My Chandler's Ford Today post this week is part 2 of my interview with paranormal historical fiction writer, Jennifer C Wilson, author of the Kindred Spirits series. She talks about the joys and woes of writing ghost stories/crossing genres. If you are looking for ghost stories that are a bit different, do check out her series. There are two books so far: Kindred Spirits: Tower of London and Kindred Spirits: Royal Mile. The former "stars" Richard III and the latter Mary, Queen of Scots. The common link here? Fotheringay Castle - one for happy reasons, the other the complete opposite!
Whatever genre you write in, there will be challenges to overcome and joys to relish! The important point, regardless of whatever genre you write in, is to ask yourself honestly would your story grip someone who doesn't know you and who has discovered your stories by accident? This is where having trusted beta readers can be really useful as they will point out what works and what doesn't. Another good way is to make yourself put your work away for a while before you come back to it and look at it with fresh eyes. It is much easier to read your book as a reader would if you do this.
One thing I did with From Light to Dark and Back Again was use Scrivener to export the book as a .mobi file so I could actually see what it would look like as an ebook. By putting it into this format, I found it easier to pretend I was new to the book and so I could read and edit it far more effectively. (The ability to change formats in Scrivener is one of the things I love about it).
The real challenge to genre writing is to win over readers who are NOT already fans of it. But it is a good challenge and keeps you on your toes as a writer!
Whatever genre you write in, there will be challenges to overcome and joys to relish! The important point, regardless of whatever genre you write in, is to ask yourself honestly would your story grip someone who doesn't know you and who has discovered your stories by accident? This is where having trusted beta readers can be really useful as they will point out what works and what doesn't. Another good way is to make yourself put your work away for a while before you come back to it and look at it with fresh eyes. It is much easier to read your book as a reader would if you do this.
One thing I did with From Light to Dark and Back Again was use Scrivener to export the book as a .mobi file so I could actually see what it would look like as an ebook. By putting it into this format, I found it easier to pretend I was new to the book and so I could read and edit it far more effectively. (The ability to change formats in Scrivener is one of the things I love about it).
The real challenge to genre writing is to win over readers who are NOT already fans of it. But it is a good challenge and keeps you on your toes as a writer!
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