Pretty Little Island W/ Author Rhea Ryan

Welcome to Dirty Talk with the Smut Swords. I'm your host Haley. And I'm your co-host Mary. This is the podcast where we talk about romance books. We discuss everything smutty and spicy. So this podcast, we are talking about Pretty Little Island by Rhea Ryan. And we also have a surprise guest joining us today, and it is Rhea Ryan. And so we typically like to do one good thing for the week. So I would say mine...

I don't really have one good thing for the week. I would just say mine's been pretty busy. We've just been doing wedding planning and I've been keeping pretty busy with author stuff. Author planning. What about you? Oh, man. Well, I'm on holidays. So I've been kind of a mixture of getting some stuff done for the family and lots of author stuff, like lots of author stuff.

Don't you have a new release coming out soon? So my new release actually is out. I published the final book in my series on July 11th. This is me taking a break after my release. Well, that's nice. Nice little break. Did you guys decide to go anywhere like out of state? So I actually live in Canada. So we did leave. Canada, we went down to, I'm in Western Canada, so we ended up going into the States, into Idaho.

which was really my first time there. And I actually loved it. Yeah. We did a theme park there and then headed back into Canada and went to the islands, Victoria islands or Vancouver Island. Should I say Victoria is the city. Okay. I've never traveled outside of the US. I live in Arkansas, so I've never been to like, you know, Canada or outside of to the UK. So I feel like that'd be difficult.

Well, you should come on up. It's nice up here. It's hot here for one. How hot does it get up there? I don't know what the equivalent right now. It's probably... My guess would be 90. It's 32 degrees Celsius, which is really hot for us. This is about as hot as it gets here. So it's been nice, but I'm not used to the heat. Yeah, I think it's been about the same here. I feel like every time I get home from work, I just need to lay down because I'm like, it's too hot. Yeah, it definitely is.

So, but that's okay. It still ends up here a lot. So I cannot complain about the heat while we have it. So why don't you tell us a little bit about yourself? Sure. So I started writing. I guess two years ago, just over two years ago. So most people started during COVID and I kind of started after COVID watching. I did a lot of reading during COVID and then I don't know what sparked it, but.

Something sparked it. So I started writing and then I couldn't stop. And so now I've written and published three books working on my fourth or yeah, working on my fourth and fifth right now.

So that's sort of the writing side of me. Also a mom of two and I work full time. So quite busy. So do you plan on just doing dark romance or do you want to do any other genre? That's an interesting question. You know, I actually pretty much for 15 years, I only read fantasy. And I only started reading dark romance about two years ago. And I was just...

hooked and became obsessed with it to the point I wanted to write it. So right now, I would say dark romance is sort of where I'm headed and going to stay, but I wouldn't be surprised if there was a dark. sort of dark fantasy in me at some point um because I do love the romantic genre but I I like to write dark so I think uh yeah I wouldn't rule it out

I always love a dark fantasy. So I always love to know, because I didn't read dark romance until, you know, like I would say two years ago as well. Who was your first dark romance author? So for me, it was Penelope Douglas. She's the one who got me in, which I think is the case for maybe most people. But yeah, I read I read Credence and then that kind of.

led me down a path. Okay. I still haven't read that book just yet. I think I have it on my shelf. Mine was, I forgot which book it was specifically, but it was Willow Winters. Okay. I haven't heard of, of her, but nah. She writes mafia romance or well, she writes a couple of different sub genres, but her books are really, really good. I'll have to check it out. I've.

I haven't read a ton of Mafia, so that's one area I have not read a ton of, but I see it all the time. I know it's a really popular sub-genre for sure. Her writing is really good. I don't know how many books she's written, but she... She has a lot that she's published. I'm going to write her down. So I haven't finished the book quite yet, but just from reading the first couple chapters that I've read, I've...

I'm already hooked just from reading it. I love all the characters that I've met so far. So Pretty Little Island is a dark new adult romance with angst, survival, hockey, and love triangles. So I haven't finished it just yet, like I said. But at this point, I feel like I'm going to give it a five star. And then I have already added the rest to my Amazon wishlist. So that way I can buy it for later.

I'm curious to know how far you are. Like what chapter is going on? I was actually reading it while I was eating my dinner, but I am, I'm still on page six.

Oh, so you have a long way to go. Yeah. All my authors, I don't know if they've talked to one another, but they all decided to have their releases back to back this week. It's just been one thing after another this week. And I'm like... oh gosh after this I plan to sit down and finish it yeah you once I've heard that kind of once you get through once you realize what the story is about you you might not be able to put it down that's

That's what I've heard. So we'll see. So I don't know where you are. I don't want to ruin anything for you. It's best. It's the kind of story that you go into blind because it's probably not what you think it is when you read it. So I want to make sure I get the reading order. So it's Pretty Little Island and then Twice Love Burned and then Wicked Little Island. Yes. Pretty and Wicked are sort of one continuous story. And then...

