Please introduce yourself and your book(s)!
I’m Ashley Munoz, I’m an indie author and I write contemporary romance. My debut, Glimmer was published last September. It’s a romantic suspense, centered around a single father trying to get free from his dangerous past, while simultaneously trying to protect the woman he’s just started to fall for.
My second full length novel, Fade– is an interconnected story with my first book, following the secondary characters in their own story.
What Are the Chances is my third novel- cowritten with Brittany Taylor. It’s a fun romantic comedy set in Ireland.
My next novel, ‘The Rest of Me’ is set to release on October 18th. It’s a contemporary romance about a widowed mother of four who seeks healing in a small town of Wyoming.
What is/are the real-life story(ies) behind your book(s)?
Glimmer: Was inspired by a random stranger, riding a motorcycle behind me while I was visiting family in Idaho.
Fade: My heroine’s family is inspired by my very Baptist family and my struggle to fit in with them.
The Rest of Me: It’s inspired by the tragic loss of my father and how I dealt with his grief. The city it’s set in is one that I used to visit regularly as a child. There are specific characters featured in the story that are based on real life friends and family that were specific to my father.
What inspires/inspired your creativity?
Oddly enough, two out of the four books I’ve written were inspired by driving altercations. Someone zooming past in the turning lane, shooting out black exhaust at me…. a motorcyclist bobbing back and forth in the lane, behind me with his feet hovering above the ground. Each of these incidents have inspired a story for me.
How do you deal with creative block?
Driving is my go-to. I live in a very beautiful place, so it’s easy to draw from the landscape.
Do you have tips on choosing titles and covers?
Research some of the bestselling books in the genre your writing- Get feedback before you purchase and make any final decisions. What you think is catchy and eye grabbing might not be to the majority of your demographic.
How do bad reviews and negative feedback affect you and how do you deal with them?
Bad reviews are just apart of the writing process. It’s just like having to edit your novel or proofread it before publishing. There is absolutely no way you’ll publish a book without getting at least one or a dozen negative reviews- because there’s no way to please everyone. Write what’s true to you, ignore the reviews until you’re ready. Then, with a pen handy; take notes. Then shut your computer and walk away from it. Don’t look at it again. Take what you can get from the review- if it’s not constructive; move on. I usually watch something funny after I read a few bad reviews, seems to help.
Do you tend towards personal satisfaction or aim to serve your readers? Do you balance the two and how?
I like to balance the two, but it’s not always easy. As much as I hate to admit this, I actually edited one of my books to have a different outcome for one of my characters after getting five very negative responses to his behavior. My original text was true to me and how I wrote the story, but the genre I write in is very sensitive to things like infidelity. It’s just something to be aware of and after some deliberation, I realized it wasn’t worth getting any more one-star reviews over.
Do you have any creativity tricks?
I like to use the Keep App on my android phone for book ideas, or to just write out parts of a story. With my second novel, I was running into some serious roadblocks with having time to write, but the ideas were flowing like crazy, so one day I just opened my app and turned on the text to speech option and spoke the entire idea into the phone. I do this if I’m listening to a song and a story gets inspired, or some crazy driver passes me and suddenly I’m bubbling with ideas. I always pull over to write them down. I always- always- always stop to jot it down because I guarantee you they won’t ever come back as crisp or clear as the first time the idea hits.
What are your plans for future books?
I have plans to break into the YA/Fantasy genre. I hope to land an agent and pitch it to a publishing company, which will take me out of the indie circuit. However, with that said I plan on continuing to self-publish in the contemporary romance genre.
Tell us some quirky facts about yourself:
I have four children, so getting the time to write is comical and stressful most the time. I wrote my first novel entirely from my phone- into a google doc, while I nursed my newborn. I like to write while munching on flavored Wheat Thins. I don’t like to start new television shows- I prefer to re-watch old ones as often as I can find the time. If I have downtime to start anything new, I prefer reading to television. I have to wash my hands after I type- every single time. Even if my keyboard has just been cloroxed. It’s a weird tick.
Website: http://ashleymunozbooks.com/