Author Diary Entries
Author Diary Entries (formerly known as the Indie Author Weekly podcast) features your host, Sagan Morrow, as she shares diary-style personal stories of life as an indie author and her behind-the-scenes journey of writing and publishing books as an authorpreneur.
You’ll learn more about the books Sagan writes, her insights and stories of being an author and a multipassionate creative, and a peek behind the curtain of a writer's life.
The Author Diary Entries podcast is hosted by Sagan Morrow, a Kamloops-based writer with 15+ years of experience as a small business owner. She is also a hobbyist burlesque dancer and performs on stage as Babe Maverick.
Sagan started out as a blogger and freelance writer (and editor) around 2008. In 2016, she began teaching other freelancers how to improve productivity and time management through her online courses. She is an internationally board-certified Success & Life Coach who specializes in personal fulfillment, solopreneurship, and anti-hustle productivity.
Sagan writes the Polyamorous Passions romantic comedy series, and has published several business books in addition to her work as a romance novelist. She published her first work of fiction in 2018.
RECOMMENDED STARTING POINT: "Ep 179: Author Update (one year later)" AND "Ep 140: Welcome back to the podcast!" AND "Ep 50: What made me start writing the Polyamorous Passions series" AND "Ep 53: Top 5 episodes from the first year of podcasting on Indie Author Weekly (and why I started this podcast)".
The first 12 episodes of this podcast were originally published on a “secret” platform only for email subscribers, but you can tune into all of those original episodes right here. This podcast was rebranded from "Indie Author Weekly" to "Author Diary Entries" in April 2025.
Learn more about Sagan’s published works and upcoming novels at https://saganmorrow.com/books/. Connect with Sagan on Instagram & Threads: @Saganlives
Author Diary Entries
189: ANNOUNCING Kiss Me — why choose chick lit novel (Book 8 in the Polyamorous Passions series)
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In this episode, “why choose” chick lit author Sagan Morrow announces her upcoming release Kiss Me (Book 8 in the Polyamorous Passions series) — and shares with you the back-of-book blurb, plus what to expect when you read this novel!
Kiss Me is a heartwarming short novel featuring found family, morally grey decisions, the why choose trope, a couple steamier scenes, and a people-pleasing burlesque performer who is learning how to put herself first.
Release day for this chick lit book is coming soon on April 28, 2026.
Resources mentioned in this episode:
- Pre-order your copy of Kiss Me (Book 8 in the Polyamorous Passions contemporary romance series: https://books2read.com/polypassions8
- The Polyamorous Passions series and Small Town Stilettos: SaganMorrow.com/books
- Sagan’s burlesque persona (Babe Maverick) on Instagram: Instagram.com/babemaverick
- Connect with Sagan on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/saganlives
- Connect with Sagan on Threads: https://www.threads.net/@saganlives
You’re listening to the Author Diary Entries podcast. I’m your host, Sagan Morrow, and this is episode #189.
It’s finally happened — at long last, I have finished Book 8 in my Polyamorous Passions series! It will be published very soon: release day is Tuesday April 28, 2026. This novel has been a long time coming and I’m really looking forward to sharing it with you!
With that in mind, today I want to give you a little teaser with the book title and about this book…
But first, a VERY brief background to this story:
Polyamorous Passions follows the lives of three best friends as they each embark on their own journeys into consensual non-monogamy. This is a 9-book series that essentially includes 3 trilogies within it: Books 1—3 focused on Emma, Books 4—6 focused on Helen, and Books 7—9 focus on Scarlett.
Each novella can be enjoyed as a stand-alone, but you’ll definitely get more out of them if you read all the stories in the series. And since THIS upcoming release is Book 8 in the series, it’s the second story in Scarlett’s trilogy — so I’d strongly encourage you to read Book 7, Her Bad Idea, prior to reading this upcoming release, in order to get the most out of it.
Without further ado…
Let’s do the title reveal, shall we?
My upcoming release — Book 8 in the Polyamorous Passions series, and the second story in Scarlett’s trilogy — is titled Kiss Me.
Kiss Me is a heartwarming short novel featuring found family, morally grey decisions, a couple steamier scenes, and a people-pleasing burlesque performer who is learning how to put herself first.
Here’s the back-of-book blurb:
“Then it’s settled: the Dusky Panther will become a burlesque club. Just you wait, Lady Salty Sweetness—we’re going to change the landscape of this city together.”
Basking in her recent dance competition triumph, a budding romance with her swoonworthy dance partner Pete Fraser, and now the career opportunity of a lifetime handed to her on a silver platter, Scarlett “Lady Salty Sweetness” Mitchell might finally have it all…
…Or does she?
“We made a mistake, Scarlett… I can’t pretend it didn’t mean anything.”
