Where I Left Off

Dangerous Pursuit with Author Bethany Rosa

• Kristen Bahls • Season 2 • Episode 38

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Thanks to author Bethany Rosa for joining me to talk about her books and writing process. 

Bethany's Books:

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**Note - I read Pursuit of Innocence, but Dangerous Pursuit was too spicy for me and I didn't finish the novel. **

For links to the books discussed in this episode, click the link here to take you to the Google Doc to view the list.

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For more, follow along on Instagram @whereileftoffpod.

Speaker 1:

Welcome back. I'm Kristen Balls and you're listening to when I Left Off a bookish podcast and today I'm joined by romance author of Pursuit of Innocence, bethany Rosa, to talk about her latest release, dangerous Pursuit. Thank you so much for coming on.

Speaker 2:

Bethany. Thanks, Kristen, for having me. I'm excited to do this Me too.

Speaker 1:

So the first question I always ask everyone is what are you currently reading? Or, if you are writing right now and not doing a lot of reading, which writers inspire you?

Speaker 2:

Well, I can answer both things. I am reading. I try to read all the time. When I'm writing, though, I tend to stick to short stories and novellas. Oh, that's smart. Yeah, I have not picked up a book over 200 words in what seems like forever now, just because of limited time. But I would say the authors that just have inspired me in my career, and not because of what they write or or any of that, it's more how they became an author, and I would say EL James, stephanie Meyer and JK Rowling I mean I two, three different, very different genres but also just how they got their start, their first books. Um, they worked hard, you know, they came out of nowhere and did these books and just ended up rising through the ranks and wrote something that just related to different people and did really cool things, not having a long history of doing it. So that really inspires me.

Speaker 1:

Nice, and I'm glad that they have all that information out for us to be able to see, so that way you can kind of hear how everyone got their start, cause you probably just assume, you know, oh, they're so famous, they just, you know, wrote a runaway hit and that was it, and they were good, but no yeah.

Speaker 2:

No, I love hearing their stories and their backstories and what a struggle it was for all three of them to just go through that process. So it's really neat to to look back on those.

Speaker 1:

Definitely, and what can you tell us about your current work in progress? I know you just released a new holiday novella, holiday.

Speaker 2:

Pursuit. Yes, and it wasn't the book that everybody was waiting for, so it was kind of a little side note surprise. But I'm now finally finally working on the book that everybody's just dying to read. Regarding two of the characters from my first book. Everybody fell in love with them and they asked for it from the get-go, but it just didn't fall in line and so I finally picked it up Pursuit of Love, and it's Cece and Eli from the first book, which everybody oh, there was something going on there but nobody knew, and so I decided I'm going to expand on their story more and and it's taken me a while to figure it out, but I just picked it up again today so it's getting it's, it's in progress.

Speaker 1:

So you're still kind of in the early stages of it.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, I've plotted the whole thing. I know what I'm doing with it, I know where I'm going with it. But you know, plotting it's one thing, and then you know you plot, it's one sentence, five sentences for that chapter, and then you have to write 5,000 words to go with that five sentences. So yeah, I'm working on it slowly but surely so yeah, I'm working on it slowly but surely.

Speaker 1:

Was it easier to plot a story about characters that you already kind of had some background, or was it a little bit harder to try to figure out where they were going to go?

Speaker 2:

Both I think Easier because I knew where they started, I knew where they came from and I had to decide where I wanted them to go and I know their personalities a little bit from those previous books. So that makes it easier to. But it's also harder because I have to keep going back into the previous two books, because there's so much that happens within those two books and you have to make sure you're on track. And okay, did I do this at the right time? Was it the right month here? Do I want to include that? And so I think going back and forth a lot was hard, but now that I've got the timeline definitely set, I think I'm ready to go. I think I could probably jam this out pretty quick with everything that I've done up until now. And do you?

Speaker 1:

know how long you want this series to be kind of in total.

Speaker 2:

So it is slated for five. So all five are on Amazon right now, but I think I'm going to add one more novella. So I did three books this year in my first year, and then my goal that's huge. Yeah, I didn't expect it. It was not on the docket, so nothing was on the docket other than Pursuit of Innocence. Actually, the only reason that this whole series came about is because I had people asking me about the other characters and it just, you know, I didn't have a plan for my career. I just thought, oh, I have this one book, I want to do it, and then it just kind of snowballed from there. So I do. I would like to stay on that trajectory and do another two full-size novels and one novella next year and make it a Christmas novella. So that's my goal and then that will actually lead into the next series.

