Hey guys and welcome back to Ella Writes! (I actually almost wrote The Quoted Blog because I'm so used to that.)
Today I'm going to answer some frequently asked/questions I want to answer about the book I'm currently writing!! So, let's get into it...
1. What is your book about?
I'm currently writing a Christian fiction book! Every time I tell someone that I'm writing a book, they ask this question, and I never know how to explain it to them because I haven't finished writing it. So, what if I explain the wrong thing, or it sounds weird?
But, all I can share is that this book follows a girl named Willa who wakes up to a normal day, when everything quickly starts going wrong. She meets the mayor's son, and begins to learn a scary truth about the mayor, who has been experimenting on Christian's to find a way to...(I don't know if I'm ready to share that plot point yet, but let this infinity sign be a guess to how that sentence ends: ♾) And the book follows Willa as her and her boyfriend, Oliver, meet the mayor's son and find a way to stop the mayor from hurting more people!
That's my best explanation right now.
I promise once the book is finished, and I've written a synopsis, it will make so much more sense.
Right now there's just so much stuff in my book that happens, so I don't exactly know how I want to explain it yet.
But, yeah! Moving on to the next question...
2. Who are some of the characters?
-Willa Pierce: a seventeen-year-old curly blond-haired girl! Her character is inspired by a girl named Cia that I follow on Instagram. (I will put a picture of her down below)
-Oliver Goodwin: Has curly brown hair and brown eyes! Oliver's character is solely dedicated to my guinea pig that pass away in April of 2022. I love him so much, and I just needed to write a character dedicated to him. Also, I love the name Oliver so much.
Oliver Goodwin is Willa's boyfriend at the beginning of the book. And, if I had to choose a person that I think looks like his character it would probably be Joshua Bassett. I did not do that on purpose. I promise I wasn't thinking about Joshua Bassett when I wrote this character haha..
-Cam Walton: Has blond hair and blue eyes. He's also almost the antagonist at the beginning, but the real antagonist of the book is his father. His character was 100% inspired by my favorite character in the Unwind Dystology by Neal Shusterman. Also, he's inspired by someone I know in real life. I will never reveal who that is, lol, but, in my mind, he looks like Jacks from Once Upon a Broken Heart by Stephanie Garber. Or Keefe Sencen from Keeper of the Lost Cities by Shannon Messenger. Basically a bunch of different guys in one.
Those are all of the characters I'm going to share with you right now! There are obviously several more, including the antagonist: Mayor Walton.
But these three characters are like the main ones!
3. What genres would you say this book is and does it have a name yet?
This book is Christian fiction along with a little bit of almost dystopian and mystery sprinkled in. And, no, I do not have a name for it yet! I'm still trying to decide that. With my first book, Quoted, the name just kind of came to me, but with this book, I'm not sure what name stands out to me yet.
Right now I'm trying to choose between Finding Forgiveness and Called By Name, but ultimately I have no idea what the final book is going to be called.
4. What does the writing process look like for this book?
If you didn't know, before I wrote Quoted, I tried to write a fiction book. I actually started several, but quickly got stuck and had no idea how I was going to finish them.
However, after writing my devotional, I decided I was finally ready to write my first fiction book.
I've written so many short stories in the past, and I can definitely clarify that short stories are the easiest to write, but I didn't want to write a book of short stories. I wanted to write an actual fiction book because I've read so many good ones, and I just want to write something that teaches someone an important lesson, while also being enjoyable and exciting to read.
So, the idea for this book kinda just came to me one day, and I sat down to start planning it out. I actually started writing another version of this book where it was set in the U.K., and the characters traveled from the U.S. on this sort of mission to save Christians from being persecuted.
But that version of this book fell flat for me. I didn't really like it, and I wanted to write something that felt more modern.
When I started writing this book, I did not have an outline. I did, however, start an outline not too far into it because I've learned how important they are. If you are going to write a book, you have to have an outline. Otherwise you're going to start writing something, thinking that you have a final idea, and then you're going to get stuck and start over and over, trying to find the right story, and you're never going to finish anything.
