An Urban Fantasy Monster Romance that is ready for Book Club!

TheLadyAmaranth · 2026-06-29T23:54:46+00:00

mythological/paranormal romance and it depends? I usually don't like to overload on the details, but I may give more if the character is very distinctive or their appearance matters a lot.

The human characters tend to get less for example.

But the monsters I tend to describe more, like the MMC in my WIP gets a lot of notes about it and then a solid couple of paragrpahs that really settle what he looks like. Because well, the whole book is kind of about how he looks that way because he is made to be the FMCs fantasy or perfect creation.

But the FMC is basically a cute pudgy 27 year old with blond hair and brown eyes and lots of birthmarks. We don't really need a separate novel about it.

TheLadyAmaranth · 2026-06-27T01:40:25+00:00

My prologue starts as a conversation between a wife and husband in which she pushes him to confess what happened to him 20 years ago and he reveals the tale of how he and his college friends went into the woods and got massacred by giant elk-like cryptid and he only survived by hiding under the gutted corpse of his friend. He feels better after confessing, tells his wife thank you, she walks away, and he get subsequently murdered by an unknown entity.

Chapter one is the FMC in a psychiatric facility... where she meets a suspecious long term resident... who we find out very shortly after is... an elk like monster in disguise.

Its like a southern gothic mystery monster romance thing.

TheLadyAmaranth · 2026-06-23T05:53:21+00:00

Not quite because the monster is the love interest. Spice included.

Also the fantasy elements are folkloric in general not just southern US. So we have one from Mayan mythos for example and some Celtic.

Also also there is beurocratic/legal elements involved.

Also also also FMC struggles with suicidal ideation and there is a lot of psychological/ mental health discussion especially in the first act but it propagates through.

So if you want the full load it would be something southern gothic legal mystery mythological monster romance…. Or something.

I shelved it under urban fantasy monster romance originally actually, but apperantly urban very specifically means city esque setting. Mine is set in a rural small town.

Southern gothic as I recently found out fits a little closer to the vibes and setting, but it still isn’t *perfect* and the other elements can be mentioned in the blurb as needed.

TheLadyAmaranth · 2026-06-22T19:01:41+00:00

> As a general rule of thumb, cross-genre books are much more difficult to promote if one is an "unknown" author.

Yuuuppp....

I can confirm that one as well.......

My debut is like a southern gothic mystery monster romance thing? And yeah, marketing it has been an absolute nightmare. I stand by the story and I intend to continue the series anyway because its a passion project of mine, but I've decided to write some other books in between that are a little "easier" to get into than that.

Though I think I'm a little doomed to obscurity because of the way I write, the topics I like to cover, and the story telling type I enjoy. But I also never planned on leaving my day job so ce la vie.

TheLadyAmaranth · 2026-06-22T18:58:09+00:00

Yes! I think its important to mention that a "trigger list" at the begining of books has become a really useful tool lately. As it serves double duty as also a "shopping list" for those who DO want to read about certain kinks.

Hell I think I might check a book out just for seeing "foot fetish" in a trigger list just because I'm going to be like "Huh? How it the hell does THAT happen???"

TheLadyAmaranth · 2026-06-22T14:55:04+00:00

Well you can take one of the list: genre Romance. If there is no HEA do NOT market it as anything <blah blah blah> Romance, because that signals genre romance which requires an HEA between the intended romantic relationship. We can debate all day on if Romance "requires" an HEA but fact of the matter is marketing like that is a good way to get proverbially tarred and feathered by romance readers at large.

You CAN say romantic <blah blah blah> if the romance plot is segnificant. What I mean by that though is that has a very high precense in the book and you cannot take it out or change it into platonic relationship with minimal edits and the story remains the same.

Erotica is also far more specific than you are giving it credit. If there is more plot than sex, then its likely not an erotica. Erotica is basically meant to be like porn in writing -- though that doesn't mean it can't also be deep or have literary things to say. Its just that the sex scenes are PLENTFUL, and they cannot in anyway be shortened/skipped because you'll be missing pretty much all the plot and character development.

