Louise Mayberry writes Historical Romance
Please welcome Louise Mayberry. She has a new historical romance series. Today she shares her writing life and inspirations.
Is writing something that comes easy to you or not?
Parts of the writing process come very easily to me. Writing a novel is a huge, time consuming project with a myriad of details and threads that need to be woven together to make a cohesive whole. The project manager in me enjoys breaking this all down into manageable day-to-day, week-to-week tasks. I also really enjoy historical research and mapping out my characters’ emotional arcs and relationships.
But it’s not all easy! I’m challenged by the words themselves. My vocabulary recall isn’t as good as I’d like, and I’m (embarrassingly) dependent on my thesaurus. As I’ve delved more into self-publishing, I’ve also found it difficult to balance my writer-self, marketer-self, and publisher-self. Some days it feels impossible to even get to the task of writing at all, which really, in the end, is the most important.
What interesting jobs have you had? How have those jobs affected your writing?
Before I became a full-time writer, I had a 20-year career in a large chain of natural foods stores, working mostly in sales and marketing of fresh, organic produce. Writing was a huge part of this work: from composing newsletter articles about the food system and local farms, to writing “tasting notes” for 25 different kind of apple varieties, as well as constructing recipes for little known root veggies. In the end, good food writing is very similar to romance writing—sensual, provocative and intriguing—and the transition was surprisingly easy.
Where do you get your ideas?
For a long time, I was convinced I couldn’t write fiction. I never felt “creative” enough to come up with something worth writing about. But then I tried my hand at historical romance. Writing in the past allows me to use history as a springboard for my creativity. I love to read biographies and histories of places, and often, small obscure references will inspire my characters and settings.
What project are you working on now or what book will be next?
Roses in Red Wax is my debut novel, and it’s the first book of an intended four book series: The Darnalay Castle Series. Book two, Swept Into the Storm, was just released on May 5th, and I’m currently in the second draft phase of book three, A Radical Affair. If all goes as I hope, I’ll have the series complete by early spring 2024.
Do you have any advice to give to aspiring writers?
The Darnalay Castle books are self-published. Before I decided to go indie, I queried Roses in Red Wax for six months, racking up something like 180 agent and publisher rejections. Needless to say, it was a difficult time, and my mental health wasn’t great.
The advice I was given over and over during this time is the same advice that’s given to many new writers: “Don’t give up.” It’s well meant, to be sure, but for me, my breakthrough came when I DID give up on traditional publishing and decided to go indie. Roses in Red Wax has been embraced by reviewers and readers, with over 75 five-star ratings across six platforms, and a 4.24 average on Goodreads.
So, the advice I would give is: Don’t give up, but be prepared to change course. And also: Cultivate a support network, particularly friendships with other authors—because some days, your friends will be the only thing keeping you going.
Roses in Red Wax
by Louise Mayberry
… it was as if I was living in a shadow, and all of a sudden the sun came out.
Jane Stuart has lost everything, her betrothed, her ancestral castle in the Highlands, and her life’s work—the orchard where she ran her apple tree crossbreeding trials. But after a year of exile in smoke-filled Glasgow, she’s gone numb to the loss, indifferent to her lonely, grey future.
Then he comes along.
Percy Sommerbell is a musician, a free spirit who holds nothing but disdain for his industrialist father. But when familial duty forces Percy to travel to Scotland to inspect his father’s holdings, he’s confronted with an uncomfortable truth. His fortune—the money that funds his aimless wandering through all life’s pleasures—is generated by the exploitation of people and children, in his father’s spinning mills.
There’s something else in Glasgow, a mysterious Highland beauty whose sad eyes and luscious curves promise temporary distraction from his growing sense of guilt, and inspiration for his music. Against her better judgement, Jane finds herself falling for this man’s charms. But when the mills become the first spark in a violent radical insurgency, everything changes. Jane and Percy’s connection might not be as fleeting as either of them imagined.
Available from All Online Booksellers
Learn more about Louise Mayberry
Louise Mayberry writes steamy historical romance set in the early industrial age—a volatile time of radicals & romantics, capitalists & aristocrats. Her stories savor the connections between our past and present, just as they celebrate the human connection between her heroes and heroines.
Louise lives with her family in the Upper Midwest where she savors the summers and survives the winters. When not writing, she can be found wandering in her garden, attempting to talk her kids into eating healthy food, or curled up in a pool of sunshine with a cup of tea and a good book.
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