Speaker 1:

So Okay, so you're going to go straight into another series after you're done with this one? Wow, yeah.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, I might take a little break. Yeah, that's fair.

Speaker 1:

That's because that's that is a lot of books. In just a couple of years You'll have a whole back.

Speaker 2:

Well, I, I go to these seminars and I see these other amazing authors who have been doing it for a lot longer than I, have some who haven't, and I just, I'm looking at their, the amount of books that they're putting out, and I'm just in awe, like I mean, if this was my full time and this is all I did and I did nothing else, I could probably, you know, keep up on that schedule, but I just, I don't. I, yeah, I take days off without writing, so that's yeah, and it's hard to schedule creativity you can't force.

Speaker 1:

I mean, you can kind of force yourself to write, but not really if it's just not coming. So that's really hard.

Speaker 2:

One of the biggest battles? Yes, definitely my husband. Why didn't you write today? I don't know, I just wasn't feeling it. Yeah, trying to explain that to him is impossible sometimes, but yeah.

Speaker 1:

Do you typically work on one book at once or kind of have multiple things going to try to keep up that pace?

Speaker 2:

I always do one book at once, but I have started kind of pre-plotting the next book, so I won't start writing it per se, but as I'm going now, I've gotten in the habit of like, while I was writing Dangerous Pursuit, a ton of notes were made about Cece and Eli because they're in that book, so much. So I just had to keep track of, like what I wanted to remember, and so it just helps me when I go to write that book. But I definitely I don't think I'm ready to do two at once, yeah.

Speaker 1:

That's a lot on your brain. No One at a time, especially when you have a full-time job as well. That's just a lot on one person's brain.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, and it's hard because I was still editing Pursuit of, or I was editing Holiday Pursuit, while I did start writing CC and Eli's story Pursuit of Love. And it's confusing because you're on one character and I don't know what I was thinking when I named my characters, but I used a lot of the same letters which while I'm writing and editing it, your mind is just like oh, was that Lily Lucy? It's crazy, yeah, so I can't do two at once ever. I know that about me, yeah.

Speaker 1:

Hey, you find the process that works for you and you go with it. Yeah, definitely. So what inspired you to start writing romance and how has your process kind of evolved over time?

Speaker 2:

well, since it's already been a year, um, or only has been a year, it's evolved for sure. I was inspired. So my first book I started about December a year ago and I had a dream. Well, there was two things that came involved.

Speaker 2:

I was reading I read 250 books the year before, wow, so I read a lot, I'm a fast reader and I got to this point of not finding what I was looking for, like I just wanted exactly what I was looking for and I kept like I would start a book. It wasn't, I would start another one, I would start another. And I was so frustrated and I'm like, gosh, dang it, I'm just going to write it. And so that's kind of how I fell into it. And then, as I was, you know, having that thought and knew I was going to do that, I was reading a book and I had this dream about the book that I fell asleep reading and I had this dream on what happened in the book and it was a really good dream, but it didn't happen in the book and I thought, well, that sucks, because that's what I wanted to happen. So I wrote the scene down exactly how I dreamed it, and then I wrote the book around it. That was my first book, so that was the first scene, and then I did it, and then I wrote the book around it. That was my first book, so that was the first scene, and then I, and then I did it.

Speaker 2:

And so now, yeah, and there's some days where I think what, if, what am I doing? I could be reading every day. I could read like two to three books, and instead I'm writing, when sometimes I just, you know, want to read that next novel. So, big reader, that's what inspired me. What genres do you typically read? I only read romance. That's so crazy. But I will say I read all genres in romance Romanticy, you know, the alpha male, the small town, the Christmas historical, you name it. If it has romance, I'm reading it At least.

Speaker 1:

romance is one of those genres where there are so many little sub genres and so many different settings that you could literally kind of find everything. It's not like a thriller that kind of starts to you know, sound the same? Yeah, exactly.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, you can even do mystery romance. I mean yes.

Speaker 1:

Romantic suspense, all of those. Yeah, yes, yes. Have you found any specific routines or habits that kind of help you stay focused whenever you're in the middle of writing?

Speaker 2:

Oh, that was the one thing that I'm not really great at. I will admit that I'm terrible to focus unless I'm super into it. And so just today, what I did and I think this is going to be my new routine I woke up and I left my phone in the bedroom. I think that's the biggest thing for me is I cannot have my phone near me because I do still have four kids who don't need my help all the time, but they do. They call me for things. So you know, I just have to put the phone away.

