybody has email accounts and everybody checks email, or at least anybody who's responsible checks their email.
• 9:09
  SPEAKER_00: I'm not sure anybody under 20 checks their email on a regular basis.
• 9:12
  SPEAKER_00: Maybe they do, I don't know.
• 9:13
  SPEAKER_00: But it's still such a vital part of business.
• 9:16
  SPEAKER_01: It is.
• 9:17
  SPEAKER_01: The other piece I found too was partner promotion.
• 9:20
  SPEAKER_01: And that's just connecting with other authors or industry experts and uh doing things together to promote each other's work and kind of tapping into each other's audiences.
• 9:32
  SPEAKER_01: And that doesn't cost anything, right?
• 9:35
  SPEAKER_01: Otherwise, uh, one of the things I talk a lot about it with my writers group is you don't have to depend on advertising or drown in advertising fees to get yourself out there.
• 9:48
  SPEAKER_00: So can you talk about some effective ways that you have found to do partner promos or uh connecting with people for those kinds of opportunities?
• 9:58
  SPEAKER_01: Well, one of them is just like this.
• 9:59
  SPEAKER_01: So guest uh reaching out to be a guest on a podcast of someone uh within your realm, right?
• 10:06
  SPEAKER_01: That that what you have to offer would benefit their audience.
• 10:11
  SPEAKER_01: Uh the other thing is live webinars where you uh reach out and ask someone again within your realm that would host your webinar with you live.
• 10:23
  SPEAKER_01: So again, you're just tapping into their audience, but you're also able to share them with your audience as well.
• 10:29
  SPEAKER_01: Uh those are two things that I've done so far.
• 10:33
  SPEAKER_01: Uh I also do for the podcast, I do what I call coffee and books every other month.
• 10:39
  SPEAKER_01: So I ask uh like I put an email out to like 10 authors and say, Would you want to join me for an hour to talk to readers and writers and answer their questions?
• 10:51
  SPEAKER_01: And so that's just another partner promotion there as well.
• 10:54
  SPEAKER_01: And again, they get those emails as well for everybody who signs up.
• 10:58
  SPEAKER_01: So it's a win-win for everybody.
• 11:00
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, it really is because the you're getting the benefit of that person's wisdom for your readers or listeners on your platform.
• 11:09
  SPEAKER_00: Your readers and listeners are getting the benefit of that person.
• 11:12
  SPEAKER_00: Um so you win, the other person wins because they're getting more exposure.
• 11:15
  SPEAKER_00: So it's kind of like a triple win almost, which is pretty cool.
• 11:20
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 11:22
  SPEAKER_00: So talk to us about about writing fiction because uh this is kind of ostensibly what I guess this conversation really is focusing on.
• 11:30
  SPEAKER_00: Um where does somebody start writing fiction?
• 11:34
  SPEAKER_00: You know, maybe you have an idea for a book or for a story.
• 11:38
  SPEAKER_00: Where in the world do you start with that?
• 11:39
  SPEAKER_00: Because there's literally an endless number of possibilities that you can can do.
• 11:45
  SPEAKER_00: So does it really start with kind of picking a genre and then figuring out the the things that are a part of that genre or part of that type of story and then going from there?
• 11:56
  SPEAKER_00: Like, where do you how do you think about this process?
• 12:00
  SPEAKER_01: Definitely find a genre you're passionate about.
• 12:03
  SPEAKER_01: That's one reason why I ended up switching.
• 12:05
  SPEAKER_01: I thought that young adults, uh being an educator, I thought, I love writing for my students, right?
• 12:11
  SPEAKER_01: It turns out it's not something I had a huge passion for.
• 12:15
  SPEAKER_01: So definitely read and read in lots of genres and figure out which genre are you very are you passionate about.
• 12:22
  SPEAKER_01: And as you're reading and you find the one genre that you like, continue to read in it because you're gonna glean a lot from those authors as well, as far as what are um how is it, how are these stories laid out, what are the expectations, what's examples of quality writing within that?
• 12:40
  SPEAKER_01: But then I always say uh I liked uh James Scott Bell's book, uh Plot and Structure, is one that I say if you are just starting out, read his book, because his book is going to give you the foundation, right?
• 12:57
  SPEAKER_01: Of where you need to start from generating ideas to weeding those ideas or taking them down to the core, building your characters.
