C. Steven: Hi. Today, The Writer’s Mind is visiting with Julia Kelly. Julia is an author, a romance author. She's written something called The Governess Series. She's written under Julia Blake as The Game Changer Series. She has something called The One Week Series, which she co-authors with Alexis Anne and Audra North and Alexandra Haughton, I hope.

Julia: Yeah.

C. Steven: Yep. She does a podcast with Alexis Anne and Mary Chris Escobar. She's a journalist. She's part of, a creator of HBIC Nation, which I'm going to guess HBIC stands for Head Bitch In Charge.

Julia: It does.

C. Steven: Of course. And I guess my first question is, why are you such an underachiever?

Julia: I don't know. I just, I keep needing to fill my day with things.

C. Steven: I'm obviously very impressed. I mean, this is an incredible resume just in the creative world. And on top of all this, you have a full-time job too, right, or you did?

Julia: I did. Yes, I just left my full-time job. I'm making a big move from New York City to London, so it's time for a little upheaval. So, I figure why not move and change professions and write some books all at the same time.

C. Steven: Okay, well, why not? So, how did you get started? Where did you grow up, first? Did you grow up here in the states or...?

Julia: I did, yeah. I grew up in Los Angeles actually, so I was kind of surrounded by the movie industry and everything related. Or is that right outside or...

C. Steven: That's my window. Actually I...

Julia: There we go.

C. Steven: Yeah, I live in the San Fernando Valley, so, as I tell people, talk slower. But...

Julia: So, I grew up from Pasadena, and was an avid reader all through my childhood, and was one of those kids who wrote, you know, scribbled away during classes and, you know, in free time, I always knew that I wanted to write. And it wasn't really until I got to graduate school, though, that I started taking it seriously. I was in grad school for journalism and just thought, if I have to write another nonfiction thing related to my master's project, I'm probably going to scream. So, I turn to what I really enjoyed reading in my downtime. And that was romance, you know, it was historical romance in particular. I had a lot of training as what I thought I was going to be a historian, and a professor when I was in college and decided to go a different route. So, it seemed like a natural decision to kind of blend the writing side and the history side and start writing historical romance. And it has kind of all spiraled out from there.

C. Steven: Now I'm going to reveal something that I haven't revealed to anyone other than my wife. About, oh, I don't know, a long time ago, maybe 10, a little over 10 years ago probably, a friend of mine, I was complaining about the commute. Because again, in Los Angeles, it's a terrible place. I was complaining about the commute, and I said, "Hey, I'm gonna try, you know, books on tape." And he says, "Oh, I've got a great book for you. It's a time travel story." And I was like, "Well, I'm a sucker for a time travel story. Are you kidding?" So, I put in this tape, and it was a big audio book too, very, very long. And the story is about this woman who, she's, you know, she and her husband are reuniting after the end of World War II. And, you know, gosh, you know, they're not sure if their marriage is gonna work. They're trying to give it a chance. And then she falls through these stones. And, you know where I'm going with this, right?

Julia: Oh, very much. I'm very familiar with this one.

C. Steven: So, I'm sitting there and I'm listening to this. I am like, "This is a romance story. This isn't a time travel story." And then, I was like, "This is such a great story."

Julia: It's excellent. It's so well done. So, "Outlander" was actually one of the first romances that I...was given by my mother. And I remember being 16 years old, and sitting in my history class, and reading it under the table, under my desk. And I ended up going into history in college. So, that's how much I loved it. I was willing to interrupt my history class to keep reading about Jamie and Claire. But, no, it was one of the gateway books for me.

C. Steven: Clearly. I mean, I saw the cover of...By the way, your covers are beautiful.

Julia: Oh, thank you.

C. Steven: I don't know who does them, but they are fantastic.

Julia: They have a wonderful art department at Simon & Schuster who's taking good care of me.

C. Steven: That's excellent. That actually will lead me to one of my follow-up questions, which will be about the difference between Simon & Schuster, which I believe publishes your romance books. But from what I was getting looking at the Amazon and looking at the publishers, etc., of the book that you co-author, that looks like it's an indie published book. Is that right?

