Show Notes:
Today is part two of two where we are talking to Aly Nichole about their novels. Over these 2 weeks you will have heard about their journey of writing since they were a kid, adapting fan-fiction to full sized novels, using people you know as inspiration for your characters, working through writers block, writing with kids, and building your team.
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Aly Nichole writes love across the rainbow and hopes they do it justice.
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Transcript:
Speaker A: Welcome to Freya’s Fairy Tales, where we believe fairy tales are both stories we enjoyed as children and something that we can achieve ourselves.
Speaker A: Each week we will talk to authors about their favorite fairy tales when they were kids and their adventures, holding their very own own fairy tale in their hands.
Speaker A: At the end of each episode, we will finish off with the fairy tale or short story read as close to the original author’s version as possible.
Speaker A: I am your host.
Speaker A: Freya victoria I’m an audiobook narrator that loves reading fairy tales, novels and bringing stories to life through narration.
Speaker A: I’m also fascinated by talking to authors and learning about their why and how for creating their stories.
Speaker A: We have included all of the links for today’s author and our show in the show notes.
Speaker A: Today is part two of two where we are talking to Ally Nicole about her novels over these two weeks.
Speaker A: You will have heard about her journey of writing since she was a kid.
Speaker A: Adapting fan fiction to fullsized novels.
Speaker A: Using people you know as inspiration for your characters.
Speaker A: Working through writers block.
Speaker A: Writing with kids and building your team heart of Conviction nathan nathan Valentine had given up from ever finding love.
Speaker A: Instead, he dedicated himself to being the best doctor he could be so no one ever felt the pain he had endured.
Speaker A: Sadie Mosey was a single mom with another on the way.
Speaker A: She only thought about how she was going to survive to the next day.
Speaker A: Can they help each other overcome the pain of their past?
Speaker B: So back to your book.
Speaker B: So you’re working on Mason’s story now.
Speaker B: When do you think you’re going to have his story finished?
Speaker C: So my goal is to have his story out this year.
Speaker B: Okay.
Speaker C: His story.
Speaker C: And then I also have another story I want out this year.
Speaker B: Not related.
Speaker C: Not related.
Speaker C: It’s completely different and I actually have more words written for it than I do for basis.
Speaker C: I think it’s because it’s not conviction series.
Speaker C: I think when you get so obsessed with something for so many years, yeah, that’s part of my blockage.
Speaker C: So I started working on other projects that I’ve thought about and I fell in love with this one and so it’s been easy to write.
Speaker C: Of course, I hit that moment of every time, every I feel like every author has this moment where you just go, okay, now you hit that moment.
Speaker B: For my one book, I’m like 30,000 words and I have not said I’m scrapping it.
Speaker B: I’m like I’m putting it on pause until I can get this other thing out of my head and then I’ll reread back through it and start again.
Speaker B: Not start over, but you’ll need to read through it to remind myself, what did I write?
Speaker C: Yeah, go from there.
Speaker B: So are you planning on both books releasing this year?
Speaker C: That’s my goal, but for sure I want Mason’s story out this year.
Speaker C: He’s waited long enough.
Speaker C: He needs to be out in the world.
Speaker C: But I like both stories out this year.
Speaker B: Okay.
Speaker C: If I’m able to keep going the way I’m going, and considering that I have two weeks in July where my kids are down with my in laws for two weeks, I think that’d be I love my sister in law, Tia.
Speaker B: Free time for you, that is.
Speaker C: And I can take my laptop and go other places to write.
Speaker B: Yeah.
Speaker C: No one talks about it, but sitting at home in writing is not as productive as everybody or for you.
Speaker B: For some people, that may be you’re not.
Speaker B: Maybe.
Speaker C: If they have an actual office.
Speaker C: I do not.
Speaker C: I guess I ride on my couch.
Speaker C: How many kids do you have?
Speaker B: I have one.
Speaker C: I have three.
Speaker B: She’s seven, but she pretty much takes care of herself.
Speaker B: Like, I home school, so I have to do that.
Speaker B: But homeschooling doesn’t take very smart kids, so it doesn’t take long for us to get through it every day.
Speaker B: And we actually do four day school weeks, so it doesn’t take us long to get through.
Speaker B: And then because I’m narrating for most of my day, I don’t believe in limiting screen time.
Speaker B: She’s a very active kid, though, so she’ll play games for a little while, and then she goes off and does something.
Speaker B: But we do limit screen time.
Speaker B: Like, today, her task is your room needs to be cleaned, and then you can play video games.
Speaker B: I don’t like it.
Speaker B: It’s such a big mess.
Speaker B: Well, it’s your mess, so clean it up.
Speaker C: Yeah.
Speaker C: My oldest son, he’ll be turning nine next month, and he’s neurodivergent.
Speaker C: He’s gotten Dyslexia and ADHD.
Speaker C: I’m pretty sure he’s on the spectrum, but where we live, it’s literally like pulling teeth and nails to get that diagnosis.
Speaker C: So I’m going through.
Speaker C: But anyways, with him, I have to do that kind of reward system, like, oh, you have to poop today.
Speaker C: If you don’t if you want your phone, you need to poop.
Speaker C: You want your phone?
Speaker C: I have to do this weird reward based system with him, but once he gets it, I don’t live that free time because he’s earned it.
Speaker C: Yeah, but he needs a lot of work.
Speaker C: And then I got my two year old daughter, who’s two.
Speaker C: She’s two, but I’m also, like, currently right now, I’m also a single mom right now, so it’s a lot.
Speaker B: Yes.
Speaker C: That’s also why, like, two weeks and I can leave the house because I won’t have to leave the house.
Speaker B: Yeah, I have a week at the end of July where she’s going to be with my grandparents, but I have, like, narrating stuff that I have to do.