• 13:07
  SPEAKER_01: I will say, before you can start plotting, you need to know your characters inside and out.
• 13:14
  SPEAKER_00: And how does somebody how does somebody do that?
• 13:17
  SPEAKER_01: Well, a lot of us like to say we interview our characters and they end up talking back to us.
• 13:22
  SPEAKER_01: Okay.
• 13:23
  SPEAKER_01: So uh uh getting into character, I'm trying to remember who the author was.
• 13:30
  SPEAKER_01: Uh Collins, I believe, wrote that one was a great one because she has lists of questions of how to get, and it's really comes into most of the time you have a character in your head, you know that they're that maybe this is the their issue, their flaw.
• 13:46
  SPEAKER_01: So just keep asking why and then bury and unbury and then write their uh backstory.
• 13:53
  SPEAKER_01: You're not gonna dump all that into the novel, obviously, but it's going to be there so you can pull on it, you know, pull little bits of it into the story.
• 14:04
  SPEAKER_01: But by doing that, then when you go to plot out, oh, I'm gonna have this happen to them or this happen to them, now you know how that character would actually react.
• 14:12
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 14:13
  SPEAKER_01: And it drives the story.
• 14:15
  SPEAKER_00: I've heard of some people using things like personality assessments or in the Enneagram or disk profile or whatever kind of assessment to to kind of run their character through that, and that way you have an idea about how they would react to different situations.
• 14:30
  SPEAKER_00: To me, that seems like that might be a helpful thing too.
• 14:33
  SPEAKER_01: Oh, yes, definitely.
• 14:34
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, I agree.
• 14:35
  SPEAKER_01: I haven't done that personally myself, uh, but yes, that is one that I would suggest.
• 14:42
  SPEAKER_00: I was watching an interview with uh one of my favorite authors is Stephen King, who is decidedly not historical Christian romance.
• 14:48
  SPEAKER_00: We all know that.
• 14:49
  SPEAKER_00: He's pretty far away from that.
• 14:51
  SPEAKER_00: But I've always liked his his stuff, particularly his earlier stuff.
• 14:54
  SPEAKER_00: I don't really like the gory, super scary, blood and guts type of of stuff necessarily, but a lot of his earlier writing, it's not really horror-based, it's more reflective, it's just really, really good storytelling.
• 15:07
  SPEAKER_00: And I know one of the things that he talks about is that he doesn't plot out his books, he he just sort of start has a starting place and then he goes from there.
• 15:16
  SPEAKER_00: And when I was watching this interview with him the other day and he was talking about that, it dawned on me that Stephen King is just he he is so uh incredibly gifted as a storyteller, even like within his really early work, you can see this really amazing natural gift for storytelling and character and and all that stuff.
• 15:40
  SPEAKER_00: And I I think unless you're like as gifted as somebody like he is, that's just sort of finding their way through the story and you have a natural gift for it, then it does help to have things like a plot and structure and and to understand how to actually tell a really good story.
• 15:56
  SPEAKER_00: So I wonder sometimes if people don't it's like listening to somebody like Brad Paisley play guitar and you go, Well, he's not reading sheet music, so I can just I should just be able to kind of riff on it, but you kind of have to learn the structure of what you're doing before you can play at a higher level.
• 16:12
  SPEAKER_00: I feel like I'm just rambling a little bit, but I guess all that is to say that it is really helpful to learn plot and structure and look at those resources to help us do that.
• 16:22
  SPEAKER_01: I highly recommend read as many craft books as you can.
• 16:26
  SPEAKER_01: Um to like you said, you in the writing world, you have pants and you have plotters and you have all the ones in between.
• 16:36
  SPEAKER_01: Right.
• 16:36
  SPEAKER_01: So uh Stephen Keene sounds like he's a pancer.
• 16:40
  SPEAKER_01: He gets the idea and he just writes and lets it go.
• 16:43
  SPEAKER_01: Uh and then you have people that say, I can't even begin to write until I know A, B, C, D, right?
• 16:50
  SPEAKER_01: One, two, three.
• 16:51
  SPEAKER_01: This is what's gonna happen.
• 16:52
  SPEAKER_01: Um I'm kind of an in-betweener.
• 16:57
  SPEAKER_01: I like to have a structure, but I don't like to be bound by this has to happen, this has to happen.
