I ignore this advic e when I’m writing first drafts, and let the adverbs come as they may. I adore adverbs-both reading and writing them-so I fel t slighted on their behalf. The least useful advice I found was that adverbs were bad and should be eliminated. Internalizing the advice that there is no single right way to do thing s helped me to stop worrying that I might be “doing it wrong ,” and to just accept and embrace my process. That didn’t square with instructions I’d heard that one should write every day. I’ve always been an episodic writer, using my off-time to think about my work-in-progress, as well as to read, watch movies, go on trips, spend time with loved ones, and generally rejuvenate. The most useful advice I found was variations on a theme-that there is no one way to write, and that we should each find and do what works for us. When I was first starting out, I searched online for writing advice from successful authors and editors.

What is the most useful writing advice you ever received? The least useful? Fortunately, my desire to write was stron ger, and now I’ve reached a place wher e I’m much better at managing self-doubt -recognizing it for what it is (an unpleasant part of the process) instead of believing what it tells me. I’m not sure where it comes from, but that is one thing that seems to plague a lot of creative people. The most destructive thing was self-doubt. Having that luxury was crucial to me in the early learning stages. The most useful thing for me by far was the combination of free, unstructured time and mental space in which I could allow myself to write, think, rewrite, think some more, experiment, revise, and generally immerse myself in the process. What did you find most useful in learning to write? What was least useful or most destructive? Therefore, it shouldn’t have come as a surprise me that when I finally did sit down to write, a paranormal romance emerged- albeit an atypical one. B ut f rom Joss Whedon’s Buffyverse to Charlaine Harris’s Sookie Stackhouse series, I’ ve always been passionate about sto ries that combine romance with paranormal elements, especially when they also incorporate great characters, quirky humor, and a bit of suspense. I simply wrote what I loved, and what appealed to m e.

When I first sat down to write, I didn’t have a particular genre in mi nd.

Why did you choose to write in your particular field or genre?

All the Wounds in Shadow by Anise Eden