Speaker B: So I’m like, I have to be in this closet.
Speaker C: But I don’t think as writing, as work by myself, I turn my brain off to everything else.
Speaker B: I started doing this so I have a day job, which is mostly an on call type situation.
Speaker B: So usually this time of year, during the summer, it’s busier, but I can pause narrating and go do that.
Speaker B: So prior to September of last year, when I started narrating, I would just sit on my couch, either binge watching Netflix or reading books, and several times had looked up like, is there something I can be, like, making money while binge watching Netflix or reading books?
Speaker B: And finally, in September, came across a TikTok for narrating and learned how to get into that because I’ve always read with the voices and all of that.
Speaker C: I’m not good at you guys narrators are absolutely amazing.
Speaker C: I could never do it.
Speaker B: Well, I know a lot of narrators have, like, either acting backgrounds, like, went to school for acting or singing, or there’s one narrator I know went to school for opera, and she now narrates audio books.
Speaker B: And I’m like, I did, like, skits and stuff in high school, but that’s not kind of acting, but not really acting, because they’d be, like, short things.
Speaker B: I never did, like, full blown productions or one I did one full blown production, but nowadays so I started in September, and all I could get was, like, nonfiction, because I don’t read monotone.
Speaker B: I mean, you heard how I read.
Speaker B: Yes, you did a very there’s not as much emotion in nonfiction.
Speaker B: But I’m, like, auditioning in September of 21.
Speaker B: I’m auditioning for everything, and all I could get was nonfiction.
Speaker B: So I’m like, okay, cool.
Speaker B: I want to read fiction.
Speaker B: So we’re going to start a fiction podcast with public domain books.
Speaker B: So I do that.
Speaker B: And then in January of this year is when I started landing all the fiction jobs.
Speaker B: And since I started doing that, I think I’ve done three nonfiction, and I haven’t done one since.
Speaker B: And those were all ones from people I had previously done books for that were like, hey, can you do this other one?
Speaker B: And since then, it’s been all fiction.
Speaker B: And I just keep going.
Speaker B: I mean, it’s a weird world.
Speaker B: I’m glad that I get to do it, but yeah, part of I have an emotional reason for enjoying and doing and wanting to do royalty share for audiobooks.
Speaker B: My dad and all of his complications was blind.
Speaker B: And so he would listen to podcasts, and he never really got into audiobooks, but he would listen to podcasts all the time because he can’t watch TV.
Speaker B: So he would listen to podcasts all the time.
Speaker B: I’m like, I have a soft spot for just making it available to and it’s not even just vision impaired people that listen to audiobooks.
Speaker B: It’s people that, for whatever reason, don’t like to read the physical copy of the book or people that have long commutes to work.
Speaker B: And so they listen to audiobooks in the car or while they’re cleaning their house or whatever.
Speaker B: And my intro for this podcast is something like, I’m an audiobook narrator that loves bringing stories to life because that’s what I feel like I get to do.
Speaker C: Yeah, you do.
Speaker B: Is bring it now.
Speaker B: The more characters you have, the more difficult that gets.
Speaker B: But I’m like nine siblings, so typically.
Speaker C: Most books that I did, sarah wasn’t there towards the end.
Speaker C: But there was, like, those family meals.
Speaker B: With all of them all of them talking.
Speaker C: I’m sorry.
Speaker C: So I have to say, there’s always going to be a family meal in every book.
Speaker C: It’s going to be the thing.
Speaker C: The family meal in Mason’s book is when Nathan proposes the sadie and I had a couple of people have mixed feelings with the proposal because it starts off with Liam and a daddy jokes.
Speaker B: Hey, proposals come in all shapes and sizes.
Speaker C: Mason starts it.
Speaker C: I’m just saying.
Speaker C: And Liam ends it.
Speaker B: Is I feel like I’ve just broken from my imposter syndrome.
Speaker B: I’m like, clearly the last nail in the coffin for my major imposter syndromeness.
Speaker B: I had a pretty substantial audio engineer type person come in and help tweak some of my settings.
Speaker B: And he was like, I’m telling him I’ve booked this many books.
Speaker B: Whatever.
Speaker B: He’s like, you’re doing just fine if you booked that many books in that short amount of time.
Speaker B: And I’m like, clearly I’m doing something right.
Speaker B: Especially, like, the fact I keep getting hired.
Speaker B: It’s not like at the beginning, the first few authors that picked me, it’s like, well, maybe it was a fluke and all they had was really crappy narrators audition the Best of the Crappy.
Speaker C: Like I said, I had my friend help me listen to you, because when I first did it back in 2021, I had three people audition.
Speaker C: One was a girl, and no, it was two.
Speaker C: And then I had that guy.
Speaker C: He didn’t actually audition.
Speaker C: He just messaged me.
Speaker C: So one was a guy, one was a girl.
Speaker C: The guy didn’t cut it because the scene I sent it was when Mason comes into Mason’s office.
Speaker C: He goes, Mason?
Speaker C: He’s Natypoo.
Speaker C: Yeah, he did.
Speaker C: Naty Poo You know that weird high pitch for a pic?
Speaker C: He did that with Nativo.
Speaker C: I don’t think he could have saved himself from that.
Speaker C: I felt really bad.
Speaker C: And then the girl had this weird, really bad Southern draw, and I was like, I never put Southern draw in there.
Speaker C: I feel like if I wanted any kind of accent, I would have said that.
Speaker B: Now I will tell you, there are authors that will say, I want a general American accent.
Speaker B: And then they’ll say, Ops, this character is Russian, and this character is Southern, and this character is Irish, and blah, blah, blah, blah, blah.
Speaker B: And you’re like, I avoid those because I can’t do all those.
Speaker B: Again.
Speaker C: I was like, I’m a newbie.