• 17:02
  SPEAKER_01: I kind of try to let the story flow.
• 17:04
  SPEAKER_01: But definitely when you're starting out, you need to know the structure so that you can get the flow right.
• 17:12
  SPEAKER_00: So talk to us, if you would, about this genre that you're writing in, historical Christian romance.
• 17:17
  SPEAKER_00: That is a really, really specific genre.
• 17:20
  SPEAKER_00: But I'm really curious about how you how you landed on that genre specifically as opposed to say general historical romance or uh Christian contemporary romance.
• 17:35
  SPEAKER_00: Like what are what are the things about that specific genre that draw you to it and what are some of the hallmarks of that compared to other types of fiction genres?
• 17:45
  SPEAKER_01: Okay, that's a great question.
• 17:47
  SPEAKER_01: And it kind of goes back to childhood for me.
• 17:50
  SPEAKER_01: Uh so I grew up with my mom is an avid reader, and this is the genre she used to read all the time.
• 17:57
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, so I kind of think I get the passion from her, but they also used to be part of a historical society uh that once a year we would camp like in a teepee and be part of and dress and do all of the of that stuff.
• 18:12
  SPEAKER_01: So I kind of have that historical piece ingrained in me from childhood, um, which I love.
• 18:18
  SPEAKER_01: I also grew up with horses and I love um, you know, cowgirls and cowboys and and on all of that.
• 18:25
  SPEAKER_01: That's just kind of built in me.
• 18:27
  SPEAKER_01: Uh so I'm kind of marking out my I'm like 1800s historical is my uh genre that I prefer to write in, but I will read up into like World War II.
• 18:39
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 18:40
  SPEAKER_01: Um and so on.
• 18:41
  SPEAKER_01: But it it's the time period I it and I think it's it's the ability to crawl into the pages and crawl back in time to where I think life was simpler and I I realized it was harder.
• 18:56
  SPEAKER_01: You know, they didn't have all the technology that we do now to help us, but life seemed so much more less complex than it does now.
• 19:06
  SPEAKER_01: Uh so I think it's that escape back into the those time periods that we really love.
• 19:11
  SPEAKER_01: And there's a lot of history to be learned through these books as well, because authors do a really great job of researching and making sure everything is accurate.
• 19:22
  SPEAKER_00: We'll get back to the conversation in just a moment, but first I want to take a second to give a big thanks to today's sponsor, The Word Wizard.
• 19:29
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• 19:36
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• 19:45
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• 20:00
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• 20:06
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• 20:11
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• 20:15
  SPEAKER_00: Now back to the conversation.
• 20:17
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, that that makes a lot of sense.
• 20:19
  SPEAKER_00: I can imagine that it would be that in some senses it would be more work to write a historical romance novel rather than a contemporary romance novel.
• 20:28
  SPEAKER_00: Now, of course, it it depends on probably a lot of different factors, I'm sure.
• 20:32
  SPEAKER_00: But you have to kind of make sure that your that your things that happen in your st in your story are at least plausible.
• 20:40
  SPEAKER_00: You know, not that everything has to be completely accurate, I guess, but but there is kind of a burden on the writer, isn't there, to at least make it plausible to the time period.
• 20:50
  SPEAKER_01: Yes.
• 20:50
  SPEAKER_01: Yes.
• 20:51
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, you definitely have to do your research.
• 20:54
  SPEAKER_01: But it's fun, the things that you find when you're doing your research.
• 20:57
  SPEAKER_01: And I've interviewed several authors that said, you know, I was searching through uh news articles from like the 1860s, and I came across this interesting news article, which then created their idea for the series.
• 21:10
  SPEAKER_01: So there's a lot you can find in there.
• 21:12
  SPEAKER_01: And I just finished a series by uh Tamara Alexander, the Cart Carton series.
• 21:18
  SPEAKER_01: I'm not sure I'm saying that right.
• 21:19
  SPEAKER_01: This based out of Tennessee, and her second book, there's only two characters in there that aren't real people, and it's all about this huge battle around Franklin, Tennessee, during the Civil War.
• 21:32
  SPEAKER_01: And she did a ton of research, but the accuracy of it, it I mean, it's a battle I didn't even know about, you know, before I read that book.
• 21:41
  SPEAKER_00: So now talk to us about the the faith component of historical Christian romance.