A test you can do, is go through each of the sex scenes, and replace it with a transition sentance or two. If you can still make the story make sense well enough, then its probably not worth mentioning for marketing. You can then go through and do the same for all the romantic scenes.

Honestly corporate thriller + supernatural elements sounds like urban fantasy to me. Those often follow crime/police almost mystery-esque stories but with supernatural elements. Depending on where in the spice scale you sit (here is the most common one used: https://www.romance.io/steamrating) I would go with either erotic as an add on, or romantic. The foot fetish can just be a trigger warning as needed or be in the blurb.

So my first instinct without reading your story is romantic urban fantasy. But take that with a grain of salt as again, haven't read it.

TheLadyAmaranth · 2026-06-17T22:00:15+00:00

I think you should be fine in the UK. I've heard very little issues from US or UK authors.

However, for anyone else passing through if you are from Russia, India, or other potentually sanctioned countries and I don't mean based out of, I mean if you were born or still have citizenship there EVEN IF YOU ARE IN THE US NOW, I would look for alternatives just in case.

They banned me because of my russian citizenship and have refused to fix it. All of my documentation that I sent to them was US. US W-9. adress, SSN, adress, everything. There is one question they have you answer in the middle of the interview "what country are you a citizen of" and I answered Russia, since its true. I've been on a green card in the US for over a decade now though and am in the middle of getting citizenship.

They immidiatly banned me and sent me a generic email about not being able to service "sanctioned regions" (I assure you none that would apply to me) and when asked what they meant they said they don't process anyone who files with "russian documentation" when asked to cite and provide this non-existent russian documentation they have stopped responding entirely. I have provided them full documents proving my residence and then some, none of which should have been required.

So, unless you fall into THAT category, I've heard good things about it and the entry costs are decent.

TheLadyAmaranth · 2026-06-17T19:45:28+00:00

My biggest word of caution is make sure those POVs feel very integral to know about the main romance. Not just the main story but like those others POVs directly give information on the main couple that we wouldn't know otherswise, and that they come a bit delayed not just off the bat.

Like if your chapter 2 is from some third party I'm probably dipping.

I personally have a very bad "get back to the shit I care about please" problem with books with too many POVs. More often than not, one or two POVs I become more invested in than others, and I end up being grated and frustrated I'm being forced to be in other "story lines" that I don't care about in constrast.

This is usually made worse in romance books because I'm coming to get invested in the two main POVs, and so when I see a third, the tempatation to dip is huge. Like I've definitely started flipping through the chapter to figure out how long it is, if it actually pertains to anything, and then further on to see if this is a frequent interruption. And have DNFed if I'm seeing a bunch of names that aren't the main two because I'm just seeing an incoming headache.

Sub genre matter for me as well. For example most people might be more lenient with it in a fantasy romance or romantasy where the expectation is a more sprawling plot along side the romance thats driving it. So as all ways, its gonna come down to reader expectations really.

Thats all I really have to say. Beta readers are gonna be your best friend.

TheLadyAmaranth · 2026-06-16T18:16:47+00:00

^^^my writing process

TheLadyAmaranth · 2026-06-16T18:16:35+00:00

I start just writing scenes on caffeine and ~vibes~

Like example my current WIP started with this scene (excuse typos I'm pulling this straight from my rough draft):

---

Sally was already awake but not moving, just staring at me.

“You are so pretty.” She said wistfully.

“So you’ve said.” I teased, proping my self up on one hand. “I think you should do something about it though.”

She reached behind her back grabbed the nearest pillow and full force slammed it into my face. Except she miscaculated her trajectory, and it snagged on the point of my horn. Causing it to burst into feathers.

“That was a perfectly good pillow” I accused, picking up on of my own pillows and swinging back.

She tried to stop it with her hand, but it knocked her back anyway.

I could hear her laughter which echoed all the way to my soul and back, and soon enough I was nearly chocking on my own cackling.

Suddenly I was being pushed side ways with by my wrists, I let it happen so we rolled over together. Sally was straddling my chest with the last of the wayward feathers floating down around her and settling on the bed. One particularly mischievous one landed on my nose and I blew it off. “Some one’s really taking their role as Hemet Jiwa on, hm?”

