Self-Publisher Interview with Claire Davon
1. When did you start writing?
I’ve been writing since I was young, but I didn’t start seriously pursuing publishing until over a decade ago. I’d collected a handful of rejections a little under 20 years ago and stopped submitting for a few years before I decided to pick up where I left off. My earliest remembrance of writing for fun was a Starsky and Hutch fan fic with a friend back in the late 1970s.
2. What came first: Self-publishing your books or getting your books published by a press? What was that experience like?
When I first went back to writing, my goal was to get the many first drafts I had edited. I wound up putting two books up on Amazon with zero fanfare. From there, I started editing on what wound up being the first in the Elementals’ Challenge series. I sent it to contests and publishers before Samhain Publishing picked it up. A few other small press publishers followed but when they closed, I decided to continue to self-publish. Both routes have their good and bad points. I liked working with a publisher – and more importantly, an editor – especially in those early years when I had old writing habits I needed to correct.
3. What kind of books do you write?
I write everything genre fiction related except for mystery/crime! I lean toward the fantasy and romance genres, but when I write short stories, I write horror and SF as well. I grew up around fantasy and science fiction, and that colors everything I do.
4. What can you tell me about your new books coming out this month? (Feel free to include an excerpt from each book, if you’d like.)
I have just released a book that is the fifth and final book in the Elementals’ Challenge series. It’s called Quintessence and completes the world building, and more importantly answers the questions that have been lurking throughout the series. I consider the series paranormal romance, but there’s also an urban fantasy feel to it.
I’ve included the blurb below – enjoy!
Tremors and distant screams rattle Eliane awake in the dead of night, but they aren’t coming from the ground. They’re rumbling through her mind, triggering the supernatural connection between her and her best friend, Joao. A connection they’ve shared since they journeyed to Argentina as children—and came away with something that makes them more than human.
Joao knows something disturbing has awakened his and Eliane’s naguals—mysterious symbiotes they each carry inside them. One of the four Elementals has suffered defeat in their initial Challenge against their Demonos counterpart. When an Elemental is defeated, all four must fight in final Challenge. A battle in which he and Eliane have some part to play.
Joao’s first instinct, to protect Eliane at all costs, wars with their mutual promise to resist the attraction between them, at least while the symbiotes’ power is untapped. But as attacks escalate, they begin to understand this Challenge isn’t about who will have the power of life or death over mankind. Defeat will spell total destruction of all humanity, and time is running out on Joao and Eliane’s one chance at forever.
5. What sort of methods do you use for book promotion?
Facebook, BookBub, book tours, author assistants.
6. Where do you get your ideas for stories?
The idea for a story can be as small as an observation on life walking down the street or as big as some crazy notion in a dream. Often the absurdity of life will prompt a thought and if that thought is strong enough, I’ll start to craft an idea. I have far more ideas than stories, from the subline to the ridiculous.
7. I noticed that you are also a self-publisher. What makes you to decide to self-pub a book or to submit it to a publisher?
I’m actually facing that decision right now. I have two trilogies that are completed (well, first drafts, anyway) and I can’t decide whether to self-pub or to submit to new publishers and see if any are interested. The trick lies in how much you want to take on yourself. As a person who self-publishes, I have a lot of people I work with, but there is something to be said for having those decisions made by the publisher. Again, I don’t think there’s a wrong answer, just one that works for you.
8. How do you manage the self-publishing end of your books alongside those getting published by an indie press? Do you promote them equally?
With indie presses you do a lot of the marketing yourself, so you have to promote them the same.
9. What are you working on right now?
I am currently working on the fourth book in my contemporary romance series to send to Wild Rose Press for consideration. I also have a few short stories in the works, as well as a small-town romance shared world book that will come out at Christmas.
10. Any advice for other authors?
Keep writing! The best advice I ever got was to just keep going. Make writing a daily habit, even if it’s 100 words a day. Even if you think the words are terrible. I often look back at stuff I write and put aside thinking it’s not that great only to be pleasantly surprised. You can’t edit a blank page!
ABOUT CLAIRE:
Claire can’t remember a time when writing wasn’t part of her life. Growing up, she used to write stories with her friends. As a teenager she started out reading fantasy and science fiction, but her diet quickly changed to romance and happily-ever-after’s. A native of Massachusetts and cold weather, she left all that behind to move to the sun and fun of California, but has always lived no more than twenty miles from the ocean.
In college, she studied acting, with a minor in creative writing. In hindsight, she should have flipped course studies. Before she was published, she sold books on eBay and discovered some of her favorite authors by sampling the goods, which was the perfect solution. Claire has many book-irons in the fire, most notably her urban fantasy series, The Elementals’ Challenge series, but writes contemporary and shifter romances as well as.
While she’s not a movie mogul or actor, she does work in the film industry with her office firmly situated in the 90210 district of Hollywood. Prone to breaking out into song, she is quick on her feet and just as quick with snappy dialogue. In addition to writing, she does animal rescue, reads, and goes to movies. She loves to hear from fans, so feel free to drop her a line. Her website.