• 21:48
  SPEAKER_00: What what specifically makes a Christian historical romance uh different than, let's say, something that wouldn't be categorized as Christian or faith based?
• 21:58
  SPEAKER_01: Right.
• 22:00
  SPEAKER_01: Well, the inspiration piece of it, right?
• 22:04
  SPEAKER_01: I in every historical Christian romance that I've read, there is something about God or God's word woven into it.
• 22:12
  SPEAKER_01: So there, and there's what I like to call a wisdom character that drops for our main characters uh verses or remember this about God.
• 22:22
  SPEAKER_01: Remember how he's always with you.
• 22:24
  SPEAKER_01: Okay, that's just one example.
• 22:26
  SPEAKER_01: Um it's also clean.
• 22:29
  SPEAKER_01: So we're not uh, you know, general uh romance may take it into the bedroom, but Christian is not going to, and it generally exemplifies a godly marriage in relationship.
• 22:44
  SPEAKER_00: That makes sense.
• 22:45
  SPEAKER_00: So it kind of puts those parameters on it.
• 22:48
  SPEAKER_01: Mm-hmm.
• 22:48
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 22:50
  SPEAKER_00: How do you know as a if you're a Christian author, how do you know whether you're being too heavy-handed with the faith component as opposed to making it a natural part of the story, but it's not being too preachy or like trying to hit people over the head with spiritual principles or Bible verses or that type of thing.
• 23:08
  SPEAKER_01: Right.
• 23:08
  SPEAKER_01: Well, that's where I like to use what I call the wisdom character, right?
• 23:12
  SPEAKER_01: It's that character, that side character that's co going alongside your main character, that just when they come up and up against an obstacle is just dropping a little line in there, right?
• 23:24
  SPEAKER_01: We're not, we're not preaching, so we're not putting a whole sermon in there, but you just, you know, here's a word of encouragement, right?
• 23:32
  SPEAKER_01: Uh that is how you do it.
• 23:34
  SPEAKER_01: You just weave it in naturally through the conversations.
• 23:38
  SPEAKER_00: That was a challenge that I faced.
• 23:40
  SPEAKER_00: And I think authors of any type of Christian literature, whether it's fiction or non-fiction, face that challenge, unless it's like a book of sermons or Bible lesson, Bible study or or whatever, that's obviously going to be very heavy on scripture.
• 23:54
  SPEAKER_00: And this was a challenge that I came across when uh I worked with Elvis Presley's brother Billy on a book a couple years ago called The Faith of Elvis.
• 24:03
  SPEAKER_00: So the book basically was a collection of stories that we wove together to present kind of a narrative of Elvis' faith throughout his throughout his life.
• 24:14
  SPEAKER_00: Uh told from Billy's perspective because he grew up with Elvis.
• 24:18
  SPEAKER_00: And even though Elvis was was quite a bit older than he was, and as the writer of the book, um, that was really a challenge to figure out how to make this kind of Christian enough for the Christian market, but also not be too heavy-handed so that people who were not heavily faith-based or not Christian at all would still be entertained by the book and really enjoy it without feeling like we were trying to hit them over the head.
• 24:43
  SPEAKER_00: And it was really a challenge to kind of work some spiritual principles into the book without being, you know, too preachy or anything.
• 24:51
  SPEAKER_00: And thankfully we had some great editors who were really helpful with that.
• 24:54
  SPEAKER_00: And of course, Ability was really helpful too.
• 24:56
  SPEAKER_00: So it that's got to be a challenge when you're when you're crafting your narrative because you have that wisdom character who's wanting to share, who you want to share these things, but you kind of want him to do it in a way that feels natural to the plot and the story and everything.
• 25:09
  SPEAKER_00: So anything you can share about maybe some ways that fiction writers can weave those principles into their books if they're doing Christian fiction?
• 25:19
  SPEAKER_01: Sure.
• 25:19
  SPEAKER_01: Uh I don't consider myself an expert on this yet.
• 25:22
  SPEAKER_01: I'm still practicing it, but you've thought a lot about it though.
• 25:25
  SPEAKER_01: I have thought a lot about it.
• 25:26
  SPEAKER_01: And it's it's a lot of times too, I find my characters are reflecting on in, you know, when you get that monologue in the head, in their head, uh questioning, even questioning God and some of those principles, right?
• 25:41
  SPEAKER_01: To say, are you really here with me?