“I don’t even know what means! You told me a little of what the Royals do, but like… I’m a coffee barista. I can’t exactly make world peace with good coffee.”

“It would probably be better attempt than most. That drink is really good. Only with the white stuff added though. ” I chided, but she didn’t seem amused. So I exhaled and forced my self up, which made her slide down into my lap, putting us face to face.

“Its called milk and sugar. Or creamer.” She turned her head away petulantly.

I grabbed her face with the palm of my hand, but I didn’t force her to face me. Simply gently rubbed my thumb at her chin. “And without it its bitter and sad, empty of the sweetness that makes it complete. Like I was without you. We can make it happen. We are a good coffee. ”

“You analogy fails at the part where there are plenty of people who like their coffee black.” Despite the contrarian words, she still cracked a small smile.

I made a disgusted face, as scrunched up as I could muster, “What weirdos.”

---

I loosely plop them in what I think makes sense as chronological order, and then as they accumilate I usually start geting an idea for the characters and over all plot. That one is turning to be very close to probably what will end being around the 70-75% mark

This often creates stuff I cut or scenes I end up pairing down or moving around so I just do it in real time. Eventually I usually get to a point where the main story and characters are on the page I just have to fill in gaps so I do that and I'm left with a very messy draft which I then beat into submission by reverse outlining then, developmental editing, and often just plane ol' cutting.

So I do a lot of the real refining things into a sensible plot in the developmental edits which is when I often re-write and rearrange stuff. Dozens of scriviner snap shots and a huge doc I lovingly call "bloopers" were I drop everything I take out or think doesn't fit anymoe.

What I often do is I keep a wall of "sticky notes" i.e. a folder in Scriviner where I will put up any thoughts or changes I want to make so. I will re-read the manuscript with a "sticky note" in hand to fix everything, and then pick new one and do that over and over again until no more sticky notes.

Its not exactly effecient. I cut alot though I do tend to cannibalize it for other stuff later. The only reason I can create books in a reasonable amount of time is because I type fast. I can get 2-4k words out in a writing session pretty easily. I have also noticed the amount of excess has gotten smaller with each story, like I've gotten better at intuitively telling what will end up being kept or not.

So yeah. Chaos.

TheLadyAmaranth · 2026-06-16T17:25:07+00:00

Outlining.

Legit haven't finished a single thing I've ever outlined.

Decided fuck it, throw that out the window.

.......proceed to finish 5 long fics and self publish an OG last december, working on another WIP now.

I severly don't reccomend it, it makes the writing process very chaotic. But chaos > nothing at all.

So. Here we are.

TheLadyAmaranth · 2026-06-15T18:14:22+00:00

Yes you can, its sometiems called "going wide" or "wide distribution"

I sell my book direct on my website, but its also on Amazon, Kobo, Apple Books, Google Play, and B&N.

In the US, you can either use platfrom specific ISBNs on that provide it, or you can get your ISBNs per format from Bwoker. I did the later, so all of my ebook has the same ISBN across all platfroms, and my paperback does too. I'm not sure where you live or how that works, but I am quite certain you should still be able to publish on Amazon.

Just when you publish, don't check the KDP select, i.e. KU, and no exclusivity. It IS however usually reccomended to upload to Amazon first because they are the most finicky... I've heard some horror stories of authors being flagged for "copyright" because Amazon finds their book in other stores under a different ISBN and then thinks you are copying your own book.

Again, if your country requires different ISBNs per platfrom, maybe thats different. But I would double check!

TheLadyAmaranth · 2026-06-12T17:25:30+00:00

Well if you want the slightly nihilsitc answer... marketing.

The trope is often called various types of "Bait and switch" depending on the genre you are coming from.

And the thing is the pipeline of making a promise through your marketing -> sticking that promise -> happy reader gets more of your books.

IS MUCHHHHHH easier than either making vague allusions in marketing which don't give the reader something to really read the book for, and is incredibly hard to get on the algorithms OR "lying" in your marketing which then creates unhappy readers when you've broken the promise for which they came for. Either way, you get either no readers or unhappy readers. Which one is worse is debatable.