Julia: That's right. So, I was one of those authors who signed with an agent and wanted to go traditional and was trying to do historical romance during the worst possible time, which is right after "Fifty Shades of Grey" came out. So, very happy that "Fifty Shades of Grey" was a big gateway book for a lot of people who didn't feel like they could read romance, or didn't know about romance before, but it was really not great if you were trying to be a debut historical romance author. So, we went out. We tried to sell. And basically, we kept getting the same response back, which is, we love her. It's a really tough market for debut right now, which is a lesson that I think a lot of people end up learning, which is that sometimes publishing doesn't always match up with what exactly they want it to be at that moment. So, I decided I was going to start small and create a fan base as best I could. So, I went in with these other authors to do this anthology. This is The One Week Series. So, “One Week in Wyoming” was the first one, and then “One Week in Hawaii”, and “One Week in December” is a holiday short story collection that we did as well. So, it's a way to kind of do some independent publishing. I learned very, very fast about what it actually takes to publish a book, which was hugely instructive and really helpful. But I also, it meant that I had some work out there that I could start to, you know, talk to people about and gain some readers. And so, one of the big struggles when you're brand new, whether you're traditionally published or indie published, is where your reader is going to come from. And how are you going to stand out from this big group of authors that they could turn to, right? Because there are so many books in the world and only so little time. So, how are you going to make sure that you stand out?

And that was one of the ways that I wanted to come to a publisher and say, actually have had some experience with this. And I've played around with marketing. And I've, you know, done a little bit of paid advertisement. And so I got to kind of cut my teeth in an interesting way. And I was, actually, I was happy about that process. And it was fun doing it with three other authors also. And you get to gain their experience, and then kind of build on that.

C. Steven: So, I guess that leads me to, you know, what is the big difference between traditional and indie publishing, especially when it comes to promotion?

Julia: So, for me, a lot of the difference is that, with traditional publishing, it's built into your publishing schedule, and it's built into the publishing expectation. So, you give up control, which is some...You know, big factor for a lot of people who prefer indie publishing, is they have control over who their cover designer is and exactly what the cover looks like. They have control over who their editor is, how many edits it goes through, their exact publishing schedule. You give up some of that control when you go through traditional. For me, especially with having worked a day job through my whole writing career up until last month, it was important to be able to rely on somebody else as well. So, you know, I have an editor who's fantastic. And, I, actually, am lucky enough that all seven of my books that are contracted with Pocket, which is the Simon & Schuster imprint, are with the same editor.

But there's also a team that's going through and doing, you know, copy edits, and doing all the production, they're doing the interior pages, they're doing the cover design, they're doing, you know, ad placement and rollouts, and try to make sure that they get into the major blogs, websites, various things like that, trying to do placements. So, things that I don't feel like I'm as much of an expert on, in terms of publicity, it is helpful having somebody out there for you. I think, knowing a little bit about publicity marketing, whether you're a traditional author or an indie author is going to serve you well, because ultimately, there are only so many resources with a publishing house, and they're going to need to promote multiple books. So, you're going to be the best advocate for your book, because you're the one who wrote it, and you're the one who really cares passionately about making sure that book sells well. Because that's your bread and butter, right? That's the money that's going to pay you to continue to do these things. So, for me having the experience as an indie author means that I feel a lot more confident walking in and saying, "Okay, this is what I need for my publisher. This is what I can do personally. This is how I can try to move the needle to gain author, or to gain readers, rather."

C. Steven: So, you're not tempted to go indie especially once you have the following that, you know, that you're building up through the traditional publisher, but to go indie and make more profits?

Julia: I think that with some projects, I would be. And I've been very upfront with my publisher that I consider myself to be a hybrid author. And I think quite a few people are at this point. They, you know, certain projects are going to fit better with an indie audience, certain projects maybe there's something similar on a publisher's backlist where they think, "That might not be quite the right fit for us." So, absolutely. I think historical romance is a tricky one because there are some people who've been very successful with historical romance, in particular, as indie authors. And there are some people who, you know, will tell you it's a hard…it can be a very hard journey. So, I think, with that, right now, my focus has really been on building readership and, you know, presenting myself being, like, if you're looking for a Julia Kelly book, this is what you're going to get. And my experience with Pocket has been very positive, and same with the Julia Blake series, which is sports contemporary romance. So, different branding, different type of approach. For right now, at this point, my career while I'm still building, I think this is a good fit for me. And who knows? I mean, publishing, as I'm sure you know, seems to change every 18 months or so. There will be, you know, a new version of KU or some sort of thing will come out and completely change the game. So, advice that somebody gave in 2008 will be completely different than 2012, than 2016. So, I think, just kind of staying educated and staying aware of what's happening in publishing is the most beneficial thing, and then trying to figure out the best fit for you.

C. Steven: And are there websites that you go to stay up on publishing news?

Julia: So there are. Although, I have to admit that I have a wonderful writing group who are in various areas of the business. So, some people do strictly indie publishing, some are hybrid, some are traditional only, and they are a wealth of information. And then on top of it, one of the people also does, she's romance by the cover, she does wonderful covers and will do social media branding and all of that. So, she's very up to date on what's going on with various changes in the romance industry that you want to make sure that your brand fits and you're staying aware of. So, yeah, that's my cheat sheet, is my writing group. But I do, you know, I frequent cable boards and there are some Facebook groups that have been really helpful. RWA, which is the Romance Writers of America has what's called a PAN Loops. It's the Published Authors Network. And it's an email chain and an email forum that people are free to ask questions, and then kind of get more feedback as they go through. There's been a very vibrant conversation about BookBub recently on that loop for example so...