• 25:43
  SPEAKER_01: Because I feel like you've left me, you know, and uh kind of those back and forth conversations they can have even with God.
• 25:51
  SPEAKER_01: Um honestly, I think that's just the best way.
• 25:56
  SPEAKER_01: It it's like uh it's like how they say don't info dump, right?
• 26:00
  SPEAKER_01: You don't want to give the whole backstory of your character.
• 26:02
  SPEAKER_01: So I even have gone through and said, you know, I want this, these scriptures to somehow show up in this story at some point, right?
• 26:11
  SPEAKER_01: Or I want the uh concepts behind these scriptures to come up throughout the story.
• 26:17
  SPEAKER_01: And so then I go through and say, where can I take just a little bit and s and plug it in, and then a little bit and plug it in here and maybe repeat it here?
• 26:27
  SPEAKER_01: That's the best strategy that I found for myself.
• 26:29
  SPEAKER_01: And I know everybody has a little different way of attacking it, but totally.
• 26:35
  SPEAKER_00: What are some things?
• 26:36
  SPEAKER_00: Um, just thinking about the marketing component of what you're doing, what are some things that you're doing this year uh to market yourself or market your business or your writing?
• 26:47
  SPEAKER_00: Um the show is is you know, we do talk a lot about the craft of writing, but we also talk about the business side of it.
• 26:54
  SPEAKER_00: So I'm curious what kinds of things are working for you marketing-wise, or what kinds of things that you want to maybe try that's different this year.
• 27:02
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 27:03
  SPEAKER_01: So a lot of this came again, came out of that 12-week uh mentorship that I did uh earlier or late last year.
• 27:11
  SPEAKER_01: And so part of my biggest thing I want to do is grow my email list.
• 27:16
  SPEAKER_01: And so what I'm doing is I'm doing that through my podcast, uh, which has a weekly episode that comes out for readers uh that we talk books.
• 27:26
  SPEAKER_01: And then uh I will be starting a Wednesday writers episode as well to give advice to writers within this genre.
• 27:35
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, I mentioned earlier I'm doing those coffee and books uh every other month.
• 27:40
  SPEAKER_01: So that helps me not only connect with other readers and writers in this genre, but with authors in this genre too, which leads into the partner promotion piece.
• 27:51
  SPEAKER_01: Um that I that is my biggest the email list and the partner promotion are the two things I'm focusing on right now.
• 28:00
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 28:01
  SPEAKER_00: Something that I find really helpful with email marketing is anytime that I am on somebody's email list and they're doing something that I like, I have an Evernote folder that um literally it's so I'm uh maybe somebody will want to steal this because I'm talking about stealing here.
• 28:20
  SPEAKER_00: So I use Evernote heavily.
• 28:21
  SPEAKER_00: I've used it for probably 13 or 14 years, like on a daily basis.
• 28:26
  SPEAKER_00: And uh I have uh notebooks, a notebook, not a folder, set up in Evernote.
• 28:32
  SPEAKER_00: So and I have like a whole like uh level one collection of notebooks called PW, which stands for profitable writer.
• 28:40
  SPEAKER_00: That's that side of my business.
• 28:43
  SPEAKER_00: And I have a notebook called PW Steal, S-T-E-A-L.
• 28:48
  SPEAKER_00: So anytime that I come across something that I want to steal or I want to borrow that idea and modify it for my own stuff, I always dump it into that notebook for reference for later.
• 28:59
  SPEAKER_00: Because man, there's so many people doing really cool stuff with email marketing.
• 29:03
  SPEAKER_00: And man, whenever those emails come in my inbox, I and there's something really good, I always send it on over to that notebook.
• 29:10
  SPEAKER_00: So for anybody listening who, you know, maybe you're struggling with what to do with your email list, that's one of the little tricks that I like to use.
• 29:17
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, definitely.
• 29:18
  SPEAKER_01: I've gained uh ideas from other people's newsletters as well, so I sign up with to for many of them.
• 29:25
  SPEAKER_01: Um yeah.
• 29:27
  SPEAKER_01: The other thing is because I offer uh author training like trainings from experts once a month for my member writers group, that's just another, again, another partner to promote with uh later on when I get ready to launch my book.
• 29:44
  SPEAKER_00: So totally.
• 29:45
  SPEAKER_00: Now, while we're on the topic, tell us a bit about your writers group.
