If you’re a newsletter reader or have followed me since September, you probably know the answer to this question. I appreciate it when another author shares their low points, so I figured I could share mine.
Ever since Flame For You came out in March 2022, and readers met Quinn Walsh, they’ve asked me if Kayleigh, his little sister, is going to get a book of her own. Look, I might not be in the top ten or have a huge backlist (yet), but my readers are awesome.
I adore my readership.
They are loyal and encouraging, and the fact that I was being asked about Kayleigh’s book gave me the confidence to finish the other books in the series.
Quinn was determined to leave everything behind, until Kayleigh called him asking to meet. Quinn realizes that he should have called it off with his ex, partially based on how she treated his little sister. We see that Kayleigh is adored by Quinn and his friends, and throughout the books, we get glimpses of her and her personality.
She’s emotional and a little all over the place, and in Flame Again, we see that something is up with her when she gives a bunch of her stuff to Quinn to store.
I was so excited about Flame For Foe! Thrilled to be nearing the end of the series, and excited to wrap up threads that were in Flame For You; thought the pairing of Erik and Kayleigh would be interesting and fun and that my readers would love Kayleigh’s story.
“What time are you meeting them?”
“Seven.”
“Kayleigh, its ten minutes past eleven in the morning. What are you going to do?”
“Get ready.” She twirled, kind of danced out of the room.
“You need seven hours to get ready? Bliss isn’t that fancy of a place.”
Kayleigh paused at the door to the guest bedroom. “But I can’t do anything until tonight, anyways. I’ll just wait. While I’m waiting, I’ll get ready and then change my outfit and re-do my make-up.”
But no.
I am so thankful for my readers! Because my core readership got me through this book’s release.
But I lost readers.
For the first time, I got angry emails.
Emails about Kayleigh.
Readers were mad that she ended up with Erik, telling me they thought Erik deserved better. Some emails were wondering why I had to make Kayleigh such a mess and irresponsible and if I was writing neurodiversity, couldn’t I show a character that had ADHD and still had it together?
I mean, yeah I could have… but that’s not this character.
From the beginning, Kayleigh hasn’t had it together. Erik is a morally grey character, and I honestly thought that readers would be upset that I chose not to go into his back story or explain how I left an issue in his past unresolved.
But…no…readers liked Erik. The hate for Kayleigh was strong.
Heart strings, pulled.
With every release in the Bandit Brothers series, I felt like I was sharing more of myself. And that’s true in Kayleigh’s book. The reaction brought up a lot of stuff for me. The call for disability representation is strong but do readers only want disability rep when it’s “pretty?” When it’s plateable? When the FMC has their stuff together? And if that’s true, what does it say about disabled af me, in trying to share more of myself with my readers?
Because most days, I’m a chaotic mess. I don’t have it together and my disabilities affect my writing career, in big and small ways.
ADHD memes are so common, so popular but is it fine as a meme and not to read about how ADHD and can actually affect a person…a character in terms of keeping a job, maintaining stability and having relationships?
Intersection of kink and disability.
I write books with kink in them and some of the feedback was asking me if I thought a neurodivergent person would really have a kinky relationship? If I should write a mentally unstable character engaging in kink?
This brought back …. stuff for me on my own experiences stemming from being disabled in the community and I don’t know, if emotionally I anticipated that. Suddenly, this book that I was so proud of, felt like it was suffocating me with issues that were glaringly personal… even if I was the only one to know that.
Quit.
Like, I can’t quit. Coming back to writing after trauma was tough and a struggle and the fact that I am writing and have books out in the world is a feat of daring and amazement and I am so grateful. I also don’t quit because my internalized ableism that formed over a lifetime of “overcoming” won’t let me – that’s a joke. Ish.
But the next book in the Bandit Brothers Series, Flame For Keeps, features Josie, a FMC with a physical disability… If I’m getting angry emails now, what kind of response am I going to get to a FMC who struggles with her disability and how that affects all the issues of her life but she finds freedom in being a submissive?
The thoughts going through my mind on this, stalled my progress. I would open up that WIP and stare at the screen, be totally frozen.
I would panic, thinking that the words were going to leave me again. I felt afraid of sharing more of myself, through this character and didn’t know what to do.
Gotta write. Pivot.
I had this idea of a series of instant-love, simmering, with pleasure Doms…Doms who were more tender, more “real” than the private operatives in the Bandit Brothers Series and I wanted to try writing first-person – maybe I wanted to be as worlds away as I could be from my current series.
So Mercy’s book, Five Days of Christmas Spice came out and because as much as I can tell myself I don’t need validation, having readers who like your book and want more are an ingredient that helps in this gig.
The thoughts that came up while trying to work on Flame For Keeps aren’t resolved, I’m still struggling with that book but I was able to leave the sting of the response from Flame For Foe and continue on.
Keep going.
You never know what the reader reaction is going to be and as an author, that isn’t mine to dictate. I can write what I want, put the book out there and how readers interact and respond to it isn’t my call.
The only thing I can do is keep going and try to make the next book better in all the ways that I can. I learned so much from Flame For Foe’s release’s – the book that made me want to quit.