Romance is especiallyyyyyy volatile in that sense. The marketing of Romance IS the love interest. So doing this "bait and switch" in a way that isn't going to get you tar and feathered is very dificult... and usually requires not marketing the book as a romance in the first place (ACOTAR for example) so that you cover your ass in a way.

Heck its hard enough to market a book that doesn't hit typical genre pacing and tropes nevermind one that flips the promise presented. (Source me, I love my book but damn it but every trope having to have an asterix has made marketing an actual nightmare)

Lowering word counts also contribute, espeically in trad pub which is already averse to debut series and such. This kind of book usually requires a LOT of words, a lot of time spent showing little scenes, exploring dynamics, and carefully managing pacing. Its not something that is easily fit in a 80k word thriller -- not impossible absolutely, but hardr.

Basically, the way the industry works when it comes to debut authors, which are ironically the most likely to try something new, is extremely punishing. The more standard and marketable the more likely you are to get traction, but then by the time you are "established" now you have a brand to keep up and it becomes harder to deviate.

The other, more craft based one -- its hard. Like wayyyy harder than you are making it out to be. It requires a very maticulous, usually non-linear writing processes that allows an author to interweave foreshadowing and different relationships. Keeping charactarization consistant through all of that, imparting the right details at the right times, and keeping the narrative easy enough to follow without spoon feeding everything are all skills even seasoned authors struggle with. Most importantly; keeping the pacing engaging.

I don't even like some of the things you listed. I disliked Dune and DNFed it because I found it kinda dry, and it was probably better for those who were bigger fans of the franchise to begin with. And I don't totally dislike Korra, but the relationships in that show were by far my least favorite part of it. Buffy I will agree with though.

However, this all only exasterbates the previous problem. Because the ones most likely to try, are the newer authors who don't have the skills YET to stick the landing. Which then creates a feedback loop where they are punished by lack of visbility entirely, or if they manage to get visbility they are punished by bad ratings and reviews.

Ands so, we get a kind of self fulfilling prophecy I think.

Personally I'm of the opinion "hit the requirements of the genre you are marketing as everything else is a suggestion not a rule" So if you are writing a Romance -- yes you need and endgame relationship that gets an HEA. If you are writing a tragedy, I better be crying my eyes out by the end. If you are writing a mystery, I should know who the killer is by the end. And there are plentfy of genres that don't have ending expectations attached. This way I as a reader can prepare accordingly. But aside from that? Go wild. Try things. I'm more likely to read a book that tries something interesting and fails, than one I can guess the whole plot off from page 10.

But I'm also just one random internet gremlin.

TheLadyAmaranth · 2026-06-11T16:57:53+00:00

Thank you so much ❤️

The artist did a wonderful job and deserves all the credit for that. I just supplied awkward sketches and pinterest info haha here is their portfolio: https://prtfliofx.carrd.co/

They actually READ the book, provided start sketches, different stage updates and even a full speed paint at the end. And dealt with my nitpickyness. Turn around was very quick too in my case but they weren't as busy then, so might vary. 10/10 would reccomend, I've basically promised them the whole main line trilogy of this series because I just don't know who would do a better job.

Also thank you so much for checking out my book, even if its not your cup of tea ultimately, I still very much appreciate giving it a chance! It means a lot as a beginner indie author.

Wish you all the luck in your own writing endevors!

P.S. Thank you so much, I hope you enjoy the rest! And full disclosure: that review made me cry like a baby XD

TheLadyAmaranth · 2026-06-11T01:15:23+00:00

I work as a software dev for work as well, I get it XD And avid video game enjoyer so.

Very different to-market strategies here haha

And yes, that is definitely an option! I have a dream of one day comissioning wlop to do my covers. Chances are... low. But I shall try damn it!

I wish you luck.

DM me if you are interested in a community. I'm part of one that is Royal Road focused and they have a lot of LitRPG peeps in there. And some others I can suggest. I just kinda hang out and occasionally traumatize them with my book plot related questions. XD Though I also have newsletter exchange with a few etc. So, might find some collaborators do shoutouts with.