C. Steven: So, with traditional publishing then, do you still look and work to build that mailing list, and do you, you know, do everything you can to drive traffic from your Facebook page to the mailing list and send out newsletters and, you know, blogs, etc.?

Julia: Absolutely. Yeah, so, I feel like the mailing list is the one time where you really have physical control over a contact with a reader. So, a reader gives you their email address. They're, first of all, trusting you not to abuse that. But then, also, they're there saying, “I want to hear from you, and I want to hear from you directly without having this, you know, buffer of Facebook or Twitter or the Amazon Follow button or, you know, same with the BookBub Follow button.” They're trusting you with their email address and they want you to contact them and so, that can be a really powerful tool. I know there's a lot of conversation right now about how to best utilize email and how to contact readers. For me, it's been really helpful to just be open and honest and talking to them about first of all, you know, I'm moving to London. What's better than a historical romance author who writes about London, moving to London, right? So, trying to make sure that, you know, they have a connection with me and I have a connection with them. I always make sure that there is somewhere in that email that makes it clear you can contact me, you can email me. I'm a runner, and a couple of times I've had mentions of running in my email newsletters. It's been great because a couple of my readers have gotten back to me and said, "Oh, my husband is a runner. He said, you know...I talked to him about you're deciding to run more. And he said, you know, make sure that you're okay with injury, and you're doing all these things." And it's really reassuring. It's nice sometimes. You feel like you sit at home, and you write these books, and you have, you know, in my case I have conversations with my editor and my agent and my writing group, but you don't necessarily have as much upfront conversation with your readers. So, it's been a really nice tool for kind of building that relationship. And maybe it's a little bit more of a long-term tool. It's not quite as immediate as a Facebook ad. But I have really enjoyed that relationship. And I find it very valuable.

C. Steven: So then, do you do something, do you have something that you publish on a schedule, you know, or do you just, you know, say, "Well, you know, I haven't talked to anybody in a long time and I'll send out my mailing list."

Julia: So, if I know that I'm not having anything event-wise coming up, so a cover reveal or, you know, excerpts that I can send out to them, or release day, the first week of the month I will send an email with an update and sort of content that I have created for web and, you know, if I've written for anywhere else, any other organizations, I'll drop links in there. Some book recommendations, keeping it very light, keeping it very, you know, very easy. I am heading into the crazy release schedule for the next little while. So, once August hits, I think those newsletters will become more when there's actually something to, you know, send out about a book being out, or an excerpt of what's coming up. That will become more of the content of the newsletters. But I try to keep a mix of kind of a personal one and being, "Hey, buy my book. Part of it." Because, you know, it can be frustrating to be told over and over and over again, "Buy my book. Buy my book. Buy my book."

C. Steven: Yeah, well, the bottom line is they're going to buy it if they want to buy it. You don't have to tell them.

Julia: Exactly, yeah.

C. Steven: What about changing your name for the contemporary romance series? Why are you doing that? Especially when I am guessing that you have worked incredibly hard to brand the, you know, Julia Kelly name. Why change it?

Julia: So, it's funny that you asked, actually, because when my editor suggested it, I had one of these like, “oh no, please don't make me do that” moments. Because you do, you work very hard to make sure that you are on top of your social media. And, you know, I've been with an agent for four and a half years and so I've had some sort of presence for at least that long. And I really thought, “I don't want to grow this again. I really don't want to try to do…” And also, it's just a logistical issue of, I don't know if I can serve two Twitter accounts and two Facebook accounts and two websites and two blogs and all that. And so, we came up with the compromise, which is presenting as both Julia Kelly and Julia Blake, which is not uncommon in romance, specifically when you're moving between different genres. So, the thought is that, you know, if you're going to get a Julia Blake book, you are going to know it is a sexy contemporary story. In this case, this series is sports, which is a dramatic difference from historical romance where it's, you know, ball gowns, and the Victorian era, and people taking carriage rides, and still steamy and sexy. So, I can kind of have the two brands talk to each other which often what will change somebody's name in romance, is if you write a very, very steamy erotic romance, something like that, and then very clean romance. Those two brands don't necessarily work together. With mine, it's more just a differentiation of the type of romance that you're going to get as opposed to the heat level.

