Marketing with Mandy~ Author Kayelle Allen
Q: Tell us a little about your experience with Liquid Silver Books.
A: I have published five books with Liquid Silver, two erotic romances and three Molten Silver romances, which are a step up in heat level. The editing staff is top notch, headed by Terri Schaefer. April Martinez is well known as a cover artist, and she heads the art department for LSB. Mike Feury runs the forums and websites and does the technical aspects of everything. He’s known as the Silver Seer. Raven Moore is the head honcho, and is treated like the queen that she is. Solid professionals, every one of them. And the authors are like sisters and brothers to me. I have a great amount of respect for all of them.
Q: What tips/tricks do you use for marketing or promoting your own titles?
A: I ally with others. I’d say that’s my only real secret — that I constantly invite others to join me. I can’t possibly tell everyone about my writing, so I let other authors come and play in my sandbox at Romance Lives Forever, my yahoo group. They in turn tell their readers, who end up learning all about me. Clever, huh? And the friends I’ve made over the years have been priceless.
Q: What is one thing you’d want to tell a newer author, just coming into the game?
A: Never let anyone steal your dream. There is always someone willing to tell you it can’t be done. If you listen to them, you will get nowhere. Instead, listen to your dream.
Q: Could you tell us a bit about your latest release?
A: I’d be happy to. Jawk, Tales of the Chosen is the final book in a trilogy. The blurb is, “Pleasure. Trust. Possession. Is a betrayal of the heart forever? Jawk Brighton works at Batchelors, a hip restaurant/club in the Top Tier district of Tarth City, where he meets the immortal Luc Saint-Cyr. When Luc offers Jawk a deal too good to pass up, one night showing him and his Chosen, Wulf Gabriel, a good time in exchange for eight times his usual pay, Jawk takes it. All three have secret agendas. The question is, will Jawk’s keep him in Luc and Wulf’s shared bed, or tear apart the alliance of the immortal and his Chosen — forever?” This is my fifth book set in the Tarthian Empire, and it will challenge everything readers know. I can’t wait to see reactions once it’s out.
Q: What’s your favorite genre to write in and why?
A: Science Fiction, because I love world-building. I spent years developing the universe for my books, even writing Felis, the language of the Kin people, a feline-humanoid race. In Felis, “te shree tu,” is “I love you,” and “kahmay te hahr” is “hero of my heart.” My current book, Jawk, has a fifteen-page glossary in the back. The glossary is also available on my website. Although only a few words are used in the book, and in one way or another, all are translated within the context of the story, it helps to have a reference. The Kin can smell emotions, and included in the glossary is a listing of what major emotions smell like. Can you guess what bittersweet chocolate represents?
Q: What types of research do you do for your books?
A: I studied drumming for a character in my current WIP, studied language development and how speech is created within the mouth so I could invent Felis. To a certain extent (as needed for a book), I’ve also studied genetics, rainforests, grizzly bears (for the kweeoh on the Kin homeworld), gems, role-playing games, male prostitution (that was for Khyff, the hero of For Women Only), and professional thieves (for Senth, the union thief in At the Mercy of Her Pleasure). I read everything I can, and Google is my best friend. I’ve been working on ideas for a series about rock groups in the Tarthian Empire as well, so I’ve studied music, and have written lyrics for several songs that will be used in the series. Can’t play an instrument though, unless you count iTunes and the radio. If you do, then I’m very versatile, as I can play desktop, Nano, PDA, AM and FM!
Q: Why do you like writing romance/erotica?
A: Writing Erotica is like getting to color with all the crayons in the box. I could never go back to eight simple colors. They are beautiful, and simplicity has its place, but I live in a larger world, and I want to express it in my writing. I also write M/M, or gay romance. Once I stepped outside the boundaries I had set for myself, I discovered the world was so much bigger than I’d imagined. I could never go back to that little bitty box. One of my characters is asked in Jawk, “You really think outside the box, don’t you?” and he responds, “What box?” Exactly.
LINKS:
http://kayelleallen.com
http://myspace.com/romancelivesforever
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/romancelivesforever