Also, another thing to note is, when you start writing something, it's going to look like a mess. It's not going to look all pretty and organized. It's going to feel like a lot, but you have to keep writing.
It took me a while to even get to this point where I could finally sit down and write something, knowing where I was going next. And I'm not one of those people who writes every single day. I only write when I'm in the mood for it because I don't want to write something that I'm going to completely regret. I want to spend time on what I'm writing, and really focus on it.
5. How do you self-publish your books?
My first book, Quoted, was actually published through Christian Faith Publishing. And I loved getting to see what it was like to publish using an actual publisher. However, I still designed the cover to my book. The only thing they did was edit it, format it, and get it out there.
That was really cool, but after publishing that book, I started playing around with Amazon Kindle Publishing, and after publishing a few journals and a Christmas book written with my friends Meredith Hahn and Rebecca Thompson, I realized that it wouldn't be hard to publish my own books.
Now, my first book is 800 pages long, so that's ultimately why I used a publisher because it would have taken me way too long to format that myself. But, self-publishing is overall way cheaper, and you can do things on your own timing.
I'm a get-thing-done type of person. I don't sit around and do nothing. I have priorities, and I make to-do lists. It's annoying when things don't go how I want them to, but I know they aren't always going to go like that.
Anyway, I like to set my own deadlines on my projects. For example, I planned out all of season ten of The Quoted Podcast months before I started recording with people. I wanted to know what I was doing before I did it. And, I actually just planned out a book launch for my next book before even finishing the book itself.
I love to plan ahead, and I love to make my own deadlines. (Not with school of course, but with my own hobbies.) That's another reason why I read so much. I learned that if I read 100 pages a day, I could finish a book in two or three days, and I love doing that because I get to read more.
So, I self-publish my books using Amazon Kindle Publishing. That's what I plan on doing for at least my next two books. (And yes, I did start working on book four. It's going to be a Christian thriller.)
And the only sad thing about that is I have no idea if my books will ever be in a book store. But I do look forward to the day that I finally accomplish that because that's another dream of mine.
Right now, it's KDP. And if you have any questions at all about how to publish using KDP, I might be able to answer some of them! I haven't published a whole 200 page book in there yet, but I will with the one I'm writing now.
One more thing: I make my own covers using Canva. It's so easy and simple! Also you can use Canva for free! I have used Canva Pro many times, but I also love the free templates they have. But, my next cover is probably going to be designed by my friend Meredith who is a really talented artist!
6. When is your next book coming out?
This is the last question I'm going to answer for this blog post!
None of this is set in stone yet, but as I have written before, I love to plan ahead. So, I want to publish my next book on April 3rd, 2024. That's the day that my guinea pig, Oliver passed away. I don't know his birthday, otherwise I would make that my publishing date. But, I just really wanted to dedicate this book to him, and publish on a day that I always just remember how much I miss him and love him.
Also, publishing something you've put a lot of work into on a special day is just special!
I plan on finishing my book this summer, and for the rest of the year I will be working on getting it published. I actually have what I think is about half of it written right now! I've made good progress so far, but school has kinda gotten in the way of my writing time.
Mark your calendars for April 3rd, 2024, and stay tuned for more information coming soon! I will of course be putting a lot of updates on here and my Instagram about my book. And I will let you know if the publishing date is changed!
Those are all of the questions I'm going to answer today! As always, comment down below, email me at guineapigfuzz@gmail.com, or dm me on Instagram @thequotedpodcast if you have any more questions!
And remember, I'm not an expert on book writing. I've always wanted to be an author, and the fact that I'm finally able to write books just makes me so excited and happy for the future! I want my writing to just encourage others and remind them of God's truth! I'm ultimately writing for God, but I'm also glad to be able to share what I write with you!!
Thank you for reading this blog post! And stay tuned for this book and season eleven of The Quoted Podcast!! ~Ella