Road to ePublishing: Fiona Ostler

Today I'm going to host my first ever author interview with Fiona Ostler, a friend and fellow writer who has just launched her first e-book, Guardian: Gold Rush.


This will be a two-part blog. First, a little spoiler about Fiona's book. Then we'll continue with a Q&A, including how and why Fiona decided to take the plunge into epublishing.

Here's the teaser for Guardian: Gold Rush:

"Sixteen-year-old Ivy Rogers has a strange gift. She remembers her experiences as a guardian angel and dreams about what will happen in the future. When she dreams of skipping her math test the next day to rescue a complete stranger at LAX, that’s exactly what she does. Why? Because the boy in her dream was totally hot and she knows that she’s the only one who can help him.

"The boy is dashing young Lord Donovan Wooster, who possesses his own unique talent of talking with ghosts. He is traveling to the US to find the lost treasure his ancestors hid during the California Gold Rush. He’s being followed by two Irish brothers who seem to know his every move.

"When Donovan and Ivy connect, they are catapulted into a supernatural race against time to find the gold before the Irishmen find them. Along the way, Ivy discovers if the stranger in her dream is the man of her dreams."

Question and Answer
Joshua: All right, Fiona, time for a little Interview. Tell us a little bit about yourself.

Fiona: Well, that's a question. I am a mom. I just had my forth child in March and I love Mommyland. My passions include writing, drawing, music composition and movie soundtrack scores, travel, food, walking, religion, psychology, and especially right now I'm really getting those homemaking skills down. I'm completely serious, too. I've gone from being a chaotic artist to a somewhat organized domestic goddess. My mom keeps coming into my house and tells me what a surprise it is to see it so clean and peaceful. Given the state of my room and life when I was growing up under her roof I'd guess she thinks that aliens have possessed my body. I write books for young adults, well, twelve to eighteen-year-olds.

Joshua: Sounds like you're really busy! Tell me, how did you start writing?

Fiona: All my life I've had story ideas, characters, and conversations bouncing around my head. As far as actually writing them down:

In forth grade my teacher, Ms. Blair, produced a play I wrote and we had an assembly where my class put it on for the whole school. Then, I took a break. In college I took several creative, fiction, and playwriting classes which were amazing and got me tinkering around with one acts and unfinished manuscripts that were okay. Then, I took another break. Shortly after my third child was born, President Uchtdorf gave an amazing talk in Woman's Conference (2008) about how creating things bring us joy. I felt that desire to write the ideas in my head once again, and almost was given permission to do so. As a mom, you just sacrifice everything and feel selfish if you do something for yourself, but I was empty and so lost at that point that I knew that I needed something, and writing was the answer. If you think about it, we are commanded to develop our talents or they will be taken away. And we are also commanded to not hide our light under a bushel, so...

I haven't taken a break since fall 2008 and have finished 3.5 novels.

Joshua: That's quite the accomplishment. Tells you what motivation and hard work can accomplish. So, tell us about your current project.

Fiona: It's complicated. I have a YA sci-fi that is being looked at by a small publishing company in New York. I'll know more about that later.

I'm trying to finish my forth book - a YA superhero book of sorts. I just read an ARC of a book coming out in May called DIVERGENT by Veronica Roth which was awesome and really got me thinking about how much deeper my world building needs to get for this story so I'm in "what if" land with this project.

But, the project that you are interviewing me for is my YA supernatural-historical-romance-adventure story Guardian: Gold Rush - the first in a three book series.

Joshua: Cool. I posted your teaser above. I think it's an interesting premise. Why did you decide to epublish?

Fiona: I have tried so hard to get an agent for Guardian: Gold Rush and have shelved it for the better part of a year. It's my first novel, and I love it to pieces - it helped me find myself in the depths of a post partum depression. And it's really a good fit for my experiments in epublishingland because I just want to get it out there, and I don't care if it makes any money. I'm going to keep writing and I'll break in eventually. The ideas, characters and conversations have not run dry. They keep coming. It's not a matter of if, but when. I just didn't want to leave this book behind as I move forward with my writing and epublishing has been a good way to do that.

My husband, Bret, was really the one who helped me get this all going. He got the book up on Kindle, and is now figuring out Barnes and Noble and iBooks, etc. (He's really the brains.) Bret was also kind enough to design a cover for me and has started putting together my website. It's not perfect, but I'm sick of GoDaddy's thong adds on my domain name, that we had to do something. Everything probably looks more like a sandbox creation than an actual glossy publishing house produced book launch, but It's been a blast. I'm grateful to be married to a technical/artistic genius! The rest of you might have to pay someone.

I'm loving the feedback I get now like, "Fiona, I keep trying to remember that you're the one who wrote this and not some author. It's actually good."

I've learned tons and it's been a blast. It's nerve racking because as a novice writer you keep waiting for an agent or publishing house to give you permission to say that you're an author. At what point are you good enough to say that? I think it's a personal decision. Right now, I'm saying that I am and I've chosen to put myself out there.

Joshua: Personally, I think you've made the right decision. I've started down that course myself, as you can see in my previous post. ePublishing is definitely the future of publishing. You've got permanent rights, and a permanent shelf space. Plus all the control over creative rights, and that huge royalty possibility. But enough of that. Tell me again where we can find your book? (Hey, I know I'm shameless promoting here, especially since it's linked to all over the place, but hey, take a look and see what you think.)

Fiona: Just type "Fiona Ostler" in an amazon search and there I'll be - Guardian: Gold Rush by, Fiona Ostler. It's $2.99. You can also get the first five chapters as a sample. Kindle readers are free and download to any computer - just set up an account with them.

Joshua: Awesome. I can't wait until mine is right up there with yours! So, what's next on tap?

Fiona: Potty Training my three-year-old.
Waiting to hear back from the Editor about the Sci-Fi book.
Finishing the sequels to GUARDIAN and epublishing them.
Trying to deeply build in my new superhero world thanks to Veronica Roth.
72 hour kits.
Read through and critique a few books from authors in my writing group.
Figure out better ways to market myself (yucky, crummy, hateful)
Start walking in the mornings again.
That's what's up.
Thank you so much for the interview and putting in a good word for me. And thank you to anyone who reads this interview and gives GUARDIAN a try.

Joshua: Thanks, Fiona, for a great interview, and best of luck to you on your first epublished title, just released today (April 18) on Amazon. And for the rest of you, if you haven't considered epublishing, get with it!