Speaker 2:

So I think what I have to do, what I've discovered is just keeping my phone out of my hands, not in reaching distance, I mean literally in another room, or even having my husband take it away from me. So occasionally I'll have him do that as well, just so I can't even go get it. So the phone is the one thing, and no, I. I just get in routines where I'll write for eight hours a day sometimes, and then I won't write for a couple of days. So when I'm into it, I'm really into it, and when I'm not, I'm not into it, I'm just there's nothing.

Speaker 1:

I'm sure some days you open up your computer and they're just art words that day.

Speaker 2:

No, and on days like that, you know, I tend to just go edit.

Speaker 1:

So I'm like okay.

Speaker 2:

Well, I'm going to pick this book up and I'm going to do something with it and I'll just start editing.

Speaker 1:

And how do you approach writing chemistry between characters in a way that feels authentic, especially in a dangerous pursuit?

Speaker 2:

Good question and I think it's an interesting one because, for me, I don't think it has to be always authentic. I think what's nice about romance novels in general, and one of the reasons I like reading them, is because it doesn't have to be real, it doesn't have to be true, it's fantasy, it doesn't have to be real, it doesn't have to be true, it's fantasy.

Speaker 2:

Like you, can read these books and think, oh, if only you know, and it's not ever going to happen, probably in real life. But authenticity the other thing that I think is authentic means something different to everybody, and so what one person reads and says, oh my God, that would never happen or I'm not okay with that Dangerous Pursuit, is a really good example. And I did not plan this and I didn't even mean for this to happen or think about it as I was writing the story. But somebody did read it and they did have a problem with the age gap that I have in the story. It was an early beta reader and she's like oh my gosh, I have daughters. I would never be okay with this.

Speaker 2:

And I thought I have four daughters. In fact, I have a 19 year old who's dating a man who's 10 years older. And I didn't even plan that, I didn't think about it. I don't think of my kids when I'm reading these stories, other than little personality traits. But I thought of that and I thought, huh, it's hard for me because I think perspective is different in everybody's life and what's authentic to one person. They would be like that would never happen, but it might. The stories that I have heard from some people on their love lives and their love stories. I'm just blown away sometimes. So what you don't think is you know real, it just might be. And then as far as the chemistry and the steamy scenes, that, to me, is where your fantasy comes in. And it's not about all that's always going to happen, because who would ever not, you know, stay married forever if everybody's life was like a romance novel.

Speaker 1:

That makes sense, and I mean, I'm sure, even with, like, just nicknames for characters. You know, some people are going to like nickname and some people aren't going to like a nickname, so that's so hard to try to come up with that, I'm sure.

Speaker 2:

Every book has people complaining about either way, and I. The hard part when you have the series and what I've discovered in writing multiple books now is oh my gosh, you really have to think of okay, well, I used this name for this party part in the last book, so I don't want that name for this body part in this book.

Speaker 2:

I want to switch it up so it's not always the same. And then nicknames oh my gosh, the main male character called her this. I don't want to do that again, Trying to think of all these different nuances when because you do have people that will devour, If, if they're going to like, if they like your writing in one book, chances are they're probably going to like your writing in all the books, and so then you have to really think about that. If I have somebody reading five of my books in a row, you've got to switch that stuff up. So you know it's a hit or miss, unfortunately.

Speaker 1:

That's hard. That sounds like a spreadsheet just waiting to happen of like I use this term or I use this name and this.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, Just to be able to see see it all at once. It's super funny. So in the first book I used one name for a part. In the second book I did another, and then the third. I thought, well, what am I going to do now? And I intermixed it. I used both. So I thought, well, I'll try it this way. So it's just kind of a like trial by error. I don't know how it goes.

Speaker 1:

And when you get feedback, like you did, from the beta readers, how do you decide what to apply and what to kind of go? Okay, this is just more of a personal preference. I'm just going to go with what I had.

Speaker 2:

So I look at it two ways. One of my beta readers I pay two really professional kind of beta readers with very different opinions than mine even and I do it on purpose. So on one hand I use her editing skills because she's a really good editor and the other one I pay definitely does not like my books and I love that about her. And I do that because there will always be people that don't like certain things. And if I can tweak little things, I'm not going to change major plot points or major things for this, you know, because she says so. But what I take out of it is you know what that could be offensive to somebody, and so I can tweak that little thing, I can make that little change and that little change. So I like hearing dissenting comments because it just it makes me think of the bigger picture. Who I'm willing to offend, who I'm not willing to offend.

