This article is a personal manifesto and an indicator of what to expect when you read my novels.
But first, a story...
When I was first diagnosed with bipolar disorder, one of the first things to go was my ability to read. I couldn't concentrate and reading took so much more time and effort than it ever had before. I didn't complete works frequently and was frustrated with how challenging reading became for me.
How I write is an antidote for that time and any other occasion my bipolar disorder rears its ugly head. I'm writing for the difficult periods, the times where reading is too much of a chore, where the length of the book feels like a slog, where there's too much to concentrate on...I'm writing for people who have a hard time reading. And, of course, I'm writing for myself.
Here's what you can expect from my books, or, at the very least, what my goals for the books to be:
Easy to Read and Simple Language
While I've attempted to throw some higher vocabulary words into my writing sometimes (and they usually get cut in edits), for the most part I'm very straightforward with my word choices and try to keep the narrative language simple. This doesn't mean simple = stupid. And it doesn't mean my writing is middle grade, either (I write for YA and older). It just means I try to make things flow in a way that the reader doesn't stop reading in order to figure out something that trips them up or takes them out of the story. I want people to actually complete my books.
Shorter Length
Although I'm capable of reading 500+ page books if the book is fast-paced and easy to read, most of the time I avoid longer works. Fantasy in particular is a genre of door-stoppers, and it just isn't my cup of tea to devote time to books that sometimes can be bloated with text. There are many books that I feel can be edited down for length, but I also know that there is an audience expectation that longer books are a given in fantasy. As a reader, I tend to avoid longer works because I feel like my time is precious to me, and if I'm devoting my life to pages and pages, the book had better be near perfect. I also think it might be too difficult for me to draw a story out for that long. Who knows, though--things could change in the future!
Medium to Fast Pace
To be honest, I prefer fast pace, but sometimes you have to slow things down a little to embrace the moment, build the world, play around with details, or deepen characterization. But overall, I try to keep my book's pacing more on the brisk side. This is in direct response to the trouble I have reading books that are slower paced that sometimes feel like a slog. I don't want my books to fall into that trap, so I try to have things happen relatively quickly.
A Diverse Cast
It's so important for me as a writer to reflect a world, even in fantasy, that represents the people who live in our real one. I want readers to open my books and find themselves in them. This means people of different colors, different genders, and different sexualities. And I write to normalize all of it. No one should feel ashamed of who they are and I want my books to make readers feel ok with themselves and not alone.
A Touch of Romance
I am not a romance writer--I think it's too difficult--but I always like to have romantic elements in my stories. I've read romance (but I need to read more) to try to take some cues from the pros, and then I think of my own personal wishes when it comes to romance in real life and put them into the story. A romance that feels true can be one of the most pleasurable things to read, and tugs at my heartstrings. Maybe someday in the future I might grow enough to write a romance in its entirety, or maybe I'll do a 180° and write a story that doesn't have one. But for now, in this stage in my life, expect some love in my books.
A Happily Ever After
Fairy tales instilled in me the classic "and they all lived happily ever after" which ended every story. And I loved that as a child...and to this day. This is totally different from how I wrote as a playwright--both Melancholia and In the Hands of Mr. Hyde had bad endings, and they reflect a very negative, tumultuous time in my life. Unless I somehow gather the courage to write horror, I don't want to write stories that end darkly or badly. I like a good HEA with my fantasy because I think it instills hope. Stories can be sad or scary along the way, but in the end, I want things to work out.
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