C. Steven: Well, but, you're not going to...If you decide to go into another genre and decide that you want to write that time travel story that's heavy on romance, or you want to, you know, whatever, if you wanted to go mystery, if you just, you know, your say, you know, "I just want to take a break. I want to stick my toes somewhere else and how it goes," you're not going to change your name again, are you?

Julia: I hope not. My hope is that whatever will be contemporary is Julia Blake, and whatever will be historical is Julia Kelly. We'll see down the line if that remains the case, but for right now, I'm happy being a woman of, I'm a woman of many names. I would like to stay a woman of these two names in my writing career, so yeah.

C. Steven: And by the way, did you did you check on Google before you picked those names?

Julia: I did. So, I originally tried to use a family name for the Julia Blake name, which is the secondary name. And we have, you know, a long-standing Scottish...I'm sorry if you can hear construction noise outside my apartment. This is New York City, so it happens. We have a long Scottish line in my family, so I thought oh, you know, it would be great to be Julia Makai, which is a family name.

C. Steven: Well, that's a great name.

Julia: It's a great name. There's, I believe, a children's book author named Julia Makai. So, I wanted to make sure that it was something that was relatively free within the publishing world. So, I definitely Google all the, you know, we went through lists. And my friends and I, my friends had a fantastic time trying to name me. So, we went through list and list of things because we couldn't find a family name that wasn't taken by an author, so...

C. Steven: That's a great contest to get going.

Julia: I know I should have [inaudible 00:19:24].

C. Steven: Find out some of the mailing list and help name me.

Julia: Name me. Exactly.

C. Steven: You know, you look like a, you know, or whatever. So, it was interesting because I know, I originally had published under my name, Craig Ellis. And the reason I did, you know, and then I started googling Craig Ellis, and oddly enough, my wife comes up, but I never come up. As a matter of fact, what was coming up were like some soccer player, you know, in Australia.

Julia: Right.

C. Steven: Some guy who's writing historical nonfiction, and then some people have been arrested for things. So, I thought, "Huh." So, that's when I, you know, I played with permutations of the name it came up with C. Steven Ellis, which is my middle name. But yeah, so, with you though, I thought that you said that your editor came up with the name, or she just suggested a different name.

Julia: She gently suggested. And by gently, I mean, and she'll tease me for this, but she gently suggested that I choose another name so that we could market me differently for the Julia Blake, what ended up being Julia Blake. And then, finally, she sent an email that said, "We need your other name." So, it was one of those things where I could understand. I was resistant mostly on the social media standpoint. And that was the compromise we struck was that I could promote both names under one umbrella. So, yes.

C. Steven: Okay, so let's switch gears a little bit and talk about your process. What is it that you do when you wake up in the morning and you look at your watch and you go, "Okay, the morning is set aside for promotion, or the afternoon, or whatever." What's your process?

Julia: So, on an ideal day, I would wake up and have a cup of tea since I am daughter of an English mother. And I sometimes will do some morning pages. I was very, very good about them for about a year, and now I kind of drop in as needed. And then, on a good day, it's opening up the computer and doing a morning session of just, you know, sitting on the couch and writing and making sure I get words in. I always feel better if I get some of my word count done earlier in the day. And it really depends on sort of what I'm doing, what project I'm working on, what that word count looks like. It can be anywhere from trying to hit 5,000 words a day. It can be 1,500 words a day. It’s sort of just, it's variable. And then I'll usually break for lunch and then do another afternoon session. Ironically, I'm most productive at night. But I was once upon a time a morning producer. And so, I have been trained to get up and just get going. I've been a journalist for nine years at this point, and it definitely trains you to just start writing. And even if it's junk writing on the page, it's much better than just writing in your head that you haven't actually gotten down on the page. And I'm a big believer in being able to edit through drafts. So, it's been a really enjoyable process. When I'm working full time, it's, you know, you go to work and you come home. I'm a runner, so I will run, and then I'll cook dinner, and that's usually kind of a night's mental transition point. And then I hit the ground running and start writing again. So, promotion usually happens one day a week. I'll do a big bulk schedule for tweets and Facebook and blog posts and things along those lines. I use a program called CoSchedule. It's been really helpful because it keeps all of the email and blog and social media marketing in one place, and literally puts it on a calendar. So, I find that to be really helpful because I can look ahead, at the week ahead, and I can also schedule out for friends. Since I know when friends are releasing books, I can promote those friends' books and, you know, wish them happy release day well in advance. Once I figure out what it is that they're actually releasing on what day. So, I try to basically give myself as much of a heads-up of what's coming up and give myself as much time as possible to write when I've actually set out that time to write. Because I find promotion to be difficult. It can creep into my writing time and there's always one more tweet you can send and always one more thing you can do with your back list. And I find, I really have trouble with differentiating between my writing time or my promotional time unless I schedule an actual block of time to do promo and just don't worry about it till then.