Speaker C: So I felt bad for being that picky.
Speaker C: But that whole nanny poo and that high pitched suit calling for a pig pitch, I was like, my friend Melissa, she is a massive audiobook listener.
Speaker C: Like, okay, I’m not an audiobook person.
Speaker C: Could you please help me?
Speaker C: And she’s like, she does really good.
Speaker C: I mean, she’s a girl reading the guy’s part, so there’s no getting past that.
Speaker C: But she does really good with it.
Speaker C: She does really good with it.
Speaker C: Awesome.
Speaker B: So review wise, I don’t know.
Speaker B: I don’t have a whole lot of reviews on any of the books that I’ve done, but two of the books that I did were erotica books, and that’s, like, the one bad comment I had was, oh, it’s a female narrating a male’s part.
Speaker B: Well, it was a royalty share.
Speaker B: You can only hire one narrator, or the narrator is paying out of their pocket to hire the second person.
Speaker B: Or sometimes you get, like, couples that narrate together.
Speaker B: But my husband is Dyslexic.
Speaker B: Well, he would be great at this, and he wants to narrate the male parts in his own book, maybe still thinking he doesn’t want to do other people’s stuff.
Speaker B: So I’m like, you’d be great at it.
Speaker B: But it would be a big hurdle for him to be able to do it.
Speaker C: It’s a confidence thing.
Speaker C: I feel like as my son’s being Dyslexic, I’m trying to figure out different ways for him, and I’m learning, like, this is the process of figuring anything.
Speaker B: Yeah, well, you’re my second author that said that, so one of the authors that I narrated the first book in her series so far, her publishers, actually, who hired me.
Speaker B: But then I reached out to the author because I reached out to you via social media.
Speaker B: I didn’t have to do this because I knew you were you, but when I get hired through ACX, you don’t know who’s actually hiring you.
Speaker B: So I will go find the author and make on social media and make sure either they’re aware that someone is making the book or it is in fact them.
Speaker B: They just maybe have a different name on ATX.
Speaker B: You can put whatever name in there you want to as your name, so you never know.
Speaker B: And a lot of them, they use a pseudonym to whatever.
Speaker B: So I had reached out to her, and so she hadn’t heard the audition, but she’s like, I trust my publisher would have picked someone that did good.
Speaker B: So I sent her like, I have all my files on Dropbox.
Speaker B: So I sent her the link to the audition piece.
Speaker B: And her one thing, there’s a character named Nanny Kimley.
Speaker B: So when I talked to her on here, she said, all I wanted to know was how you voiced Nanny Kimley’s voice, because that was my make or break.
Speaker B: Like, if she can get that how I had it in my head, this narrator is going to do great.
Speaker B: And I apparently did it how she had it in her head, but then she’s, like, listening to it.
Speaker B: She has no idea who her publisher hired or what the other options were whatever.
Speaker B: And that was still relatively early on.
Speaker B: I did her book in February or March, so still relatively early into fiction, which I didn’t start getting until early February.
Speaker B: She heard it.
Speaker B: She listens to audiobooks almost primarily, and she said, yeah, it’s like, oh, my gosh, this sounds like an actual audiobook.
Speaker C: I feel absolutely bad.
Speaker C: And that’s what I tell most.
Speaker C: Like, I feel like a fraud trying to do an audiobook when I don’t listen to audiobooks.
Speaker C: I pulled her in because she’s an audio bit.
Speaker C: She loves her audiobooks.
Speaker C: I was like, all right, you need to help me.
Speaker B: When I was like, I have my husband listen, too, sometimes, because I’m like, I listen through all of my audio to make sure that the words all make sense.
Speaker B: And sometimes I read what words were on the page, but those words don’t make sense together.
Speaker B: And sometimes my brain automatically fixes while I’m narrating it’s.
Speaker B: Like, this is how it should be.
Speaker B: And sometimes I’ll read it and hearing myself read it, I’m like, oh, that doesn’t sound right.
Speaker B: I’ll stop read this and just a couple of times, figure out what it was supposed to say and then fix it.
Speaker B: Yeah, my husband listens.
Speaker B: He’s a delivery driver, so he listens to audiobooks a lot while he’s driving.
Speaker B: So I’ve had him listen a couple of times.
Speaker B: I’m like, I am so sorry, because he’s never listened to any of the books I’ve done before.
Speaker B: Right.
Speaker B: One day I’m like, I’m so sorry, but I need to make sure I’m not crazy.
Speaker B: And I just like, it because it’s me, and I need to make sure this sounds okay.
Speaker C: Yeah, I do that with writing.
Speaker C: I’m like, Listen, I’m obsessed with what I just wrote, and I need to know if it’s because I wrote that because of it.
Speaker C: Yeah, or like, the is it lack of sleep that I got so excited by this.
Speaker B: That particular one, it was a third person perspective, and it was my 1st 3rd person book.
Speaker B: So I’m like, I need to make sure that this doesn’t sound too monotone because it’s a detached person narrator.
Speaker B: He was like, no, he usually listens to male narrators, but he was like, no, it sounds fine.
Speaker B: Whatever.
Speaker B: Yeah, I just need someone who listens to them occasionally.
Speaker B: And I’m like, I don’t know.
Speaker B: You don’t necessarily want to be telling the author, like, hey, I want to make sure I don’t sound stupid, because then it makes it sound like I don’t know what I’m doing.
Speaker C: No, see, I think that needs talked about more.
Speaker C: Like, even this is your profession occasionally.
Speaker C: You need to outsource just a little bit to make sure I feel like you do something so much, you get in this weird autobot, like, robot tone.
Speaker C: You’re like.
Speaker C: Wait a minute.
Speaker C: Okay, am I actually doing this correctly?
Speaker C: Or did I just get in the zone of, yeah, I worked at a factory job and, like, I do the same thing over and over again.
