About the Author

Anya W. Vossand lives and writes near Boston, Massachusetts. When it comes to romance and erotica, her philosophy is that each story should be beautiful and moving, with an emphasis on clever and engaging characters with relatable motivations. As a nonbinary and bisexual person, she enjoys crafting inclusive stories with a wide variety of LGBTQ representation and believes that everyone deserves love, acceptance, and their own fairytale ending. When not writing, Anya enjoys heavy metal, BDSM fashion, excellent coffee, and spending time with her spouse and their two familiars, Susi and Lily, who some mistake for regular cats.

FAQ

Questions obtained from BookFox.

What is the most difficult part of your artistic process?

Self-criticism! We are all our own worst critics or, at least, I am my own worst critic. Because writing, and especially writing romance, can be so completely vulnerable, any set back, rocky turn of phrase, dead end, or anything else feels quite personal, as if I shouldn't be attempting this story at all. But the intensity of the distress is only there because of the intensity inherent in the work, which is neither positive nor negative. So it is best to take a moment, correct whatever error that caused the self doubt, and continue. Don't feel bad about having those moments - if you didn't ever have them, it means you aren't striving for something complicated and personal. And isn't that what romance is?

How long on average does it take you to write a book?

It can range from months to years, depending on what else is going on with my life at the time. Rarely has writing every been my full-time endeavor, though I always feel very lucky during those periods when it is.

What is your favorite childhood book?

The Last Unicorn by Peter. S. Beagle.

Do you read your book reviews? How do you deal with bad or good ones?

I sometimes do! I enjoy the positive ones a great deal, especially the ones where people express that seeing their own story played out and their own struggles represented gave them comfort (I remember "Larkspur" seemed to help quite a few people, as a main theme in the book is familial rejection based on sexuality). But even the negative comments have value. If they are inane and simple firings of an angry synapse, they are amusing. If they have a more salient critique, I see that there is indeed an element to improve, and so it gets improved in future editions.

How do you select the names of your characters?

I love names, and I love finding just the right name for each character. Sometimes I agonize about it for weeks, sometimes the name emerges from the mental ether right away and it's locked in. Tolkien crafted the names of his characters with great care, aiming to reflect their place in the world, their culture, their age, and (at times) their destiny. He even invented several languages for his created universe. I'm not ready quite yet to go that far, but I do try to use that philosophy with names.

How many hours a day do you write?

I am, what you could say, consistently inconsistent. I do not set out to write for X amount of hours every day, but only settle down to move stories along and grow them when I'm ready to. Does that kill my productivity? No, because I can't be more productive than that and still turn out something of quality. Plus, I have nine titles at present on this site (at the time of filling out this FAQ), so I'd say that's pretty good, given my methods!

What’s the most difficult thing about writing characters from the opposite sex?

I myself am nonbinary and I was assigned female at birth, so nearly every gender+sex combination is different from mine! More to the point, I view every character as a human being first and not a stereotype. I try to look at their motivations, their aspirations, and the restrictions and benefits of their environments and cultures. I also try to keep in mind what their culture's idea of gender rolls and appropriate presentation would be, and whether this character is comfortable with those rules or whether the character refuses them. What effects does acceptance vs. refusal have on the character in the greater context of their culture? How then does that effect come back at them and direct them?

Gender is complicated. People are complicated. Simplifying any of it is unreal, at least in my opinion.

What kind of research do you do, and how long do you spend researching before beginning a book?

I love researching things for stories of any genre, and I feel that every story deserves to have a solid foundation upon which everything happens. The world must feel reasonable, consistent, and real. Rules that are established can't be broken for anything save the utmost plot-driven reason, and even then it must be severely consequential. I would say that I have clocked the most research hours for the "Lucifer" novel and all of its parts, as there is a great deal of historical information I wasn't aware of before starting it. I wanted my character to exist in a vibrant collection of settings and times and cultures that are unfamiliar to me as a caucasian American, and so I researched historical timelines, looked up dictionaries for dead languages, watched videos of cuisine made by cooks of that culture, listened to music both of that period and of more modern varieties, and the list goes on. I didn't want to make a pantomime of these cultures as if they don't matter - I wanted to get as close as I could to the real living thing, and pay them all respect by proper representation as well as I could.

What’s the best way to market your books?

I am learning that right now. Stay tuned for a better answer!

What does literary success look like to you?

If I had been asked this question perhaps ten years ago, I'd have said "Money", but I don't ascribe to that metric anymore. Success is a personal and subjective thing, and for me, success means growing my talents, networking with other readers and writers, finding joy in those communities, and feeling pride in my own works.