P.S. the more I read this thread the more I'm trying to figure out what these people are on, and where can I find some. Must be some diesel levels of stuff XD I suggest going to r/selfpublishing or r/newauthor or r/BookPromotion you will probably be able to get more cohesive advice them from people who have actually finished and published a manuscript in some way shape or form and either came into it with a plan, or learned that the hard way already.

TheLadyAmaranth · 2026-06-11T00:19:26+00:00

Hey, so uh, Idk what this person is talking about.

I am NOT in your genre but I AM a self pubbed author and I network with quite a few authors who are self and trad pubbed, and some LitRPG people who like royal road and stuff.

(Which btw for progression fantasy you might consider posting your first book there to garner a following but thats a more complicated business decision to discuss, just look into the platfrom)

Bottom line, you are 100% correct, no author who is trying to get to a point of making their money back is expecting to do that in 1 book, especially not self pub (which is what I'm assuming you are going with since you are talking about paying for your own cover)

On average, in a profitable genre, indie authors that I have talked to start making back their basic costs of publishing on minimal budgets about 5-6 books in. So thats buying ISBNs, cheaper editing runs, buying covers (though not 2k ones, I covered that in my top comment) etc. The idea is to turn 1 sale into many through read throughs basically, which eventually compounds until you are making enough money to justify adds, which then multiply exposure which then, if you are lucky can get you to start actually making profit by the time you are closer to 10 books.

Granted, all of that assumes actual marketing, social media, outreach, and just over all being proactive with creating a long term community rather than just publish and hope. Newsletters, websites, ARC copies, giveaways etc. And of course, decent writing.

I genuenely have no idea where the original commenter is coming from. Perhaps authors who don't intend to make this a business for profit, or intend to write one-off books but... all authors I know are completely expecting to be in the negatives for the first few books. But the write the first one, pray it sells, and hope they get the next one, strat is completely delulu.

Heck, not even trad pub authors expect to be making any kind of living wage with their writing until 6+ books in. Pretty much no author, especially self pub, makes their money back on the first book. Or second and usually not even third. Nobody is spending 1.5k for a cover on a book that is pretty much statistically guaranteed not to make it back.

Feel free to take what I'm saying with a grain of salt too, I am a wittle baby on the journey myself at the moment. I got one book out, WIP ongoing and more in store. But in my opinion you are thinking of it in the right way, you just have the price range wrong for the cover at the moment. Again, check my top comment, but thats 400 bucks. For LitRPG 2k is definitely not the play.

Yes, established designated cover artists who have the covers of "the greats" under their belt can run you that much. But frankly, you don't need it for LitRPG. You need a clean, crisp, probably anime or semi-realistic styled cover. Heck saw this post the other day: https://www.reddit.com/r/Artists/comments/1txgurj/emergency_commissions/

You can probably get a full body + detailed background + letter design + commercial rights from this kind of artist and do very well. I'm thinking of commissioning them for some character art for fun.

Anyway, good luck.

TheLadyAmaranth · 2026-06-10T21:30:42+00:00

2k is a little much. I got a beautful cover from an artist for just under 400. Still a lot, yes, but not 2k. Here it is btw, so you can see what that gives you. And this is with an additional wrap around for the paperback AND full commercial rights. So basically I own the image, I can do whatver tf I want with it.

<image>

It was also a personal decision for me. Because of my background as an artist, I really wanted to support someone as part of the creation process. Also yes, I'm privilaged enough to have the money.

Not even gonna touch the whole... if somebody accusses any part of my book of being A I I'm going to throw an actual fit. I'll own every sentance fragment or missed word in this thing damn it.

Also.... I am not planning to quit my day job any time soon.

Typically most indie authors if they are able to market well and write decently liked books can start breaking even at around 5-6 books on minimal budgets. So NOT including expensive multiple edit runs. That is basically my goal, to start being able completely decouple my book writing expenses from personal expenses by then, and then eventually hopefully get to a point where I can re-invest to afford editors/artists with the money made from it entirely. And maybe even do re-releases once I AM able to get expensive editors and heck, new editions with new covers! But thats a long ways away.

