About Lilly Rayman:
First and foremost I am a wife and mother. I was born in England where I had a dream at the age of 14. That dream was to chase cattle on horseback across the Australian Outback.
In 2008, I had the opportunity to follow that dream, and found myself travelling to Australia on an Outback working holiday, and I’ve chased cattle; on horse back; across the Outback. I met my soul mate, whilst on my working holiday, married him, and we have two beautiful daughters, and I’m still loving life in Australia.
I love to read, much to my husbands dismay sometimes when I have my head metaphorically buried in the pages of a book (I mean, how can that be literal since the dawn of e-books?)!
I love fantasy, I used to take myself away from my nasty world of bullies and appear in some wonderful land of dragons and magic! Pern was my all time favourite hide out world, God bless Anne and Todd MacCaffery.
When I immersed myself in my fantasy worlds, I used to re-write the plots in my head, starring myself as some great, sword drawn character who wouldn’t give two hoots what the local bully thought! That eventuated in my actually writing down my own stories.
More recently I was inspired to start writing again, and I picked up on the whole craze of werewolf and vampire. I have had the most enjoyment writing AN UNEXPECTED BONDING, and the two books that will follow it.
What inspires you to write?
I’ve always loved books from a young age. I was always a story teller from a young age. When I was about 14 I started writing my own stories as a way to escape the reality of bullies at school. There was something empowering about writing a sword swinging strong female character who didn’t care about the bullies. However I didn’t start writing with any real meaning until after the birth of my first daughter. I was annoyed with the constant cliches that came with all the paranormal stories of werewolves and vampires, and I set out to change that by writing my own story and avoiding those aforementioned cliches.
Tell us about your writing process.
I guess I’m a seat of the pants writer. I have scenes that come into my head, and I just write until I get there, sometimes getting diverted along the way.
I do like to use Wattpad as my draft forum. I post my first draft as I write to try and keep me going as I have readers wanting more. It also helps me to gage the reception of my work.
For Fiction Writers: Do you listen (or talk to) to your characters?
I daydream my scenes, I’m there with them and I watch everything they do and say. I have also been known to pull some funny faces as I imitate the facial expressions of my characters, helping me to actually write about them.
What advice would you give other writers?
Just relax as you follow the journey. Get your first draft finished before you go back to edit and re-write. Don’t be afraid to use Beta readers for their opinions about content and flow. The most important thing I can’t stress enough is to tell you to edit. And use an editor, if you can. There is nothing worse than a book that is published with silly typos or grammatical errors.
How did you decide how to publish your books?
I was encouraged to enter my first draft of An Unexpected Bonding into an online writing competition. When I actually walked away with Best Work and Most Popular Work, and some prize money in my pocket, I thought I should definitely publish.
What do you think about the future of book publishing?
This is a tricky one. Personally I have self published, and its a hard market to crack, especially if you can’t afford all those expensive marketing avenues.
The ease of self publishing means that anyone who thinks they can, publish as a writer, and the market is flooded with a mass of poorly written and even more poorly edited books. Some authors even go for quantity over quality and flood the market with too many books that may have had a promise of a good story line with plenty of content editing and advice.
Without the backing of the big publishing houses, I think it can be hard to break into a market of so many books, but if it’s your dream, and you’ve done your hardest to get quality from your work, then go for it!
What do you use?: Professional Editor, Beta Readers
What genres do you write?: paranormal romance, western, adult
What formats are your books in?: Both eBook and Print
Website(s)
Lilly Rayman Home Page Link
Link To Lilly Rayman Page On Amazon
Link to Author Page on other site
Your Social Media Links
Goodreads
Facebook
Twitter
Instagram
All information in this post is presented “as is” supplied by the author. We don’t edit to allow you the reader to hear the author in their own voice.