How many unpublished and half-finished books do you have?

Oh christ... at least five? It's ridiculous. And most are nearly done - I just ran out of enthusiasm for them. Maybe I'll take another look at them to either finish the ones that warrant it, or retire those that don't.

As a writer, what would you choose as your mascot/avatar/spirit animal?

A unicorn, of course.

How do you balance making demands on the reader with taking care of the reader?

I never want to assume that my readers are stupid, conservative, or bigoted. I am not writing for that crowd, and I highly doubt that crowd would be drawn to my work. Instead, I write for everyone else. Is my vocabulary on the large side? Yes, but I temper it for artistic purposes (sometimes less is more) as well as the unwillingness to come off sounding like a thesaurus-philic blowhard. My dialog, on the other hand, is often quite candid and, where appropriate, loaded with idioms, shortenings, and other tweaks of language that feel familiar, at least to me. I want my characters, no matter how arch their concept, to feel real.

How did publishing your first book change your process of writing?

For a long while I idolized the brass ring of traditional publishing, and looked down on independent publishers. But the more I learned about the industry of publishing, and the more I learned about the community of indie publishers, my mind changed completely. So I self-published my first novel, "The Taming of Lucier" (now part of the "Lucifer" book), and felt so much +agency+ over the entire process. The cover was of my own design, the formatting all my own work. No one could tell me to change anything - I had complete control. It was liberating, and I still greatly enjoy that freedom today.

If you could tell your younger writing self anything, what would it be?

You did just fine, and you will continue to do just fine. You're writing is human and engaging and interesting, and it was and will always be a great outlet for you to express what in real life you couldn't.

Do you want each book to stand on its own, or are you trying to build a body of work with connections between each book?

I like to leave room for most of my stories to exist in the same universe, or the same metaverse, at least. But it's never really all that explicit.

Do you think someone could be a writer if they don’t feel emotions strongly?

This is going to be a delicate question for me to answer, as I have ADHD and therefor feel EVERYTHING strongly. It's not always a good thing, or an easy thing, to feel everything so +much+. However, it does help me saturate emotion and feeling into the situations and into the characters. For a writer who doesn't feel emotions that intensely, yes of course they can be a writer! Even if your emotional dynamics are naturally unturbulent, you still have fascinating stories to tell, especially for a reader like me. I want to see what your experience is like!

Do you try more to be original or to deliver to readers what they want?

Both. Such a question, in its phrasing, suggests that readers don't want originality. They do. What they want, I feel, is something relatable, something accessible. That isn't always something familiar or rote. If you humanize the main character in a way that readers can relate to, or create a conflict that is understandable and viscerally felt by so many, you'll be giving the reader what they want. You can be as original as you like in how you deliver that.

Did you ever consider writing under a pseudonym?

I write under one right now.

What is your writing Kryptonite?

Brute force. Writing, for me, is like building something amazing but delicate. It requires patience and passion and a gentle touch. To try and muscle out scenes and chapters by brute force, when I am feeling tired and uninspired and unmotivated, is going to always result in something shitty. In the end, all of those brute force portions get rewritten anyway, so it saves time to be patient and wait for inspiration.

Does a big ego help or hurt writers?

As I am a fan of both Trixie Mattel and Katya Zamalodchikova, I have espoused their philosophy of "Delusional Confidence", i.e. you need to go out there and fully believe you are THAT BITCH in order to get over your own nerves. Sometimes that takes an amount of confidence that is outrageous in the moment. But the idea is that you know that confidence in that moment is delusional and unrealistic. You are aware of your product and where it sits in the deluge of other writing - that's honesty. So it's a balance of big ego and realism.

What are common traps for aspiring writers?

Feeling like there is only one way to do anything, and unfortunately a lot of "writing mentors" put out this message, sometimes on purpose and sometimes without realizing it. There is no one proper way to write. There is no formula. There are no cheat codes or tricks. Just focus on the story you want to tell, and tell it as you can, in the way only YOU can. That's what makes your story valuable and unique.

Does writing energize or exhaust you?

Both. The act of writing both requires mental energy and provides an outlet for packages of ideas that have been taking up space in the mind. It's like cooking a meal - sometimes it's a simple recipe, sometimes it's complicated and effortful, but the results are delicious and the use of ingredients leaves a bit more space in the pantry for future items.

What is the first book that made you cry?

"Two Hearts" by Peter S. Beagle, a sequel to "The Last Unicorn".