Speaker C: I have to stop.
Speaker C: And they’re like, hey, you missed it.
Speaker C: I don’t know if that makes sense, but even if you’re a professional, you need occasionally a double check.
Speaker B: My double check is so I had an entire day last week, an entire day of narrating that I had to completely delete because my mic was literally an inch too far from my face, and it made my voice sound tinny.
Speaker B: And I’m like, it had, like an echoey metallic kind of sound to it, and there’s no fixing it at that point.
Speaker B: Like, you just have to redo it.
Speaker B: So I had to message the author, and I’m like, hey, I’m still going to have your book done on time.
Speaker B: I just want you to know, like, today was a scrap because the mic was an inch too far from my face.
Speaker B: So now every day when I start, I’m like, measuring, make sure it’s the.
Speaker C: Right you’ve added that new routine.
Speaker B: I have a ruler in my booth now, so I can make sure it is exactly the correct amount of space.
Speaker C: All right.
Speaker C: So I also do photography, and I made the one mistake.
Speaker C: I’m really glad it was a friend who was not paying me, and I volunteered.
Speaker B: It’s only worse than they’re paying you because you want to make sure you.
Speaker C: Like, yes, well, actually, I find paying customers more forgiving than friends who are getting a free product.
Speaker C: I get obsessed with paying customers because they’re paying customers.
Speaker C: Not that nobody doesn’t matter, but they pay for the product.
Speaker C: It needs to be perfect.
Speaker C: But, like, I learned this lesson early on.
Speaker C: Check your settings on the cameras because my last shooting was in a dark place, and then I went to a really bright place.
Speaker B: And you didn’t adjust?
Speaker C: I did not adjust because I’m a manual shooter.
Speaker C: And do you know what that means, manual?
Speaker C: Yeah.
Speaker C: So I always have to I didn’t change it.
Speaker C: So now I’m obsessed with taking at least three photos, looking at my camera, like, oh, yeah, I need to.
Speaker B: In the same thing.
Speaker B: I had a narrator say to me, and he didn’t mean it this way because we talked about it afterwards, but what he said was, oh, yeah, it needs to be really good if they’re paying you up front.
Speaker B: And I’m like, no, I’m going to put out a professional sounding audiobook whether they’re paying me up front or I’m getting paid royalties.
Speaker B: Because you never know what book may end up in a TV series or a movie one day.
Speaker B: And your audio book is going to be bought tons and tons and tons of times.
Speaker B: And if it sounds like garbage, you’re going to have garbage reviews.
Speaker C: I know this is the big thing now.
Speaker C: You don’t know what Tik Tok is going to get viral.
Speaker B: I just had my first contact for an audiobook off of a TikTok video.
Speaker B: So, like, put it out there, but you never know.
Speaker B: Yeah, now I’m usually just talking in my TikToks, but you never know what thing.
Speaker B: But I’m very careful to stay away from like, I had someone ask for tips and tricks and basically wanted me to coach them.
Speaker B: And I’m like, I don’t work for big publishers.
Speaker B: I don’t feel comfortable coaching anyone because I can’t tell you how to get hired with big publishers.
Speaker B: I work through ACX, and I have one other website that emails me as well, but I’m too scheduled out for them.
Speaker B: Like, their books have to be done in three months.
Speaker B: And I’m booked further out than that.
Speaker B: And I felt bad because one of the managers actually messaged me was like, we really want you to audition for this book.
Speaker B: And I’m like, I don’t have the time.
Speaker B: Like, I could audition, but I can’t have it done in three months.
Speaker C: So yeah, I feel like also, there’s so many not to dismiss you, but there’s so many people out there that they could get those tips and tricks.
Speaker C: Like, there’s so many audio books, and.
Speaker B: I will point them to like, here’s the ones that I got my information from and here’s the websites that I got my information from.
Speaker B: But at the end of the day, I’m like, I started on a $50 mic, and the audio quality wasn’t great.
Speaker B: And I’ve said this several times on this podcast at this point, but in my first two months, I made one $200, and I put almost all of that into upgrading my equipment immediately because I knew $50 mike is going to put out $50 mike of quality.
Speaker B: No matter how much you edit that.
Speaker B: It’s the same with writing, too.
Speaker B: Like, you’ve got to make sure you have the tools.
Speaker B: I’m at the point in my adult life that I generally now audio books.
Speaker B: I started on the $50 mic because I didn’t know if anyone would like my voice.
Speaker B: So at the beginning, I’m like, oh, there was a thing that I found that said, everybody will find somebody that likes their voice.
Speaker B: So I’m like, I’ll probably get like, I don’t know, five people that want to hire me and that’ll be it.
Speaker B: So I don’t want to put a bunch of money into this.
Speaker B: Way past five at this point.
Speaker C: Yes, you really do have you’re very good.
Speaker C: Narrator it’s weird.
Speaker C: I feel you on that.
Speaker C: Anybody?
Speaker C: Like, I don’t really have an audience.
Speaker C: I don’t have the readers yet.
Speaker C: But from my understanding, you need more books to get the readers.
Speaker B: Yeah, you really do.
Speaker C: You need the backlist, because one book doesn’t give them the backlist to really.
Speaker B: Get your I mean, you figure once you have a couple of books under your belt and I mean, just even into the tips and tricks portion, I guess even just getting on TikTok and talking about your book gets it out there.
Speaker B: But I know a lot of readers, because I do this sometimes we’ll wait for a series to be finished and then binge the whole thing instead of waiting a couple of years for the next one to come out.
Speaker B: But if you’re constantly talking about it, you can get on there and talk about your book reviews and your other stuff, too, because if you’re just pounding your book in people’s faces, that’s going to turn them off.
