Meet The Authors Showcase Edition #1 (1 of 3)

A showcase with @Julie Midnight, author of Wolf's Kin

1 what inspired the idea of your story? 

This is part of a series, so I'll go with what inspired the entire series, which is about a woman recovering from an abusive relationship while falling in love with a werewolf. I was really fascinated with the idea of someone being unafraid of a literal monster from the woods because she was used to living with someone who was much worse. From there, the idea grew into a romance that's now spanned three books!

2 what is something you struggled constructing with your story?

Everything, haha! I have rotten self-esteem and always doubt what I'm doing, so writing is a constant struggle. I guess the toughest part of Wolf's Kin has been adding more action to the mix and trying to balance it with the romance and horror. 

I try to work on my weak points as a writer and improve my craft with each story, but I really took a leap with this one and it's been HARD. I don't think I've felt confident writing anything beside the sex scenes. But at the very least, I'm learning a lot and hopefully readers are getting a good story out of it.

 3 what did you enjoy writing most of your story?

The fact that I'm writing it. I've had the idea for Wolf's Kin in mind since late 2017 but didn't make it my main focus until 2019. It feels really good to post a chapter and realize I'm that much closer to finishing it

 4 what's the overall response of your story from your readers? 

I'm getting amazing responses from readers, and I'm so blown away and grateful by that. Wolf's Kin is pretty different from the previous two books—way more characters, deeper worldbuilding, more action—so I wasn't about to blame anyone for disliking the changes and dropping it. But readers are really loving it and that makes me so happy!

5 is your story a stand alone novel or a piece of a series ? 

It's the third book in my erotic paranormal series Monstrous Hearts. It could probably be read as a standalone, but I think you'd get a better sense of the main character's growth if you started with the first story.

6 what would you like your readers to take away from your story?

For a while, books were the only source of happiness I had, and my biggest dream is to write stories that can give others the type of comfort and escapism that I'd feel when reading my favorites. 

On a more technical level, I like using themes to drive a story, and this one continues the previous story's themes about the anger of being used by someone you're supposed to be able to trust—mostly in how it can be a rough journey to make peace with the past and move forward, and how you can be more than what they thought you were and more than what they used you as.

In the end, if someone finds my stuff and is entertained by it on any level, then I'm fucking stoked.

 7 what advice would you provide to fellow writers, when it comes to focusing on their own story?

Being a writer can be brutal to your self-esteem, so I think it's really important to hold onto what you love about telling stories. It's so easy to get worn down by self-doubt, passing trends, or feeling like you'll never reach your goals. Fuck all that. Focus on the spark that made you decide to start writing, because it'll keep you going if you look after it.

 8 does your main character share any similarities to yourself?

Alice's emotional struggles are definitely inspired by my own. This entire series began as self-therapy after I got out of an abusive relationship, so sometimes it's really hard to work on this story for reasons that have nothing to do with the actual writing. It's rough to explore myself and my past and turn it into writing fuel, but it's also unbelievably cathartic and helps me face things instead of ignoring or hiding from them.

 It also means that there are some obvious similarities, but I'm fine with that. Anyone who knows me will also know why, and as for anyone who only knows my writing and criticizes it for having a Mary Sue... eh, I'm an erotica writer. I've developed a thick skin by now.

 9 what is something about your story you believe would draw in new readers? 

I'm not sure! This is the third book in a series, so it's probably being read by people who already knew about the first two. I hope any new readers would enjoy the romance and the action.

10 do you have any future projects?

I have SO MANY future projects. For this series, I'm super excited to write some side novels that focus on secondary characters: Gretchen and Shane for fans of Wolf's Bane, Ambrose from Wolf's Kin, and possibly Adair from Wolf's Kin as well.