C. Steven: Well, let's circle back to morning pages. Morning pages, that's from the drawing on the right side of the brain or...

Julia: So, mine was Julia Cameron [The Artists Way] was the artist...

C. Steven: Yes, Julia...Yeah, that was it.

Julia: Yeah, I find it to be really helpful and it got me through a period of burnout that I was struggling with when I just was really having a hard time sitting down and actually writing. Because I think I was just, honestly, I was putting too much stress on myself. So, for whatever reason, those morning pages helped get all of the stress out, and then kind of leave it behind, and be able to move on with the rest of the day so...

C. Steven: Do you keep a journal?

Julia: So, it's funny that you ask. I literally just threw out about five of them because...

C. Steven: You threw them out?

Julia: I did. I never look back at them. I know it's like [inaudible 00:24:51].

C. Steven: You're going to hate yourself.

Julia: Well, so I'm that person who threw out her high school journals, and has thrown out every college journal, and I never look back at them. And for whatever reason, it's written down, it's in the past, and I've been okay with that.

C. Steven: You just [inaudible 00:25:05]

Julia: I was just talking to a friend.

C. Steven: You're just a forward person, right? You're a futurist.

Julia: I guess.

C. Steven: You just, “I don't look back at anything.”

Julia: Yeah, I guess not in that respect.

C. Steven: Which is hysterical considering you, you know, you basically are, you're a historian.

Julia: I know. I guess maybe I have a hang-up about making sure nobody finds those journals 200 years down the line. I know. “Here's a look at this writer.”

C. Steven: Yeah, you'll be caught, you know.

Julia: Exactly.

C. Steven: That's too funny. But I mean, I can't believe that you're actually throwing out that stuff. And you even threw out your high school journals.

Julia: I did.

C. Steven: I mean...

Julia: Oh, yeah. I think I shredded the pages of those.

C. Steven: So, just at home, too. You're not a pack rat at all?

Julia: No, you know, and that's the thing. I live in a 320 square foot studio in New York. You can't be a pack rat. It's just not allowed. I would literally die under the weight of all the stuff. The one thing I'm terrible about is books, not a big surprise. I am surrounded by books. And it's been somewhat painful giving a lot of those away. Although, the research library is coming with me, so...

C. Steven: Well, in a previous podcast, I talked to my cousin who's a professional organizer. And actually, I say previous podcast. That actual podcast is airing next week. But, you know, one of the things, you know, if I take a look back here, I mean, it's just, it's a mess. It's crazy. And, you know, and my wife too would be like, "Oh, please. Get rid of everything." So, yeah. Getting rid of books is hard even though...

Julia: It's hard.

C. Steven: I don't pick them up. I don't read them. I just want them there. I just want that library feel.

Julia: There is something very comforting, if you're a reader, if you're a book person, there's something comforting about being surrounded by books. And my books are digital first so, you know, they're on Kindle and on all that. And so, I'm very much an advocate for e-books obviously. But I do like having the physical books around. I just have had forced myself to not be terribly precious about it because it's, you know, moving across country or across the ocean, it's not kind to book lovers.

C. Steven: Yes, well, clearly, I mean, it's a few suitcases and that's it, huh?

Julia: Exactly, yeah. In fact, I'm sitting next to my few suitcases right now.

C. Steven: No furniture, nothing like that. Everything stays in New York, right?

Julia: Exactly.

C. Steven: Well, I’ve got to tell you, I love New York. And let's talk...Well, I'm all over the place, so let me go back. We were talking about your process. You sit and you write, you write, what do you do, do you have a pad, a yellow pad? And you write out, or do you have a laptop, a computer?

Julia: I have a laptop and...

C. Steven: Do you use Scrivener? What do you?

Julia: I use Scrivener. I love Scrivener. And I use Scrivener through both the drafting and developmental edit process. And once it gets out of there, once we're into copy edits, then I stick with Word, because that's what my publisher goes back and forth with everything on the team. I love Scrivener and have been that person who was incredibly frustrated by it, and tried it, and hated it and stopped using it, and then came back to it and kind of figured out that there's no one way to use Scrivener. It can be whatever it is that you want it to be and you need it to be. In terms of writing, I am a hands on the keyboard and just go type of person. If I get stuck, I'll sometimes write longhand. But for the most part, it's pretty much been either the iPad with keyboard or my laptop so...

C. Steven: Have you tried dictation?

Julia: I have. It's funny you mention that.