Twice Love Burned is sort of a prequel story of what happens to two of the main characters a year and a half before. So something major happens that our... Our main female character is sort of exploring, kind of getting to the bottom of. And so that's sort of, I would say, a subplot in the beginning, kind of driving her goal for the story. And then...

This sort of goes into detail on what exactly happened a year and a half earlier. Okay. And it's short, but it kind of hits real quick. It's giving me some mean girl vibes. Yes. Yeah, I would say, I would say. It does. So my characters are in high school, which I know some people love that trope and some people do not like that trope. Obviously, Penelope Douglas is one of my favorite authors and she writes a lot of high school.

I like it but it's not YA in any stretch it's definitely 18 plus lots of trigger warnings so the beginning is very high school and then it kind of goes from there So can people find the trigger warnings on your website? Not on the website yet, but definitely in the beginning of the book. They're there listed. Perfect. So for the questions...

What point did you decide you wanted to be an author? It was around March. 2022 like not that long ago I do not have a typical story where people say oh I wanted to since I was a kid and I thought maybe I could and I'd had it in me at some point but I was more concerned with um going to school and getting a job and all that stuff so I did all that kind of got a career going and then now that I've

been in my career for some time I just needed something different and then uh yeah I just started writing I just took a course online just to kind of get get me going and learning just the basic structure of you know how to outline and all that stuff and then it kind of just took off from there and then once this part of my brain opened up there just wasn't stopping it and I've

Yeah, that was about two years ago. And I've written, I actually had a book written before Pretty Little Island. This is my second book I've written. My first one may or may not ever see the light of day. Who knows? Maybe I'll dust it off one day. So yeah, in that short amount of time I've written kind of working on my sixth. And you have three published right now?

I have three published right now. Yes. Yeah. So Pretty Little Island and Wicked Little Island are the full length novels. And then Twice Love Bird is the novella to read in between. Are there any books that you're currently working on?

Or that you plan to work on that you can tell us about? Yes, yes, absolutely. So I am just in working on a cover reveal for a new series. It's called Shadowface. And it's... slated to come out. I don't want to put like an exact date yet, but I'm doing a couple. book signings in the early next year and I want at least the first book out before that book signing so that's in March so plan to see something

February, March, I would say is when it's ready. But it is a dark college, serial killer, secret society, masked man. Yeah. So it's this one I'm really excited about. It's coming together nicely. And then so that one's written. The first draft is written. I'm working on the second draft now. And then I've sort of done a skeleton draft about 30, 35,000 words for the sequel to that is already.

sort of in play as well so I'm kind of working on them simultaneously which is a little crazy but that's just the way my brain works so they're going to be interconnected standalones but definitely interconnected so that's sort of what I have on the go right now, which is fun. And then on top of that, I'm also working with a couple of narrators and I'm getting the entire Bone Love series in audio as well. And so I'm working on that at the moment too. So there's lots coming up.

Well, if you ever need an extra narrator, I have a narrator that would be perfect for, like, an MC. He does perfect background narration. Okay, interesting. Like... Like when you hear like a door slam or like, you know, footsteps or anything like that. It is really perfect. He's just amazing. And for dark romance. I'm excited about it. So the whole audio book.

world is obviously super new to me yeah I'm working my way through it through working through ACX right now but I have a couple narrators that have sort of narrowed down that I just I think kind of embody my main characters so well sort of just their voices are amazing so I'm really excited about it I'm just working on the contracts with them for your dark college romance

No, this would be for Pretty Little Island. Pretty Little Island? Yeah, all three of them. I'm going to get audio done for all three. And then eventually I will for Shadowface too, but right now I'm still writing it, so I'm just focusing on it.

on the creation part. I like that. That's exciting. So would you say that the current books that you've already written or the new series that you're writing is your favorite book to write? Oh, that is... That's a hard question. I'm absolutely loving the books I'm writing right now. And they're so fun. But I think you always have that sort of honeymoon period with your third current whips.

But it's going to be really hard to beat Pretty Little Island. That book was just incredible to write. I wrote the first draft in about six weeks, maybe just shy of six weeks, about 80,000 words. And I wrote it over my... Christmas break in 2022. Yeah, I get my years all mixed up sometimes. But I wrote it really, really quick. And then it just sort of consumed me until I published it. It'll be really...

hard to beat that book in that process because it was my first. And I really, the characters sort of wrote themselves. It's hard to explain how that happens, but it just did. So I worked really hard on creating the characters and then they sort of just went off and wrote the book for me to a point. So just experiencing that.