Speaker B: But occasionally, oh, hey, I have this book, or the video with the quotes and the page flips and whatever little tips and tricks of the day is going on occasionally helps.
Speaker C: Yeah.
Speaker C: I did a new thing where I talked about the first chapter of my book, and I do it, like, in a weird, like, here’s the Tea about Sadie.
Speaker C: We’ll see what it does.
Speaker C: But the few people that have read my book, this is where I was going.
Speaker C: I still go, really?
Speaker C: You liked it?
Speaker C: I don’t know why you liked it.
Speaker C: I’m really confused right now.
Speaker C: What is it?
Speaker B: What?
Speaker B: Well, and sometimes reviews don’t help either.
Speaker B: Some of those reviews are either like, I have one, I got a review, and they left me like three star review, but they don’t leave a comment.
Speaker B: So I’m like, yeah, because for anybody in any kind of arts writing, painting, narrating, voiceover in general, like, reviews are, in my opinion, how you grow.
Speaker B: So you learn.
Speaker B: Like someone telling me, oh, I don’t like that.
Speaker B: It was a female narrating, a male voice.
Speaker B: I can’t fix that.
Speaker B: That is what it is.
Speaker B: But if you say, I didn’t like that, she did.
Speaker B: I don’t know, she took too many breaths, or her breaths were too loud, or she talked too fast or too slow, whatever, those are helpful things you can fix.
Speaker B: Now, sometimes you’ll get contradicting.
Speaker B: This person was too fast and this person was too slow in the same.
Speaker C: And that’s when you realize it’s a personal opinion.
Speaker B: Well, and also you can speed up and slow down the audible app.
Speaker C: Yeah.
Speaker B: And pretty much any listening like ours is exclusive to the Amazon owned things because the royalty share.
Speaker B: But I do have other books that have been taken elsewhere.
Speaker B: I imagine they all work the same, where you can slow them up.
Speaker C: Yeah, I would assume.
Speaker B: One say I talked too slow, and I’m like, sir, no.
Speaker B: I’m like, no, I can guarantee you I talk way faster than most narrators should, which is evidenced by the fact that pretty much every book I do will say, oh, this should be a nine hour book based on word count.
Speaker B: And I usually make it an eight hour book.
Speaker B: Like, I’ll cut yeah, I just finished a book where I cut an entire hour off the book time just because I talk fast.
Speaker B: Yeah, but then a nonfiction will usually be longer because you have all the pauses between bullet points.
Speaker B: Make it take a lot longer.
Speaker C: I think that’s, like, with a heart of conviction.
Speaker C: If it’s out there and I’ll never pull it, I’ll never change it, it’s going to be out there.
Speaker C: But I kind of wish I had more of those critique points, especially like, with reviews, I see that I got a one star, two star, and a three star with no reviews of why they didn’t like it.
Speaker C: But like, with my beta readers and the alpha reader, they never gave me a true critique.
Speaker C: And I feel like you need ones.
Speaker B: I need to buy new ones to help critique me.
Speaker C: I know.
Speaker C: So when I’m writing a mind of conviction right now, it’s like what I’m going through.
Speaker C: And I was like, I really need to go out there and ask some people.
Speaker C: But that imposter syndrome and that anxiety, but I don’t know if I’m ready to hear it.
Speaker C: I need that critique.
Speaker C: I need it because I want the best book possible.
Speaker C: And Nathan and Sadie stories could have been so much better and probably smoother if I had the real critique instead of the yes people like, oh, this was really good.
Speaker C: I feel like you could have done this, but it’s really good.
Speaker B: Well, I think, too, that’s you can maybe ask people on TikTok for that.
Speaker B: But I had one author that I talked to that said, just ignore the really big critiques.
Speaker B: But I feel like there’s a fine line between ignoring the ones that are just they had a bad day that day, and really bad stuff, and then the ones that are like, bad, but it’s constructive.
Speaker B: Like, helpful, constructive.
Speaker B: Here’s how to improve.
Speaker B: But I know me, I’m going to take everything to heart.
Speaker B: And like, I do for when I get narrating reviews, I’m like, Why did you leave?
Speaker B: It three stars.
Speaker B: I want to know why.
Speaker B: Did I do something wrong?
Speaker B: Or did you just not like the story?
Speaker C: That’s what I do.
Speaker C: It hurts for a minute, like, oh, man, that really sucks.
Speaker C: And then, like, you process I’m like, you know what?
Speaker C: That’s like, kind of true.
Speaker C: I really need to look at that.
Speaker C: It’s like a weird process of they hate it, but what are they really.
Speaker B: Saying that could be improved on?
Speaker C: Yeah, it’s a whole thing.
Speaker B: We’ve been talking for a while.
Speaker C: We have.
Speaker B: Do you have any advice for a new author that maybe they write fan fiction like you were doing and thinking about writing their own book?
Speaker B: Do you have any advice for someone who maybe wants to get into writing or is thinking about writing or is sitting on a manuscript they haven’t put out there yet?
Speaker B: Do you have any advice for pushing forward?
Speaker C: Building a team is real.
Speaker C: Honestly, I feel like no one talks about it.
Speaker C: Like, get your beta reader and your alpha readers and do it outside your friend group.
Speaker C: You need at least one or two people that aren’t friends, that aren’t.
Speaker C: Worried about hurting your feelings.
Speaker C: Don’t worry about I feel like if you have a budget, just do the best you can because eventually you’ll get the money.
Speaker C: More books come in, more money.
Speaker C: You can start putting out the better product and go back and edit your books.
Speaker C: But I will do it.
Speaker C: You’ll regret it if you don’t.
Speaker C: As much as I want to put all these books out, at least I put one out, right?
Speaker C: I hope to put more books out, but I did it once.
Speaker B: You cross that hurdle once, makes it a little bit easier next time around.