C. Steven: I'm a funny guy.

Julia: There you go. I started Dragon Anywhere with my, first of my new historical series, "The Matchmaker of Edinburgh." I did some dictation on that, and then I've done some dictation on the second book, which I just finished drafting this week. So, I'd say it's about 85% accurate, which sounds great until you go back and read what it is that you actually dictated. And sometimes, it's completely incomprehensible. But, you know, in some cases it can be really helpful with just kind of getting into a nice flow with the narration. I find it to be helpful, especially, in introspective scenes, where characters need to kind of think about what it is that they've done, and the feelings that they're having, and all those things. Dialog is a little trickier.

C. Steven: Well, that's interesting. I'll be interested to see, especially, the Anywhere, because this is a subscription service through Nuance, right?

Julia: It is. It is. Yeah, I was warned off with the Mac version, the most recent Mac version, I guess, has some bugs and some problems so...

C. Steven: You know, I’ve got to tell you that I, of course, you know, have read everything about that, and I belong to the Facebook group, you know, what is it? Dragon...

Julia: Dragon Writers.

C. Steven: Yeah, Dragon Writers. Yeah. And I've been warned off of that too, but I'm not going to do it, because I'm not going to give up my Mac. I'm such a hardcore Mac person.

Julia: I am too, yeah.

C. Steven: And I'm not gonna put Windows, you know, create a special section.

Julia: Run parallel.

C. Steven: Right, yeah. I'm not going to do that. So, so far so good. I have to say, if you do it right, there's just there's a couple bugaboos about it. And then, of course, you know, they even recommend that even on Windows, you use TextEdit, or that's Mac. But on Windows, you use the equivalent, you know, DOS, or not DOS, but, Text Editor. Anyway, so, let's switch over now to podcasting. How did you get into podcasting? Why did you get into podcasting?

Julia: So, I love podcasts since 2008. When I was moving to New York, I wanted to learn more about New York history and so, I found the Bowery Boys Podcast. And I just adored it. And it must have been in the early days of that podcast, because I think now they're into, I want to say the 200th episode recently aired, something like that. It's extraordinary. And so, there's something very intimate about listening to someone's voice that I really enjoy. And I came from a background of, my training is in broadcast journalism, so both television and radio. I worked in television, but I started with interning in radio and just loved it. I thought it was fantastic.

C. Steven: Were you the face in front of the camera or behind the camera?

Julia: No, I was the producer bossing the people around the people around, behind it.

C. Steven: Well, that's fun.

Julia: Yes. It was a lot of fun. I really enjoyed it. I never had the taste for being in front of the camera. And I think you really have to be passionate about it because it's a tough, tough job. It really is. So, I’ve just always loved radio. And I think that from there, I had been talking to Alexis and Mary Chris to do First Draft with me. And I'd been talking to them about, you know, maybe we should do this podcast thing. And we've done a couple things on YouTube were playing around with it, and so we decided that we were going to go ahead and start doing this monthly podcast. And we usually take a month off around the holidays. But yeah, we've sort of really been enjoying doing that for the last, almost three-and-a-half, four years, so...

C. Steven: Well, now who came up with First Draft? The idea of having...before you even start your podcast, I'm just saying this for my audience, what they do is they all get together, and there's the window is split into three screens so you see everybody at once, and then they take a drink, and they talk about what their libation is. Which, of course, appeals to me because I have a sommelier, you know, certified somm and...

Julia: Yes.

C. Steven: Wanted to know, how did that happen?

Julia: We're all bad. This is gonna sound terrible. We're all big drinkers so...

C. Steven: Please. Good for you. I don't have enough friends who are big drinkers, so yeah.

Julia: Yes, Mary Chris has a real deep expertise in beer. And her husband brews, and she's in Richmond, which is a wonderful area for beer if you're in that area of the country. And we've been lucky enough to go and visit her a couple of times. And she's taken us taking us around to some of the breweries. I'm from California. I love wine. And I grew up drinking wine with my family and, you know, grew up around people who loved wine and were in the wine industry. And then, I think both Alexis and I share a deep love of bourbon as well so...

C. Steven: What's not to like?

Julia: Yeah, so, the feeling that we wanted to create with the podcast was that you were getting together with these three friends who were also writers who sometimes had special guests on and it was a conversation. And it was a conversation that could be had, you know, while hanging out with drinks and...because that's what, you know, when we get together for retreats or conferences, that's what the conversations are like, you know,. Sometimes they're about marketing, and sometimes they're about the frustrations of, you know, trying to deal with the rest of your life and work-life balance and all those things. But we wanted it to feel welcoming, and like, you were kind of involved in this conversation, this ongoing conversation that happens throughout the months.

C. Steven: So, with the podcast, and with the writing, how does your family feel about this? How do your friends, how do they treat you? Are they very respectful of you? Are they coming to you and going, “I’ve got a great idea”?

