About Antara Man:
Antara Man started writing at the age of seven and has been doing it to this very day. Apart from reading and writing, you can also find her practicing yoga, as she has developed a keen interest in self-improvement, spirituality and becoming a better human being. Apart from fantasy and science fiction, she also enjoy writing criminal and suspense stories and believes in unity in diversity. In her opinion, the best books and stories are a crossover between genres.
What inspires you to write?
My main passion comes with the question: “What if…” And then “What would the world of tomorrow be?” In general, my main inspiration is, , the battle between good and evil and the role we people play in the grand scheme of life.
Tell us about your writing process.
I first start with an idea that sinks into me and I entertain it for a few days. If it’s good enough, it flickers my imagination and I want to go further. Then I outline it by pen and paper and create a new project in Scrivener. I sort of follow Sean Platt and Johnny B. Truant’s technique of writing beats. Then comes the writing itself. I must confess that no matter how hard I outline and plot in advance, the story follows its own plot and while I actually write it, I am a pantser with some basic outline.
For Fiction Writers: Do you listen (or talk to) to your characters?
I think of them as people whom I know; I try to place myself in their shoes and in their world.
What advice would you give other writers?
My advice is to be persistent, to write a lot and to try to improve with every subsequent project.
How did you decide how to publish your books?
I knew when I finished Alice in Sinland that I have to share this story. It was a painful experience for me because I live in the EU and I used to suffer from the “I have to live in the US to publish in the US” mentality but, hopefully, some good folks told me that this is not true since we’re all living in the digital age, not in the 90s.
I decided to go indie after I explored the options offered in my home country and none of them made any sense to me. Even while I was writing and outlining the story, I was aware that my main target audience is the States; I was also influenced by some authors who have had very poor experience with traditional publishers and have opted to go indie. James Altucher’s post in Copyblogger How to Self-publish a Bestseller opened my eyes. He stresses on the importance of team-publishing instead of self-publishing and criticizes the lack of marketing and editorial input in most of the publishing houses. I naively believed that publishers provided authors with marketing!
In another post about self-publishing, Copyblogger’s CEO Sonia Simone wrote in the comment section that nowadays publishers provide marketing only if they are certain that the book will sell. In other words, if you are Stephen King, Dan Brown or J.K. Rowlings, only then can you expect any marketing. No matter how good your story, writing style or themes are, publishers don’t care. In Reddit’s Q&A Hugh Howey wrote that nowadays publishers will publish everything that sells. The proof – 50 Shades of Gray. Half a century ago no respected publisher would have bothered to take a second look at a poor quality BDSM erotica. Today, the book rights are owned by Random House.
What do you think about the future of book publishing?
I see the future of publishing as becoming more and more difficult. At some point еven Amazon will be disrupted – there is no question in that. Even Jeff Bezos has confessed it. Despite the pessimistic predictions about publishing and books, however, there will always be people who enjoy books and prefer them to TV shows or the Internet.
What do you use?: Professional Editor, Professional Cover Designer, Beta Readers
What genres do you write?: women’s fiction, fantasy; sci-fi and fantasy; suspense
What formats are your books in?: eBook
Website(s)
Antara Man Home Page Link
Link To Antara Man Page On Amazon
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