• 29:48
  SPEAKER_00: And we've talked about your podcast a couple times.
• 29:50
  SPEAKER_00: Um, I don't I think you might have mentioned the name of it, but just in case you didn't, uh, what's the name of your show?
• 29:56
  SPEAKER_00: Where can they find it?
• 29:57
  SPEAKER_00: And also tell us about your writing group.
• 29:59
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 30:00
  SPEAKER_01: So the name of our podcast is Literary Scape, and it's all one word.
• 30:06
  SPEAKER_01: And you can find us uh on Apple, Amazon, and Spotify.
• 30:14
  SPEAKER_01: Uh and if you go to literaryscape.com forward slash podcast, you can listen there as well.
• 30:20
  SPEAKER_01: And so every Friday we do episodes for readers.
• 30:25
  SPEAKER_01: And then like I said, this next month, uh February 14th, Valentine's Day, I'll be uh kicking off our writers Wednesdays, which will come out every other week.
• 30:36
  SPEAKER_01: Nice.
• 30:37
  SPEAKER_01: So we have some great uh authors coming in to talk to our audience there as well.
• 30:42
  SPEAKER_01: And then the writers group is HCRW.
• 30:46
  SPEAKER_01: And if you want to learn more about that, you can go to literary escape.com forward slash HCRW.
• 30:52
  SPEAKER_01: But basically it's very it's a genre-specific writers group.
• 30:56
  SPEAKER_01: So we it's for historical Christian romance writers.
• 30:59
  SPEAKER_01: That's what that stands for.
• 31:01
  SPEAKER_00: Okay.
• 31:02
  SPEAKER_01: And I offer a training from an expert once a month, and we do uh critique meetings every two weeks, every other week.
• 31:12
  SPEAKER_01: And then they also get um I create have created additional courses.
• 31:19
  SPEAKER_01: So we have an online resource library that they have access to and they get early access to all of my podcast episodes as well.
• 31:27
  SPEAKER_01: So it's been great so far just to connect with other aspiring authors and help them navigate um through the writing process.
• 31:36
  SPEAKER_01: And I'm excited too because we have some new opportunities that I'm working on um to bring editors and hopefully some agents in as well to give advice on like query letters and for those who want to go through the traditional route as well.
• 31:51
  SPEAKER_00: So yeah, that is a big decision that that authors have to make is what are you gonna do for publishing?
• 31:57
  SPEAKER_00: Self-publishing, you know, hybrid traditional.
• 32:00
  SPEAKER_00: There's a lot of there are benefits and drawbacks to each to each, well, maybe not drawbacks isn't the right word, but there are considerations definitely for any direction that you go.
• 32:10
  SPEAKER_00: So so I'm glad that you're kind of looking at it from all the angles.
• 32:14
  SPEAKER_00: Because I do think there are times where traditional publishing is the best solution for certain situations or certain authors, or it just depends on what you want and what your goals are.
• 32:24
  SPEAKER_01: Mm-hmm.
• 32:24
  SPEAKER_01: Yes, definitely.
• 32:25
  SPEAKER_00: So I think that's really cool.
• 32:27
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, we look at both.
• 32:29
  SPEAKER_01: Oh, they can.
• 32:30
  SPEAKER_01: They're a wonderful um asset to have.
• 32:33
  SPEAKER_01: So yeah, so we look at both.
• 32:35
  SPEAKER_01: So I don't, even though I prefer to do indie publishing, I make sure that I bring in experts for those who want to go down the traditional route as well.
• 32:43
  SPEAKER_00: So totally.
• 32:44
  SPEAKER_00: Now, is that what you're doing?
• 32:45
  SPEAKER_00: Is indie publishing, or are you thinking about traditional?
• 32:48
  SPEAKER_01: That is my goal.
• 32:49
  SPEAKER_01: I actually am working on putting together a Kickstarter campaign to launch my next book.
• 32:56
  SPEAKER_01: So nice.
• 32:57
  SPEAKER_00: I did an episode, um, gosh, how was it?
• 33:01
  SPEAKER_00: Six or eight weeks ago with a friend of mine who did Kickstarter for her book.
• 33:05
  SPEAKER_00: And gosh, that was I learned a lot on that episode.
• 33:08
  SPEAKER_00: So I did too.
• 33:09
  SPEAKER_00: So thank you.