Julia: So, a little bit of both of those. I'm very lucky I have a family who's been wonderfully supportive. I come from a family of readers who were all incredibly excited about having an author in the family. And you would think that, you know, with romance, of course, there's an element of sex that gets involved in those books, and I have thought, "Okay, you know, everybody's gonna be okay with this except maybe my father. Maybe that'd be too weird." And I get random text messages, every once in awhile like, "I just read your third book. Really loved it. Saw what you did there with the illusions too, it happened one night," because it's a road trip book. So, it's been wonderful. It's really been a lot of fun. I'm lucky I have not had a lot of flack. And some romance writers do. They got some weirdness from family members or friends. Dating in New York City has been interesting being a romance author. Some people have some opinions about what that should be like.

C. Steven: I bet there are some assumptions about what that'd be like.

Julia: There are some assumptions which get corrected rather quickly. The thing about the people who say, "Oh, I have this great idea." Or, "I've always wanted to write a book." Usually, at this point, what I say now is, "Why haven't you?" And that's usually the moment where they think, "Oh." Because it's not. You know as well as I know that you have to sit down, you have to do the work. It's like any other job, and it's hard and in some ways it's a lot more difficult than other jobs because it's a lot of upfront work before you get any of the praise, or any of the money, or any of those things that come along with it, if you get those at all. You do it for the love of it, first and foremost. And so, I think, when people have that moment of saying, "Oh, you know, it's a great idea for a book." My answer is always, "That's fantastic. What are you going to do about it?" If you're not going to actually write this book, you know, why are we having this conversation? So, yeah, it's a little bit of tough love, but, hopefully, it's taken as it's meant, which is, you know, well meant, but also kind of a, let's-really-see-what-you're-talking-about-here moment.

C. Steven: But, do you steal stories that you've heard from your friends and, you know, try and dress it up so, and then they come to you, and for example, my first book started with a guy getting strangled. He was on a date with a woman and he's getting strangled in a movie theater. It turns out that the stranger strangling him is her husband. And that actually happened to a friend of mine. That happened, except, it wasn't in a movie theatre. It was in a restaurant and all that. But I mean, I hear the story, I keep it here, and then, I'm going to use it later.

Julia: Right. I have done that before. I did ask permission. So, one of my best friends got married down in Florida. And her husband-to-be was walking out the door with his jacket in his hand, waved goodbye to all the brides...Well, we weren't bridesmaids, but all the friends that were waiting around to put her in her dress. And he turned around and caught the seam of his shirt on the shoulder and ripped it wide open.

C. Steven: Oh no.

Julia: And I just, I looked at him and I thought, "Oh my God," this sheer panic. So I remember grabbing him, pulling him, and, you know, shoving him into the bedroom and saying, “Do you have a backup shirt?” And his mother was in there. And he said, "I do." And his mother said, "Oh, my eyes aren't good enough to, you know, sew up your shirt. But so, I said, "You iron the backup one, I'll sew the shirt up." So, I ended up in the bathroom sewing his shirt up 20 minutes before the ceremony, shoving it back on him, and he went and, you know, he got married in that shirt, and the whole thing, and that ended up being the beginning of The Wedding Week, which is one of the, One Week in Hawaii. That's the One Week in Hawaii novella. So, I ended up dedicating the book to the two of them because that was where the, that was where the short story had originated from. But yeah, it's funny the little things that will sometimes pop up in conversation or little experiences that you have and you just think, "Yeah, I'm going to file that away for research." And if it's really identifiable, I usually ask permission. Nobody’s said no so far so...

C. Steven: That's incredible. I love that story. So, I know we're running out of time here, and I've got so much that I still want to talk about. You're very easy. You're obviously a very good interview you, you know, obviously you've done it more than once.

Julia: Thank you. But usually I'm on the other side where I'm the asking the questions.

C. Steven: Oh, and parenthetically, again, this is just for my audience, you made reference to a movie called "It Happen One Night." And it's...

Julia: Yes.

C. Steven: It's incredible that I have to do this. But "It Happened One Night" was a best picture with Clark Gable, Claudette Colbert, director Frank Capra. So, just want everyone to know that. And by the way, if you haven't looked at it, look at it. It's one of the greatest, most romantic movies, and Gable at his best.

Julia: And it's very, very funny. And I think that in terms of, if anybody's interested in comedy and comedy writing, that's a great movie to look at.