Speaker C: Yeah.
Speaker C: And covers matter if there’s anything I don’t think editors matter.
Speaker C: Not diminishing that.
Speaker C: But you have to get that person to your book and that is the cover.
Speaker C: And if you’re going to put your money anywhere, do it with the cover.
Speaker C: And please, if when you’re formatting, put spaces between chapters.
Speaker C: Have you read the books with no chapter spaces?
Speaker C: Like they’re on the same page?
Speaker B: I’ve had to reformat a couple of books to make it work for narrative.
Speaker C: I’m just saying those are my tips.
Speaker B: If you don’t know how to do it, not you, but for anybody listening, if you don’t know how to do that, no matter what editing program you’re using, there will be some setting for inserting a page break.
Speaker C: Yes.
Speaker B: Find what that is.
Speaker B: Memorize the shortcut key for Google Drive.
Speaker B: I know it is.
Speaker B: Command and enter.
Speaker B: Well, I’m on a Mac command or Control if you’re on PC and Enter will enter a new page so that you can get in there.
Speaker B: And then also if you will set your chapter names as headings, that will also help get your table of contents ready to go.
Speaker C: Yup.
Speaker B: So it’s all in there and pretty.
Speaker B: These are things that as a narrator, I’ve had to format people’s books to do.
Speaker B: But then if you do that while you’re writing, it’s so much easier because then when you go and you’re ready to upload and all that, it’s already all there for you.
Speaker C: Yes.
Speaker C: See, I’m OCD and my friends laugh at me like, you can fix it.
Speaker C: No, I’m not fixing it later.
Speaker C: I’m doing it now.
Speaker C: One less thing for me to worry about.
Speaker C: I do my heading, one for my chapter, and I do my heading, three for my name and I move on.
Speaker B: Yeah.
Speaker B: Now the author that I’m editing through her book right now, I’m doing it as I am editing through.
Speaker B: So that tells me where I am.
Speaker B: I can just click on the beginning of the next chapter that I need to go through, but alright.
Speaker B: Well, those are pretty good tips.
Speaker B: So what is the near future plan for books?
Speaker B: You’re planning on getting one, possibly two done by the end of the year.
Speaker B: Do you have a plan, a time frame for when they’re going to edit or when you’re hoping to have the fall?
Speaker C: I’m hoping the fall that they’ll both be at us because I’m working them in tangent.
Speaker C: So I’ll spend like 2 hours on one and 2 hours on the other.
Speaker B: Okay.
Speaker C: Because they both speak to me at the same time.
Speaker C: So you have conviction, mind of conviction speak, which is Mason and Cynthia.
Speaker C: And then I have I don’t understand, which is Tobin and Bo, which is a male male suspense mystery, who done it kind of thing, which is done in third person.
Speaker C: It’s been really fun doing something that’s different.
Speaker C: They’re different.
Speaker C: I’m hoping to have those out by no later than I want them out this year.
Speaker UNK: Okay.
Speaker C: Then next year my plan is to have Mickey story, which is Home of conviction, which would be Mickey and Katie.
Speaker C: After Mickey and Katie.
Speaker C: Give me a second.
Speaker C: It is Madison and Toby.
Speaker C: So I’m happy to have those two in 2023.
Speaker C: I’m trying not to do more than two books as much as I want to do.
Speaker C: If I do more than two books a year, that’d be great.
Speaker B: But researching myself, I’ll let you know that it doesn’t matter how many books now.
Speaker B: People will always demand, like, I want the books faster once they get to liking the books and all that.
Speaker B: But as long as you have a schedule and you stick to it or you become that author that all of your readers know she’s going to publish when she feels like publishing.
Speaker B: But you’re saying, like, hey, I’m going to get two books out a year.
Speaker B: There might be bonus books, too, but I’m definitely getting two books out a year they want to expect.
Speaker C: My problem is right now is scheduling the writing time with my young kids and being a single parent.
Speaker C: It’s been a struggle getting that writing time in because, like all my writing times at night and as a parent, by the time it’s 809:00, you’re tired.
Speaker C: You’re tired.
Speaker C: You’re mentally tired, like you just want to turn off.
Speaker C: And especially when you’re planning a suspense thriller you need your brain on.
Speaker B: Yes.
Speaker B: Or your suspension scenes seem really stupid.
Speaker C: Yeah, they my goal is because I don’t know about you, but I always figure out who done it in the beginning.
Speaker C: So my goal is I don’t want anyone to know, so hey.
Speaker C: Really hard.
Speaker B: I was just telling my husband this a couple of days ago.
Speaker B: There are very few books that surprise me, but there’s a book called The Silent Patient by Alex, really long last name.
Speaker C: I love that.
Speaker C: Sorry.
Speaker B: That was perfect.
Speaker B: I think it starts with an M but it’s a really long last name.
Speaker C: Yeah.
Speaker B: And I got it for Christmas like, two years ago.
Speaker B: And I’m like, I read through it and by the time it gets to the twist, it’s going along and I’m like, oh, I’m pretty sure I know what’s happening.
Speaker B: And then the twist happens in that book.
Speaker B: And I’m like, where did that come from?
Speaker B: If you can do that for me, because I will normally guess a guitar that I’m reading through right now.
Speaker B: For example, I knew who she was going to end up with in the first book.
Speaker B: In fact, I was talking to going through singing lessons to help with vocal health and all of that for narrating.
Speaker B: And I was talking to her about it, and I ended the first book.
Speaker B: And I’m like, okay, but I know who she’s going to end up with.
Speaker B: I’m ready for that to happen.
Speaker B: Because I could see that in the first book when it’s just, like, not even romantic teasing, but he would just, like, poke fun at her.
Speaker B: And I’m like, I know how this is going to end.