A non-monogamous relationship with Pete isn’t as easy as Scarlett thought it would be. Unintended secrets build between them, escalating when new realizations come to light with her longstanding unrequited (or is it?) crush, Westley Prince.
And as Scarlett works with the owner of the Dusky Panther to transform the nightclub into a burlesque-specific club, she must also navigate new-to-her creative blocks and performer anxieties.
Can Scarlett learn to trust herself to make the right decisions? Will she find the courage within to follow her heart? Who will she become, when she sets aside people-pleasing and finally goes after what she wants?
In this much-anticipated sequel to the beloved Her Bad Idea, Scarlett wrestles with her life choices—and steps into the grey area of being in a polyamorous relationship.
Pre-order your copy at SaganMorrow.com/books, or search “Kiss Me by Sagan Morrow” on your favourite e-bookstore platform!
Kiss Me has 3 main interlocking plots throughout the novel: Scarlett’s relationship with her boyfriend, Pete; her yearning for her unrequited crush, Wes; and her new career opportunity with the owner of the Dusky Panther, Zach. I haven’t written a book quite like this before, but I’m really happy with how it turned out! Each of these three aspects of the plot are very important for her character development and the arc of the novel.
There are 2 key themes that you’ll notice come up again and again for each of the 3 main and interlocking plots: exclusivity and trust. We see different characters experiencing and reacting to various types of fears and insecurities; confidence and desirability and stuckness and running away all play into it.
One thing I also want to mention here, regarding the connection this book has to the others I’ve already written and published, is that Scarlett’s unrequited crush, Wes, is mentioned in the very first book of the Polyamorous Passions series. I believe he makes an appearance in every single novel in the series leading up to this one! So for that reason, it would be especially useful to read the previous books in the series.
PLUS, the entire premise of this novel — the idea of the Dusky Panther being transformed into a burlesque-specific club — comes from a scene in Small Town Stilettos, which is a spinoff novel from this main series: Small Town Stilettos is set in the Polyamorous Passions universe, but follows an entirely different set of characters. The three main characters of the Polyamorous Passions series (Emma, Helen, and Scarlett) all make a cameo in one scene of Small Town Stilettos which then sets the stage for this new novel — my upcoming release, Kiss Me.
So with THAT in mind, the chronological reading order is the exact same as the order in which I’ve published my books to date: Read Books 1 - 7 in the Polyamorous Passions series, then read the Small Town Stilettos spinoff novel, and THEN read my upcoming novel, Kiss Me, which is Book 8 in the Polyamorous Passions series. That’s an aside about the reading order!
I’ve struggled a lot with how to categorize my books into genres over the years; they are contemporary romance, but they aren’t all laugh-out-loud funny enough that I’d consider ALL of them to be romantic comedies; they also feature main characters in their late 20s to early 30s, so they aren’t quite new adult. I think the best way to describe them all is chick lit. And Kiss Me, in particular, has (I think) less romcom vibes than some of my other novellas. Definitely some humour, but it’s much more in line with classic chick lit.
Kiss Me is about standing on a precipice. There is an interesting reluctance to move forward, vying for control against the desperation to move forward. Scarlett is at the centre of this hurricane of movement happening around her; it’s kind of like she’s standing on this revolving platform or standing on an escalator as it moves beneath her. The entire story has that sort of tension to it, a wanting to take the step forward and a resistance—out of fear, out of uncertainty, out of insecurity—to making that happen.
And that’s also reflected in the narrative structure of this book, because there are a lot of flashbacks and backstory woven throughout (especially in the first few chapters) which, at times, keeps the reader from being able to fully move forward with the story.
I like to think that this is the type of novel that might make you want to throw your copy of the book across the room in frustration, but then you’ll immediately go and pick it up again because you GET what Scarlett’s going through, and you’ve BEEN where she is (because you’ve felt fears or insecurities in some way in your own life), and you NEED to know what will unfold for her and whether she can get past it. Because if she can get past it, so can you.
If you like the sounds of that, you can pre-order your copy at SaganMorrow.com/books, or search “Kiss Me by Sagan Morrow” on your favourite e-bookstore platform. I’ll make sure to include the links in the show notes for this episode.
That’s a wrap on today’s episode! Find me on Instagram & Threads to share your thoughts about this episode — my handle is @Saganlives. I would love to hear your own insights or any questions that you have about this topic, or to simply continue the conversation with you on those platforms.
As always, you can access the show notes and transcript of this episode at SaganMorrow.com/podcast. And if you are enjoying the Author Diary Entries podcast, please take 2 minutes to rate and review it on your favourite podcast platform — or give it a share on social media so your friends and community can tune in.
Thanks so much — I appreciate you!