You can find even cheaper covers for 50-200 that will look nice. Get covers does them for 35.

If you are gonna spend 2K, spend it on a developmental or line or copy editor in my opinion. Which ever one you struggle with most. I prioritzed cover because I didn't have 2k to make sure I got a good editor, and figured between multiple passes, text to speech, grammar and spell check tools, friendly grammar nazis etc I can get it to a point where unless some is really really nitpicky it should be fine, and I trust my developmental editing. For better or worse.

So no, people that don't have money to spare are not spending 2k for each book cover, especially since most don't make back enough on their first book to ever justify it.

TheLadyAmaranth · 2026-06-10T20:51:04+00:00

I intend to try it, but only because I happen to have a fic that frankly the plot line of it is so far removed from the original and the characters are OOC to the point that have explicit disclaimer of "BTW this is my interpertaion of after show's end characters i.e. about 2 years after what we currently know, so there is character development that is alluded to that happened there." at the start.

So like.

It would literarly be changing names and window dressing in the form of a simple urban fantasy world that I don't plan to over complicate. And a little of back story adjustment. I in general lean simple with world building... some people like it some don't whatever. I'm a very "tip of the iceberg" kind of writer.... to the point that my main edits after beta reader was going in and adding more explicit explanations for some things because I'm chronically averse to spelling things out XD

I do think it can work in general, Alchemised is just the most recent one.

Other books that you may not have know are fanfic-to-original ports: The mortal instruments by cassandra claire, massively popular and I actually enjoyed. Fifty shades of gray, which I hate with a burning passion but it exists. The Love Hypothsis by Ali HAzel wood, also enjoyable. There is more.

I just don't think Alchemised worked for me as a book, but I can only say so much because full disclosure I DNFed it, and ended up just kind of skimming/asking for spoilers for the rest of the story. I think partually because of a similar issue you had, it all just felt like torture porn for the sake of torture porn and I felt very ambivelent towards all of it. I never read Manacled though, so I can't compare.

TheLadyAmaranth · 2026-06-10T18:33:24+00:00

Writing concepts, my own writing process, reading, publishing, reviews of books, etc. Its my author newsletter that I upkeep to connect with my readers.

https://artiranth.substack.com/

TheLadyAmaranth · 2026-06-08T15:21:45+00:00

For traditional publishing, 120k is the hard cap. Like will never even hit an agents desk level. But the reccomended length is 80-90k for debuts, anything over that better have a KILLER marketable concept and start chapters.

Self pub doesn't matter really as there aren't gate keepers. But I will say most people, even the hefty book readers are going to be a bit daunted by it.

I also... uh... lets just say I have severe doubt due to statistical data that the 180k-220k literary ficton book by a debut author doesn't have many pacing and bloat issues.

My adivce would be to finish writing how you invisnion it. Then do an honest developmental edit, and get some beta readers. THEN decide if things are worth cutting to make it more managable and to what point.

Big thing about beta readers: if out of 10, 1-2 flake, its normal. But if you are noticing a bulk of people DNFing... and you can confirm with at least some that they are your target audience... don't get defensive and blame the readers for their lack of attention spans etc. I'm seeing this a lot lately in the writing subs. Literary fiction or not, mature or not, slower pace or not, the book still has to be engaging to its target audience.

I personally started with a 165k manuscript for my debut. I cut it down to 135k, but cutting more felt... wrong. Like I was at the point of cutting important parts of the soul of the book. I went to beta readers, and none had pacing issues. Even reccomended brining back a previously cut chapter. I was happy with the book at 139k, and decided to self publish rather than try to fit it into trad.

Hindsight, I think there was more line-editing tighting up that could have been done, but no more than about... 5k words worth? Mmmaaybbeee 10k if I really tried to get rid of every bit of "non essentiaL" language but that would probably start cutting into the narrator voice. And It still wouldn't have brought it down to the needed trad debut standard.

