The Kobo Writing Life team is excited to announce our latest Live Q&A on Wednesday September 29th. From 12:00 PM-1:00 PM EST, we'll be chatting with Author Revolution's Carissa Andrews on the Kobo Writing Life Facebook and YouTube pages. If you can't make the takeover, feel free to comment on this post with your questions and we can ask them for you!

Hey there, author revolutionary!

My name is Carissa Andrews and I'm an international bestselling indie author who's been around for the past decade or so. I originally started my author journey back in 2011, when the indie author boom was just starting to … well, boom. HA!

I published my first scifi/fantasy genre bender, Pendomus, in 2013, and life itself changed forever. Not only because I became a published author – but because I chose the path less traveled and published intentionally as an indie.

Since then, I've published more than seventeen titles across my fiction and nonfiction works, with most of them being in the past four years. See, while I might have begun my journey in 2011, and published that first book in 2013, I didn't really get my prolific author mindset locked in place until 2017.

While I could go on about how life got in the way, as it always does, the real reason I didn't propel my author career forward was because I was scared to. Can you relate?

Now, just because I wasn't publishing between 2013 and 2017 doesn't mean I wasn't paying attention. Pendomus was the first book in a series, after all, so I knew I had to get back to it at some point. The whole time I was learning marketing, websites, ads, and trying on the various online marketing hats to see which ones fit. I was trying to decide how writing fit in my life, too.

When I reentered the scene in 2017, it was by rapid releasing the final two books in the Pendomus Chronicles series back-to-back. At the time, rapid releasing was just gaining some traction, and everyone seemed to be promoting it in the indie space.

However, what I found was rapid releasing those two books wiped me out. I felt like a chicken with its head cut off and I didn't even get to enjoy the process as much as I would have liked. How other indies were writing and publishing a book a month for years was mind-boggling.

In 2018, the Pendomus Chronicles went on to become an international bestselling series and by that point, I had the writing and publishing bug firmly implanted in my DNA. I knew this was where I was meant to be, rapid releasing or not. But more than that, I wanted to help my fellow indies learn the ropes in a way that felt good because burnout isn't fun.

At the same time as the final two books in the Pendomus Chronicles were launching, I began teaching indie publishing through Facebook and Twitter livestreaming. My hope was to help other indies avoid some of the pitfalls I was finding. I can't say I knew I'd end up splitting my career in half this way, but looking back, I'm not surprised at where I've ended up.

I started teaching in-person workshops and conferences in 2018.

In 2019, I officially founded my company Author Revolution. I knew it was my mission to take what I've learned and expand it in a way that empowers my fellow writers and friends to become indie authors. I wanted to demystify the process and make it as easy to understand as possible. I now have six different courses and tons of other assets to help my students become the most empowered version of themselves as possible.

I also started the Author Revolution Podcast in October of 2019 to be a natural extension of what I do and how I teach. While I love writing (obviously!), there's something to be said about the energy behind our voices. And since I spend much of my day writing, it's actually a nice pivot to speak about a topic, too. To date, I have a hundred podcast episodes and counting. So, if you're looking for motivation, inspiration, or plain old information, I have you covered.

Overall, what I really love to teach is how to build an intentional author career by developing a prolific author mindset and putting a plan in place to make magic happen.

My signature course, Rapid Release Roadmap, has become my war cry for indies looking to create a sustainable, lifelong author career without all the overwhelm and burnout. In it, I teach authors how to write and publish four books a year (typically in a series) to build their backlist, readership, and royalties. 

When all is said and done, I want nothing more than my students and fellow indies to feel supported and heard – and for my readers to be entertained while they escape for a bit.

I'm looking forward to stopping in to take over Kobo Writing Life for a bit. Let's talk all things indie publishing, author life, the prolific author mindset, rapid releasing, writing genre-bending books, and heck, whatever else you can throw at me!

Until then, go forth and start your author revolution!

Carissa

Carissa Andrews is an international bestselling urban fantasy author. She's also the CEO of Author Revolution, an online academy that teaches writers how to create a prolific author career. Carissa is also the host of the Author Revolution Podcast. Visit authorrevolution.org to learn more about being a prolific author and download her free book The Write Frame of Mind. Visit carissaandrews.com to learn more about her fiction and snag a free copy of her novella, The Final Five.