Lainey Lockett shares her journey from avid reader to indie romance author, discussing her writing process, the importance of community, and the challenges of balancing life and writing. She emphasizes the significance of developmental editing, building an audience, and utilizing tools. Lainey also highlights her inspirations in the romance genre and offers valuable advice for aspiring authors.

Keywords

Lainey Lockett, indie author, romance writing, writing process, editing, book promotion, author success, Pacific Northwest, cozy romance, writing community

Chapters

00:00 Introduction

00:52 Background

01:44 Discovering Self-Publishing

03:06 Author Heroes

04:17 Definition of Success

05:40 Building an Audience

06:27 Writing Process and Tools

10:56 Editing Process

20:17 ARC Readers and Promotion

24:01 Scrivener for Outlining

30:37 Plotting and Structure

32:53 Balancing Writing

36:19 Setting as a Branding Strategy

39:03 The Best and Worst Writing Advice

41:29 Building an Author Community

44:10 Books and Future Plans

45:37 Where Can You Find Laney?

Recommendations

• The Smutty Authors Support Group on Facebook
• Romancing The Beat by Gwen Hayes
• The Fussy Librarian Newsletter
• The Emotion Thesaurus by Angela Ackerman and Becca Puglisi
• Naughty Words For Nice Writers: A Romance Novel Thesaurus by Cara Bristol
• The Truly Successful Author by Maria Secoy

Guest Links

Instagram | TikTok: @laney_lockett

Amazon author page: https://www.amazon.com/stores/author/B0CCZKVQJY

Host

Instagram | TikTok: @kkalbabooks

Email: k.k.alba.books@gmail.com

Recorded with Riverside.fm.

Music by Denis Pavlov from Pixabay.