It was awesome. And it's the same thing is sort of happening now with Shadowface. But yeah, the first book, it's going to be hard to beat that one. I love that the characters, they just, you know, speak to you. It's just easy to write and pour it out there. So would you say that in that book, would one of them be your favorite character or would a different book have your favorite character?

My favorite character is definitely Micah, for sure. There's no question. He's my favorite character. Why is he your favorite character? He's just really complex. But the other MMC in Pretty is, oh, he's good too. They're both good. But I think Micah just sort of takes the cake. He's just broody, but he's really complex and he's selfless. just completely selfless but he's has a really hard shell he's strong and he it can

survive. He has survival skills and he takes care of people and he just does it in his own way. Yeah. Whenever I try to take control of him, he basically just tells me to fuck off. So I have zero control. So when you're reading and he pisses you off and you want to yell at me, just remember I have zero control over him. He did what he wanted.

So what are some books for authors that you like to read that you would recommend? Yeah, so there's, you know, a lot of the really popular... dark romance authors i think of we see all the time um but there's some new ones that i've discovered recently so alina may is one of them um i just read her she has a new one coming out right now but it was better run that I think is her new one.

But there is, yeah, she's a couple that I really, really enjoy. Elle Mitchell is a friend of mine and I will always wreck her books. We're very similar in our styles. And she also likes the high school trope. So she kind of bonded over. traumatizing teens so I will always recommend Elle and and then my good friend Abigail Hunter is also a an author that I would recommend she just launched her first book in

not her first book, but her first Omegaverse book. It's called Bubblegum Pop. So yeah, I'd recommend Abigail Hunter as well. I think actually that book, that pen name is Abby Hunter. She has a couple other books, but she's pens under Abigail. And when you're not writing or reading, what do you like to do? Oh, well, I don't have a whole lot of excess time to do.

Other hobbies. So, yeah, you know, I'm a busy, a busy mom. My kids are eight, nine. My son is turning 10 soon and he's in hockey. I don't know if you know much about Canadians and our hockey, but it's a big deal up here. So usually hockey season sort of takes over and it's all. It's all about hockey for about seven, eight months a year. So I'm usually just carting my kids around to their activities. And then I also work full time.

I don't have a lot of excess time for anything else. But, you know, when we go out, we do like to go kind of on hikes and walks. as well so I'm a pet owner so I go for a long walk with my dog that's my usually my downtime listen to a lot of audiobooks and podcasts and think about my my own stories so yeah I'm kind of boring And that way we host a lot of dinner parties. I don't think that's boring. That's basically what I do. I stay home and I do nothing. I sit on the couch or clean.

Yeah, I mean, the writing takes a long time. You know, it does take a lot of my kind of downtime. And usually once I get home from, you know, whatever activity, get the kids down, it's like eight o'clock. 830. And then I usually write from about 830 to 11, sometimes midnight. And I do that day in day out. I very rarely miss a day.

So it just takes a lot of time to get books to market. So take it easy on indie authors because it really is a lot of work. I can tell, I can say from experience how many hours it takes to put a book out there. And I know, you know, my readers will read it and like, like I spent nine months and I can't even tell you how many hours writing it. And people just, you know, inhale it like an hour. It's funny, but it's the way it goes.

I did interview one author where she said she's written 70 books. I don't know if they're all novellas, but I was like, can you repeat that number? Did you say 17 or 70? And she said seven zero. And I was like. are those full length novels or are those novellas? And she's like, no, some of those are novellas, but mostly full length novels. And she had only been doing it for, I want to say like five years, maybe.

And I was like, I'm stunned because that is a lot. That is a lot. Yeah, that is definitely a lot. I think for me, just... you know, realistically with like what I have going on in my life as well. One, two years, probably what people can expect from me, but they're going to be good. So I throw myself at them. So yeah, that's kind of where I'm at. I can't imagine publishing more than that and keeping my marriage intact. Yeah, I think whatever makes you happy would be good.

You mentioned you like reading fantasy. Do you think if you ever made a fantasy book, what do you think you would make one about? So I've actually written a dark fantasy, but it was published in an anthology last year as well. It's not published currently. I'm thinking about publishing. I know what you're talking about.

Yeah, it's called Sea Queen Reborn and it was a fun little novella. And I just need to figure out what to do with it because it's just in great shape. I mean, it's been professionally edited and it's been published already. It doesn't really fit with the brand that I'm kind of headed.

for my other books so if I did publish it it's just gonna kind of be this like one little fantasy type spicy yeah on its own little island but I had so much fun writing it it was yeah there's just lots of magic and yeah you could do a different pen name if you wanted to oh that just gives me headache even thinking about trying to manage a different pen name. I can barely keep my one pen name intact. Yeah, I can't imagine managing the one pen name. We'll see.