Speaker 2:

And you know, you can take a really Tessa Bailey, for example amazing author, like queen of dirty talk, love, one of my inspirations, because I I'm really big into dirty talk and my steamy scenes and I literally just DNF one of her books yesterday because I didn't like how she did the dirty talk, and she always does great dirty talk. I love it. I just didn't like this character. It wasn't my cup of tea, I didn't. I didn't like how he talked to her. I didn't like the things he said and I thought, oh, I'm not going to be able to get through it, and that's fine. That doesn't mean I don't like all the rest of her books. It's just so you know you're never going to like it all that is true.

Speaker 1:

That is very true, especially with things that are so personal, like that, everyone's always going to have their own preference. Yes, yes, what advice would you give to aspiring romance authors who are kind of just starting out?

Speaker 2:

That's a fun one to think about, you know. I think the first thing would be to just do it, stop thinking about it and just write. It's not going to be perfect the first time around, so that would be number one advice. My second advice to that would be just do it, but do it right. Don't put something together and throw it out there and have it be total crap. If you're going to do it yourself, pay for the editor, pay for the cover designer, pay for the second editor, pay for the proofreader. You know, do those things that you would have done if you were doing it, you know, through a publisher.

Speaker 2:

First of all, and my last piece of advice, I really wish, going back, that I could have done this because I did the first two things.

Speaker 2:

I'm really big on paying to get everything done professionally, but I really wish I would have waited until I had the first three books done, at least even maybe a complete series, because the time in between and the stress and knowing that, oh, that's a good point, I don't know. I'm just a very like. I'm a people pleaser and if I know people are waiting for a story, I want to get it done and I want to put it out there, whereas if I had this whole series done and I was just putting it out and I was a little more relaxed during the process, I think it would be um more enjoyable throughout throughout and I'd have more time to do marketing. Luckily I have somebody that's helping me do that. But you know, I think huge piece of advice if you know you're doing a series, at least get your first three done, three, if not the whole thing, and if not, then maybe get one or two books done and yeah, it'll just make you so much more relaxed.

Speaker 1:

So yeah, I saw something that BK Borson posted the other day on threads and she said that she went from self-pub to trad-pub and so she was like, oh my gosh. I was at first disappointed with how slow trad-pub moved, but then she was like I'm now three books ahead and she was like what it did for my mental health was so, so much better being able to just kind of have that breather in there and not have to feel so stressed out, trying to write all the time and crunch them out.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, yeah, and having somebody have your back doing all that for you.

Speaker 2:

I mean I. There are pros and cons to each for sure, and I think that's leading to the rise of the hybrid author, which is doing self-publish and traditional publishing, which I think is probably the best way to go, and someday maybe I'll be doing that as well. But the self-publishing is such a great thing. For those like me who I don't have any kind of history with writing, it's the first time. You know well, where did you learn to write? I didn't, I just read. And so to be able to do something like that and put it out there without having to go to all the you know go hundreds of publishers and editor or yeah, publicists to try to get out there, it was, it's, it's neat to be able to do this for sure.

Speaker 1:

Especially when you found a hole in the market, you could just fill it before everyone else figures it out too, and you didn't have to try to wait and query and all of that kind of crazy stuff?

Speaker 2:

Yes, yes, it is. So I was talking to another really big author the other day at a book signing and I was shocked. So she has made a really big name for herself in a, in a certain genre, I mean a world. She's definitely known worldwide and she's been publishing for probably about five years I want to say four or five years and her original book, her original plan, was to go traditionally published and she got picked up by a major traditional published publishing house. Well, now we're four or five years into her career and her first traditional published book is coming out next month. Meanwhile, all of her world that she's created has been self-published. It's just like hearing stories like that is just. That's why self-publishing is great, cause it's like okay, I wrote the book, it's going out, you wrote the book, it's going out two or three years from now or, in her case, four or five. It's just crazy to me.

Speaker 1:

True, and I'm sure with self-publishing you can also kind of test things and learn things that you know it would have taken so long Tried Pub to get the book out, and then you would have realized, and then you might have already written the next three books, and then you would have to go back and adjust. Versus Self Pub, you get to hear reader feedback it seems like a little bit easier and then make adjustments and then apply that moving forward. Yeah, yep, definitely. Are there any themes or tropes that you're excited to explore in future books, since the series is not complete yet?