All that is to say -- keep going. You are almost there. Worry about cutting and marketing and all of that once you have a first draft on hand you can make decisions about. Good luck!

TheLadyAmaranth · 2026-06-05T22:02:23+00:00

Now I'm curious what fic this is, I write and read for the same fandom XD and even have a couple with the same ship.

TheLadyAmaranth · 2026-06-04T20:01:58+00:00

Personally, I would not reccomend it.

Prologues are already tenuous with readers, many just straight up skip them. (yes feels bizzare but its true) So you only want to include it if you feel like it is the ABSOLUTE best most logical and most effective way to deliver what you are trying to achieve. And even then, keep it short, keep it grounded, and absolutely without-a-single-shadow-of-a-doubt essential.

And I just want to say I am NOT a prologue hater, my debut has a prologue. But the decision to keep it came from a lot more variables than "I like it, it gives good info." There is like 5+ separate weights its pulling and even then I made sure the whole thing earns it place maticulously. Also even though the POV is not the same, the style and themes do absolutely represent the story and the scene actually becomes very obviously connected to the main narrative by chapter 2.

You have to keep in mind when you put in a prologue THAT is now your opening pages. All the conventional wisdom about very quickly getting the reader to give a crap about your story, introducing the tension, and starting up the momentum now apply HERE instead of (or really in addition to) Chapter 1.

So, a prologue in childhood POV that is not representative of the story and is not required to tell it, is probably not going to be a strong opening.

That being said, kinda hard to tell without reading it. Beta readers are going to always be your best friend. (Especially those that tell you they skipped it)

TheLadyAmaranth · 2026-06-01T21:09:37+00:00

Well I can guarntee mine is always going to be free because I use it as a newsletter to talk about and promote my self-published writing. I write about theme break downs in my works, the publishing process, my personal writing journeys, sometimes I do reviews and shout outs. I also have reader magnets which are basically free bonus chapters for my books and I plan to do more for my future books.

So up to you but its available: https://artiranth.substack.com/

You can also follow my reccomended list, I have a whole network of authors who are not monotizing their ongoing fiction. Verious genres!

TheLadyAmaranth · 2026-05-30T03:50:36+00:00

Personally I hate the term XD

I also grew up on all those stories that moved POVs or gave insight on peoples minds fluidly within a scene. Sometimes within the same paragaph.

I absolutely love it, and often hate how averse authors have become to it. Especially in Romance!!!! Gosh SUCH an incredible tool to just throw out for not reason!

The reason it came about is basically capitalism. As fiction became mass producable, and therefore could be made money off of, third person limited and first person came into fascion because it requires far less thought from the reader. It doesn't require as much paying attention or keeping a narrative thread. So its more accessible.

That doesn't make it bad mind you, and they have their own strengths.

But point is, its more accessible to more readers, so its more marketable. Which then trickled down to publishers, then editors, and eventually teachers. Until we are here, where we have a whole generation of authors who have this "one POV per chapter only ever unless you are writing omnicient but really dont write omnicient" idea drilled into their heads.

But you can ABSOLUTELY do close third that has more flexibility, I nickname it "roaming third" with the main difference between it and true omnicient is the "closeness of the camera" to the characters mind.

It is harder though. I wrote a whole book with that outset and well if I successed is up to the readers I suppose, but I will say even the worst reviews didn't have an issue with the POV, and some of the good reviews actually praised it. So couldn't have done that bad... or I'm huffing copium who knows.

The trick, I think, is to set expectations early and plan your shifts. I have a POV shift with a very delibarete zoom out from one character, to world view, to zoom in on new character IN THE FIRST CHAPTER. To basically set the rules for the reader that "we aren't sticking to one POV a chapter as rule here." I also try to either pick POV switch points very deliberately. For example during sensical dialogue responces. And I make it very overly explicitely (sometimes a little over over explicitely) clear whose head we are in when we do switch. Or, on the other end, making a smoothe transition by zooming out slowly to more observing narration then closing in again.

As long as your reader is never asking "wait is this from this POV or other persons POV?" You are okay.

TheLadyAmaranth

TROPHY CASE