C. Steven: Yeah, oh, absolutely. So, I want to talk about your...How fast? How fast are you? How many books do you get out? How many books do you turn around? Are you doing it in a year, one book a year? Are you doing two books a year? What are you doing? So, this year, I am contracted to write three full books, and I had previously written another book that got edited this year. So, the last one I wrote was in 38 days. That was really fast. That was very, very fast for me. So, the one before that was like pulling the teeth, and it took about three or four months. So, it really, it's the book's personality, and then like a true journalist, it's also the deadline that kind of dictates when that all gets done. I am very serious about my deadlines and try to make sure that, you know, make sure that I hit those. So, like a true journalist, I will take it up to the deadline sometimes, but I'll get it done.

C. Steven: Right up to it.

Julia: Yeah, exactly. A nice pace would be three or four books a year would be great. And that's romance. I mean, romance is very specific. Romance readers are, if people aren't aware of it, voracious, and they read in series, they read very quickly, and they can be very, very loyal. And they'll also go through back lists. So, the industry is set up in such a way that there are a lot of books that are published every month and you kind of move through those books relatively quickly. So, I had three novellas published last fall and they were 40,000 words. So, long novellas. And they were published September, October, November. With the Edinburgh books, I think we're on a schedule that looks tentatively like October, January, March, but that may also move around a little bit. We're still finalizing on the last two books in the series. But yeah, it moves really quickly. And it's kind of one of those things where I'm still building a backlist. And romance backlists can be, you know, 60, 70, books long. I'm nowhere near there yet. But as I'm building that backlist, I'm pretty resigned to writing fast so...And I have to say, I do enjoy the challenge of writing fast.

C. Steven: So, you know, in the indie world, if, you know, more books you write, the more books you're going to sell. And you can bundle as well. And bundles are doing very, very well especially when you're bundling a series of some kind. Is this true in the traditional world as well?

Julia: I think, in the traditional world it's not as common to bundle in the same way that you see with indie publishers. I think that you still get the series, the tightly knit series, but not necessarily presented as, you know, a $0.99 pack and things like that. That may very well change. I mean, there are a lot of instances where traditional publishing has followed indie publishing. So, I wouldn't be surprised if you saw some people playing around with that. I know there are some publishers who've done serials because serials were huge for a while, especially in contemporary and erotic romance. So, we'll see, but...

C. Steven: Okay. And we are almost out of time, so I've got one last topic I want to touch on, and that is the HBIC Nation. And what is this? And who joins it? And is it exclusive to women only, or if there are some men who are real bitches, can they join as well? What...

Julia: So, we definitely, we’re six women and we started this group that was an offshoot of our private writing group. Because we felt like one of the things that was really beneficial to us when we finally started going to conferences and participating in writing related events was finding a community. And I don't know that I would have been able to do the last four years of publishing without the group of people I have around me being supportive. And because there's something unique about being a creative that can be very difficult to translate to family and friends who are not in that world. Especially when you're a writer, especially when you're starting out. So, yes. We are HBIC Nation. And it right now has a very, very active Facebook group. We are inclusive and, you know, so long as people identify as being kind of the owners of their businesses and their creative brands, we want to help grow them. So, we say that we're inclusive of anybody who identifies as an HBIC, and the idea is to really give people the tools to do what we have been able to figure out in our own careers, but maybe without so much of the tears and pain that comes along with that. We want to kind of be able to guide people, and exchange information, and share experience, and educate. We're also encouraging and being supportive. So, one of the biggest things I found is that it can be very, very lonely being a writer. And I imagine it's the same thing with being a musician or, you know, actor. There are people who are never going to understand what you do, but there are communities of people out there who are looking for each other. And so, we're hoping to bring all those people together, and kind of learn from each other.

C. Steven: Well, it sounds incredibly empowering.

Julia: I think so. Yeah, it really has been. So, it launched, I don't know when the show is going to air, but launched last week as of our reporting.

C. Steven: Oh, no kidding?

Julia: So, it's very new. Very, very new. And so far, it's been fantastic. It’s been kind of this group of of people just, you know, talking to each other there and exchanging information, and it's been wonderfully supportive. We're very excited about that. People have been very active. We're a Facebook group as well as a website, and kind of working to build that community so...

C. Steven: Okay, and then, I guess that pretty much wraps it up. Although, how do people get in touch with you?

Julia: It's very simple. I'm on juliakellywrites.com. And I have the very pretentious twitter handle of @The_Julia_Kelly. Because Twitter limits its characters, I can't squeeze Julia Kelly and Blake in there. And then I'm also on Facebook searchable as Julia Kelly as well so...

C. Steven: Okay, and do you wanna, your podcast?

Julia: Its First Draft Writing. And we have a website firstdraftwriting.com as well.

C. Steven: Okay.

Julia: And we're [inaudible 00:46:07].

C. Steven: Excellent. Excellent. Okay, well, this has been a wonderful interview. You have been absolutely terrific. Thank you so much.

Julia: Thank you.

Julia Kelly talks about writing Romance novels.

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