• 33:10
  SPEAKER_00: Okay, so you saw that one.
• 33:11
  SPEAKER_01: So yeah.
• 33:12
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, with uh Leslie May Zachary.
• 33:14
  SPEAKER_00: That was really informative.
• 33:15
  SPEAKER_00: And she did a great job on that, that Kickstarter as well.
• 33:18
  SPEAKER_00: That was cool.
• 33:19
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 33:19
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 33:21
  SPEAKER_00: Well, I'm wondering if you can tell us um what kind of tips would you give to people who are thinking about writing their first book?
• 33:29
  SPEAKER_00: I know we talked a bit about this at the top of this conversation, but kind of as we wrap things up, any final tips, maybe two or three things that you would share with authors who are thinking about putting their first book out into the world?
• 33:42
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 33:43
  SPEAKER_01: So get plugged into an active writing group.
• 33:47
  SPEAKER_01: And if it's genre, if you can find one that's specific to your genre, even better.
• 33:52
  SPEAKER_01: Uh get training.
• 33:55
  SPEAKER_01: I paid for some courses, and I realize sometimes that can be kind of scary to put that money out there, but it's it is completely worth it.
• 34:02
  SPEAKER_01: Uh to get the training, read your craft books.
• 34:06
  SPEAKER_01: Like I said, start with James Scott Bell's book.
• 34:08
  SPEAKER_01: It it'll lay the foundation out for you.
• 34:11
  SPEAKER_01: Uh and start connecting.
• 34:14
  SPEAKER_01: Start connecting with other authors and writers in your genre.
• 34:18
  SPEAKER_01: And don't be afraid to fail.
• 34:20
  SPEAKER_01: Don't be afraid to fail.
• 34:22
  SPEAKER_01: I did, and but so I've grown so much from that failure.
• 34:26
  SPEAKER_00: So but is there really such a thing as failure in all this?
• 34:29
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, every everything is really forward progress.
• 34:32
  SPEAKER_01: It is, yeah.
• 34:34
  SPEAKER_00: And I think there are things that that work or that don't work.
• 34:38
  SPEAKER_01: Um But I think sometimes our fear of it not working kind of holds us, can holds some of us back.
• 34:46
  SPEAKER_01: Totally.
• 34:46
  SPEAKER_01: And so I just say go for it.
• 34:49
  SPEAKER_00: Yep.
• 34:50
  SPEAKER_00: Well, I think we all we all think that people are paying closer attention to us than maybe they actually are.
• 34:56
  SPEAKER_00: Because we're so afraid of, oh, this person's gonna think this or they're gonna think that or whatever.
• 35:00
  SPEAKER_00: But most people just aren't paying that close attention.
• 35:03
  SPEAKER_00: So go for your dreams anyway.
• 35:06
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 35:06
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 35:07
  SPEAKER_00: Well Melissa, this has been a lot of fun.
• 35:09
  SPEAKER_00: I appreciate you taking time to be a guest and sharing your wisdom.
• 35:12
  SPEAKER_00: And I'm excited to see what uh what the publishing world holds for you the next few years as you put more of your stuff out there and and really start to grow your business much more.
• 35:22
  SPEAKER_00: This is really exciting.
• 35:23
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, I'm excited too.
• 35:24
  SPEAKER_01: Thanks for having me.
• 35:25
  SPEAKER_01: This has been fun.
• 35:26
  SPEAKER_00: Absolutely, totally my pleasure.
• 35:32
  SPEAKER_00: I mentioned at the top of this episode that Melissa was a lot of fun, and of course, you can hear that.
• 35:37
  SPEAKER_00: Uh in this conversation, I had a blast talking with her about fiction and writing and um marketing and all the things.
• 35:44
  SPEAKER_00: We had a lot of different bases in this conversation, which is exactly the kind of the kind of conversations that I love.
• 35:51
  SPEAKER_00: I encourage you to go to Melissa's website, which is literaryscape.com, check that out, and all the cool things that she is doing.
• 35:57
  SPEAKER_00: And of course, I want to thank Melissa for taking time out to be a guest on today's episode.
• 36:01
  SPEAKER_00: Melissa, thanks for your insight and your wisdom and your generosity in sharing that with our profitable writer audience.
• 36:08
  SPEAKER_00: As always, my friends, thanks for listening, and I'll see you next time.