Speaker 2:

So, yes, I'm not going to divulge what the next one is. Everybody will see that it's a surprise. So, and the last book and I was thinking that I do try to hit different tropes in every book, you know, I've got the age gap, workplace romance in book three, I've got the holiday, and then I love my alpha male. I will always love my alpha male billionaire trope, which was book one. I tend, you know, part of reading romance to me is to make the reader feel good and happy and fantasize, like we talked about. And so I do tend to stick to wealthy main characters, just because for me I, you know, I'm like putting myself in these people's shoes, like, oh, wouldn't that be cool, wouldn't that be great, oh, this is such a great story. And so I do want to write about people you know, things that you don't have or things that you would you know want. So I think all of my characters will always be more fortunate. I think that's just something I know in all of my books will happen.

Speaker 2:

My next series is going to be small town, so I'm going from Sandy to to. I'm moving the series over to my hometown, actually a Bozeman, so I'm moving it over to small town and then I'm going to do some ex Navy seal and firefighter in my next one. So I have the series mapped out and it's interconnected somehow. But if I could do anything I wanted, I would write a book a month and I would have paranormal and I would have vampires and I would have werewolves, I would have all of it, because there's so many different genres that I love that I wish I could just dive into. But I've already started down this path, so I'm going to stick with it until I run out of this, maybe that next two series, and then I'll go write some vampire, werewolf stuff, I don't know, just for that's really fun, cause then you're still sticking within romance, but you get to try something a little bit different and you have a lot of options.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, and I think really what makes people like books is not just the genre but the author's voice. I've crossed into different genres with the same author and you're still getting that same voice. So if you tend to like an author, you're going to like. You know, any, almost anything they write. As long as it's not something you absolutely like, can't stand. That is very true.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, and then, lastly, what's something that you've learned from your previous books that you're going to carry into what you're currently working on now?

Speaker 2:

Just tying everything in. And one thing I didn't do when I first started was plot. So I think now, before I start a book, I plot a character, I do their personality test, I put their whole lives, where they grew up, what their history is, what their fears are, and I just plot the characters really good now. And then I now map out. I think it's really important to map out your series and I wish I'd known that earlier, because you can tie in things to the previous books and lead in. And so now that I've figured that out by the third, I am now starting to like part of writing this book that I'm writing now I'm actually trying to figure out the story of the next one so that I can put that lead into it. So I know where they're coming from. But, yeah, pre-plotting, pre-plotting the whole thing and editing I will never I feel like I'll never have a routine for editing, but if I do one day, my life would be much happier. So I think, yeah, I'm learning every, every time.

Speaker 1:

I get better. Is there anything else you would like listeners to know about your books?

Speaker 2:

You know they are steamy, they're good and I do try to hit, you know, a little bit of trope for everybody and I think, like I said, if you like the writing style of one, chances are you're going to like most of them. And one thing I think I really try to do because of what I like when I read my steamy scenes are very I like dialogue. I don't like steamy scenes where it's just descriptive and it says what happened and this is what happened. I'll skip over scenes like that. So if you like a lot of dirty talking and you like dialogue during your steamy scenes, I think that's something that I think I've perfected.

Speaker 1:

And would you suggest them reading in publishing order and starting with Pursuit of Innocence, or really they could skip around, you know if there's a trope you absolutely hate, don't you know?

Speaker 2:

you don't have to make yourself miserable. All of my books are standalone. Make yourself miserable. All of my books are standalone. They have enough backstory and lead in that you can read any of them without the others. The nice thing is is when you're reading it you can read them out of order and you can always go back and say, oh well, they sounded like really interesting characters. I don't love the trope, but I want to go find out about them. You can do that. Nothing in any book gives away or or gives you know, ruins the book before it. So they're all fun and and I and the rom the holiday pursuit that I just holiday pursuit that I just released is kind of was kind of a little attempt at a rom-com. So I I don't feel like I am super funny in my writing, but I feel like I stepped it up a little bit with the holiday one.

Speaker 1:

So I think I did it, and that's it for today. Thanks for listening to when I Left Off a bookish podcast. You can purchase Bethany's novels through the links in the show notes and follow her on Instagram and, as always, they are also available on Kindle Unlimited.