Speaker B: Get me there.
Speaker B: And my husband, I’m like, I read a lot of romance.
Speaker B: I read a lot of fantasy.
Speaker B: You know they’re going to end up together.
Speaker B: The journey is always different.
Speaker B: I like the different journeys, the different characters.
Speaker B: I like when you throw in an extra dynamic.
Speaker B: Like, you get, like, the BDSM books and you get the there’s the shifter aspect in there.
Speaker B: I like the journey to get there.
Speaker B: You know, they locked eyes across the room.
Speaker B: You know, that’s going to end up being the couple at the end.
Speaker B: But how do they get there?
Speaker B: How do they get from being the enemies to the major couple that everybody talks about?
Speaker B: Like, I like the journey because with.
Speaker C: Tobin and Bo, I threw in there that Tobin also it has a slight on supernatural aspect.
Speaker C: So Toby can see ghosts, and he can also see a whole history of the person, but he hates the gift, so he, like, buries it down so he doesn’t use it to the full scope.
Speaker C: So I have to also work around, why hasn’t he guessed who the killer is?
Speaker C: Yeah, because he should just know.
Speaker C: But I’m talking to a couple of other author friends about it, and she’s like, well, he hates his gift, so why would he know?
Speaker C: He would never really use it unless he’s forced to.
Speaker C: Unless it’s, like, in his face at that point.
Speaker C: That is true.
Speaker C: Thank you for that loophole.
Speaker B: I’m going to move on at that.
Speaker B: You could even throw, like, little he sees a snippet, totally steal this if you want to.
Speaker B: He sees little snippets, but he just shoves it away because he doesn’t want to look further at the little snippets.
Speaker B: He just doesn’t want to happen at all.
Speaker C: Yeah, absolutely.
Speaker C: And then I throw in a ghost in there.
Speaker C: That absolutely annoys him.
Speaker C: That’s supposed to be like his spirit guide.
Speaker C: He’s going to be the spirit guide, but Topin doesn’t want any of it.
Speaker C: He lives on the streets.
Speaker C: He’s a street person, and he doesn’t want any of it.
Speaker C: He just wants to live his life and take care of the kids he’s gathered together on the street.
Speaker C: That’s all he wants.
Speaker C: And he’s drugged in to the middle of this murder mystery.
Speaker C: And then of course, there’s a detective whose bow as it works.
Speaker B: Well, it sounds like you are busy.
Speaker B: So any further parting words for I mean, you’re a newbie author, but any parting words for helping anybody become an author?
Speaker B: Maybe a tip.
Speaker B: Someone may not have thought about being an author that’s been writing for 20 years and uses the same cookie cutter storyline.
Speaker C: You know, I really wish people I’m going to take an example.
Speaker C: There is an author and I absolutely love her work.
Speaker C: I pretty much read everything she puts out.
Speaker C: But at the same time, I have to go take breaks in between her stories because she writes the same characters.
Speaker C: They aren’t different.
Speaker C: It’s a different plotline, it’s a different story, but the characters are the exact same.
Speaker C: If you’re writing a different plotline, you need a different characteristics for your characters.
Speaker C: I know it’s a big struggle.
Speaker C: Yeah.
Speaker C: Like, so they’re very sarcastic, very sarcastic characters.
Speaker C: And I love that.
Speaker C: I love sarcastic, especially done right, especially between main characters that are falling in love.
Speaker C: But if you continuously do that and every single character that you bring no depth.
Speaker C: The awesome story.
Speaker C: I love this plot.
Speaker C: I love how different it is that the characters are exactly the same characters from the story.
Speaker C: I feel like I’m reading the same story.
Speaker B: So as you write more books, think, how can I make this different from the previous one?
Speaker B: Yeah, I feel like especially if it’s a series, how do I build on?
Speaker B: Like, for me reading series, each book in the series should build.
Speaker B: It should always be more intense than the book before it.
Speaker B: It should constantly build.
Speaker B: Eventually in a fantasy, you’re eventually going to get to the big battle at the end or the big thing at the end.
Speaker B: So you got to figure out how to think somewhat plan.
Speaker B: Even if you’re a Panther, you can have somewhat of a plan in place for how is the next book going to top the book before it.
Speaker B: And in a series, you’re just a little bit different because it is a series.
Speaker B: Yes, it is a series, yes.
Speaker B: In that they’re all part of the same family, but they are standalone.
Speaker B: And while you’re going to miss some of the family dynamic, if you didn’t read the other books before, you could read the book and kind of get caught up.
Speaker B: But if you’re writing a, you know, same characters are the main characters throughout the entire series, what situations can happen to build on what happened before?
Speaker C: Yeah, I’m not going to name the author because again, I really do like their works.
Speaker C: But like, they threw out a Demon series.
Speaker C: Two main characters, totally different series.
Speaker C: Then they had another series that had like a killer in it, but you couldn’t tell from the Demon series and the killer series, they don’t overlap.
Speaker C: They’re totally different worlds.
Speaker C: Everything but the characters were exactly the same, except different names.
Speaker C: That doesn’t bring I don’t feel like that’s Range.
Speaker C: Yes.
Speaker C: Totally different plotlines and everything, but the characters are exactly the same.
Speaker C: And someone who binge reads authors backlog.
Speaker C: That kind of like, ruined.
Speaker C: I Don’t Know.
Speaker C: You know what I’m talking about.
Speaker B: Yeah.
Speaker C: I want to read your character.
Speaker C: You need to be different characters.
Speaker C: I feel like that’s the thing.
Speaker C: Like I hope when I’m writing mason you don’t think nathan, you know what I mean?
Speaker B: Well, Nathan was kind of like the cocky little brother.
Speaker B: At least that’s the voice that I kind of gave him was like the cocky little famous, and I know it.