I'll probably end up publishing it because honestly, it's really fun. And I think people would like it. And it's just as long as it's not being read. I know my readers would just eat it up. But yeah, I have. Because I was just going through your Instagram trying to find like a little, like the tropes to put on my outline to like summarize the book.

And I saw that picture and I was like, wait a minute, I have that in my book funnel. Oh, you do? Yeah. I haven't read the third, like the, I don't know which book it's in, but I was like, I haven't read it yet, but I have it. Oh, so you have the anthology? Yes, I have all. I'm in the spiciest volume three. Okay, so I haven't read that one, but I've read the first book. Okay, so they get darker as they go.

And then I'm in the third, the third with just fabulous authors. So yeah, you should definitely read the book three if you like it really dark and spicy because there's some awesome, I'm teamed up with some awesome authors in that volume.

So with the anthology, is there anywhere where readers can purchase that at all? No, it's been pulled. So it was... published for three months and then we kind of got our stories back so if you have it in your book funnel then you're lucky because you can read it and not a lot of people can unless they've purchased it so yeah no that's

that's good that you have it so you can read it that's excellent yeah you'll have to let me know what you think of it it's very different from from uh pretty little island like like very different because it's a completely different genre you know it's spicy and it is a romance so there's there's that but that's pretty much the only thing that's similar to it so well besides that one if you had a different idea in mind what would you write

Other than dark romance? No, like besides the anthology that you wrote, if you had like a different idea, what would you write? Oh man, I don't know. I honestly don't know. I haven't thought about it. No, mainly just because I've been so focused on the two series. So I just haven't had a lot of brain power to think beyond that. No, you're okay. Yeah. I don't think I, I don't know.

I was trying to talk one of my authors into writing a Phantom of the Opera retelling. Oh, yeah. I've seen that out there. I think there are retellings. I don't think I know the story well enough. I'd have to go read the original story to know. It's really, really good. Yeah, the retellings are a little challenging for me because I like to kind of go rogue.

It would be a very loose retelling. I mean, you can make it fun. It doesn't have to be like to the, like to the book. It could be whatever you wanted to make it and have fun with it. That's absolutely what I would do because everything I write is fun because otherwise why am I doing it? Yeah. Right. Yeah. I think, I think my books are fun, but.

I get a wide range of emotions from the people who read my stuff I think I I put them through everything there's been tears anger joy happiness I've gotten lots of distress calls in the middle of the night Do you ever get text messages from readers, like happy or sad text messages? Yes. I get a lot of DMs and I love it. I honestly do. I love it. It could be two in the morning and I see somebody's messaged me and I'll like wipe my eyes. I'm like, okay, I gotta read this.

And then I'll respond kind of anytime if I see it. The reader reactions are sort of one of my favorite parts of writing because it's why I'm doing it. So I absolutely love it. I know. I was... i forgot which book it was i was reading a series and i read it back to back and something really big happened and i think a character died and i was I texted the author and I was like, this cannot happen. I am not okay. I need, I can't do this. And she's like, I'm sorry. I know it's hard to respond to.

Sometimes I don't want to ruin it for the reader. They're trying to guess what's going to happen or they're feeling the way I just try to be a good listener and not interfere with their, their reaction to it. But yeah. My street team, we have a chat and they've all read my stuff. So I just recently put in for a call for sort of new street team members who haven't yet read me. So I've just said, if you ever need.

supportive of listeners and it's not me yeah they've all read it you can feel free to speak openly in this group so i try to stay out of there the chatter and just let them have their space i love that well i just wanted to say thank you for coming on here and if you ever need anything like sharing anything to just let us know and then Do you have any questions for us? I don't actually. I wish I did. Well, if you ever do, you can always message us.

I appreciate your interest in interviewing me. That was fun. This is my first podcast, so I hope I did okay. You did great. I did a few, I've done a few lives. So I've sort of used to the process of it, but yeah, no, I'd say the only thought I'd have is if you. did if you when you're reading and you if you do want to reach out my dms are open i would love to hear sort of your reactions as you go through especially when sort of the plot really kicks in and you'll know it'll

You'll know when it kicks and just let me know what you think and how you're feeling about it. Okay. I appreciate it. I appreciate you coming on. I hope you have a great night. You too. Thank you. Thank you for joining us on Dirty Talk with the Smutsus podcast. If you like this, please don't forget to leave a rating and feedback. Also, don't forget to follow us on Instagram and TikTok so you can stay updated on future podcast episodes and so much more. We hope to see you next time.