Tell us your name and then a bit about yourself.
Hi! I’m A.D. Ellis. I’m a mom to a 13 year old and a 15 year old. I’ve been teaching for 22 years and I’m in my second year as an instructional coach. My whole career has been spent in the inner city of Indianapolis and I wouldn’t have it any other way. I published my first book in 2014 and never once looked back; I absolutely love the book community and writing stories.
I’m a huge fan of Schitt’s Creek, Kingdom, Pose, The Handmaid’s Tale, Eastsiders, Sense 8, Sex Education, the new Tales of the City, and pretty much any good romance or romantic comedy.
I taught myself to crochet and love to do it, but I don’t have as much time for it as I would like lately. I’ve adjusted to a new schedule of going to be around 8:30pm so I can get up at 3:45am to get ready for work and have some writing time. That leaves my afternoons and evenings free for family, dinner, catching up on shows, reading, and relaxing before bed.
I love hard cider, wine with friends, and I’m pretty much addicted to tea. Pizza, chocolate, and sushi are amazing. I rarely turn down a good pork taco, noodles, or bread. Chocolate covered peanuts are from Heaven.
I’ve published over 30 books and I have several more in the works. My early titles are small town male/female romance, but I switched to male/male romance back in 14/15 and it’s totally where my heart is now.
When you are writing a book, which is harder? The first book in the series or the others after it?
Both? The first book is hard because you’re just getting to know the characters. The next books are hard because you have to remain consistent with things that happened in the first book. Were those eyes blue? What was that neighbor’s name? They definitely both have their challenges.
What comes first? The plot or characters
I’m kinda 50/50 on this one. Sometimes I’ll get hit with characters and build a plot around them. Sometimes I’ll get hit with a plot and fill it in with characters.
What author would you love to meet (Who is your unicorn author)?
I’ve met so many great ones! I think I’d likely go way back to authors of my childhood and want to meet Beverly Cleary, Ann M. Martin, Roald Dahl, or Barbara Park.
If you could ask that author three questions about their writing, writing process, or books, what would they be?
I’d just ask them to tell me what they do with their ideas, how does a book come together for them, and what book they loved writing the most.
What is harder? The blurb writing, naming the book, or naming the series.
Oh Lord! ALL OF THEM!! Sometimes a title will come to me right away, sometimes I end up at THE END with no title at all. If I can figure out a series name, the individual titles usually come easier. The blurb isn’t fun, but I think I’m getting a little better at it. I (as a reader) hate long blurbs and I’ll pass on a book immediately if the blurb drags on and on, so I’ve adapted to the current way of blurb writing (in my genre at least) and I keep them short and sweet with a focus on the tropes.
What is your favorite memory so far as an author?
There are so many! I love all of the fun signings, meeting readers, and hearing that people love my stories. The best part of being an author is finding friends I never would have had in my life if it wasn’t for my books. That part makes all the hard parts worthwhile.
What is your definition of success?
I think there are different levels. My first success as an author came when I wrote THE END on my first book. Another success was when I hit publish on that book. Holding my physical book in my hand is a success. Each title published after that is a success. Growing as a writer is a success. Finding a circle of friends who gets me and supports me is a success. Having readers contact me to say my books touched them in some way is a success.
Yes, having money to continue publishing is a success and I do need to keep making sales in order to keep writing and publishing, but I don’t look at money as the biggest marker of success. At least not for me.
(Maybe if I was making millions I’d feel differently- hahahaha!)
What are your social links?
https://www.twitter.com/ADEllisAuthor
https://www.facebook.com/adellisauthor
https://www.instagram.com/adellisauthor
What are your buy links?