Speaker B: And I can just hire people to do this.
Speaker B: Yes.
Speaker C: And when someone actually reads his book and you’re no longer with Nathan, and when you read Mason, I hope you get that same energy of you know what I mean?
Speaker C: Your characters need to be different.
Speaker C: No matter.
Speaker C: You need different voices.
Speaker C: Voices for your character.
Speaker C: They can’t just because it’s a different series.
Speaker B: This is why I track voices that I use, which I don’t know.
Speaker B: I don’t know that we talked about me doing the whole series or not.
Speaker B: And it’s fine if you want other people to do the whole series, but regardless, I keep track of these character voices so that if you do want me to do the next book in the series, I can use that character’s voice for that character to a certain extent, because I know one of the males I used a really deep voice.
Speaker B: Hurts my throat.
Speaker B: I have to rethink that.
Speaker B: Yeah, well, I have another author that it’s mafia books, but they’re kind of interconnected.
Speaker B: But not but I told her upfront.
Speaker B: I’m going to have to basically use the same voices because I can’t maintain and she, from the very beginning, was like, yeah, she tried to narrate her own books and decided there’s no way she was ever going to be able to do that.
Speaker B: I never even thought about that.
Speaker B: Now she pays other people to do it, which I’m totally cool with, but, yeah, I’m contracted on this.
Speaker B: I think it’s a five book series following these different mafia characters.
Speaker B: But yeah, I was like, I can use the same voices in books, but using one character’s voice to do a whole book, that’s a really hard to make voice is rough.
Speaker C: Yeah.
Speaker B: As a female who doesn’t have a deep voice, doing the deeper voices is rough on the throat.
Speaker C: Yes, I believe that.
Speaker C: Because when I got to use, I call the God voice on my kids because my husband’s not here right now.
Speaker C: I Feel that.
Speaker C: Boys.
Speaker B: All right.
Speaker B: Well, I think we are about done.
Speaker B: I want to say thank you.
Speaker B: I know we had to reschedule, but thank you so much for finally getting on here.
Speaker B: I want to say good luck with your writing.
Speaker B: Thank You So Much.
Speaker B: Good luck getting your writing time scheduled.
Speaker B: And I’m sure I’ll see you around.
Speaker B: Tik Tok.
Speaker C: Yes?
Speaker B: You have a good rest of your Saturday.
Speaker C: You too.
Speaker C: Bye.
Speaker B: Bye.
Speaker A: As Ali got older, she loved stories with shifters.
Speaker A: Her favorite were werewolves.
Speaker A: The first known story of a werewolf comes from Greek mythology.
Speaker A: In Greek mythology, Liikon was a king of Arcadia who, in the most popular version of the myth, tested Zeus omniscience by serving him the roasted flesh of Liekone’s own son, Nicamus, in order to see whether Zeus was truly allknowing.
Speaker A: In return for these gruesome deeds, zeus transformed Licorice into a wolf and killed his offspring.
Speaker A: Nctamus was restored to life.
Speaker B: Despite being notorious for his horrific deeds.
Speaker A: Lico was also remembered as a culture hero.
Speaker A: He was believed to have founded the city lycosara, to have established a cult of Zeus lychus and to have started the tradition of the lychian Games, which Pacinous thinks were older than the Panasoniaic Games.
Speaker A: According to Gaius Julius hygiene, Lagoon dedicated the first temple to Hermes of Cyline.
Speaker A: Today we’ll be reading the portion of Ovid’s Metamorphosis that covers the story of Licoin.
Speaker A: Don’t forget, we are also continuing the original story of Beauty and the Beast on our patreon.
Speaker A: The story of LIC.
Speaker D: A bad report about this age had reached our ears.
Speaker D: Hoping that this report was false, I went down from lofty Olympus, and though with God I walked on Earth in human guise, it would take a long time to relate how much evil I found everywhere.
Speaker D: The report was not as bad as the truth.
Speaker D: I traversed the mountains of Manolas frightful with the hiding places of wild beasts and the pine forests of Chilege and Celine.
Speaker D: Here is the throne and the hostile palace of the Arcadian King.
Speaker D: I went in at the time when the late shadows were drawing on the night.
Speaker D: I gave signs that a god had arrived and the people began to worship me.
Speaker D: At first, Licorice ridiculed the pious offerings.
Speaker D: Soon, he said, I’m going to find.
Speaker A: Out by means of a guaranteed test whether this is a god or a mortal.
Speaker A: The truth will not be in doubt.
Speaker D: He prepared to kill me.
Speaker D: At night, while I was heavy with unexpected sleep.
Speaker D: He settled on the test of the truth, but he was not content with it.
Speaker D: With a knife, he slit the throat of a hostage sent from the Malaysian tribe and softened his limbs, though not yet fully dead, by boiling some of them and roasting others in the fire.
Speaker D: As soon as he placed this meal on the table for me, I used my avenging thunderbolt to overturn the palace on its penalties.
Speaker D: They were worthy of their master.
Speaker D: Licon himself led in terror.
Speaker D: When he had come to the deserted reaches of the countryside, he held and tried in vain to speak.
Speaker D: As a result of his own nature, his appearance took on a kind of madness and he exercised against the flocks the lust for slaughter to which he had become accustomed.
Speaker D: He began to take pleasure in blood.
Speaker D: His clothes became FIR and his arms turned into legs.
Speaker D: He became a wolf, but he kept vestiges of his former self.
Speaker D: There was the same grayness and the same fury about his face.
Speaker D: The same eyes shone in his head.
Speaker D: He had the same appearance of fierceness.
Speaker A: Thank you for joining Freya’s fairy tales.
Speaker A: Be sure to come back next week to hear Gabriel’s journey to holding his own fairy tale in his hands and to hear one of his favorite fairy tales.
