JA Huss is The New York Times and USA Today bestselling author of more than twenty books, including Three, Two, One, and the Junco series. Below she shares the story of her unlikely beginnings and some of her marketing strategies with Maya Fleischmann and IndieReader.
Maya Fleischmann (MF): You went to school to become a vet and scientist, even getting a graduate degree in forensic science. You then published about 20 non-fiction science books designed for science home study. What led you to write fiction?
JA Huss (JAH): I home-schooled both my children, my youngest almost all the way from start to finish. So home school was a passion, and home school science was something that never clicked with our family. So I decided to write my own home school science curriculum. Needless to say, neither of my kids love science. 😉 But whatever.
Once my kids got older I had a lot of time on my hands with my part-time job back in 2007-2013, so I thought up my first science fiction series while I was driving around as an environmental protection specialist for the state of Colorado. Also, I had been writing science non-fiction that whole time, publishing more than 200 (yes, two hundred) of those, and I pretty much ran out of things to write about in non-fiction science and got bored.
So in 2012 I started writing my Junco science fiction series and just never stopped. I’ve been a full-time fiction writer since January 2013.
MF: How much, if any, of your knowledge of science do you use in your books?
JAH: I use science for everything. 🙂 If there is anything technical about my story like a drug or technique that can be used to brainwash a young girl, or a bulletproof vest that looks like a child’s life jacket, I base all that on truth. Of course, since it’s fiction I play with the idea any way I want. But I like to keep the facts straight so you will find a lot of non-fiction in my fiction books. I love science, I just made a really shitty scientist, so it’s a good thing I found writing about science to be more my thing.
JAH: My specialty is dark romantic suspense. If people are looking for a happily ever after without being put through hell first, they should stay well clear of me and my books. I always have a HEA, but it’s not generally a rainbows and puppies kind of story along the way. I write books about people who live on the edge of society. Shadow governments, assassins, brainwashing, and things people assume could never be happening in a first-world country. So if they like cute, easy-to-read romances, they won’t generally get that from me. Although some of my books are darker than others, so I can pull a contemporary romance out of my head every once in a while.
MF: What aspect(s) of your books do you think your fans love?
JAH: I *think* they like the men for being the perfect anti-hero, the perfect alpha, and one hundred percent loyal. I’d like to think they are all redeemable at the end and even though their worldview at the start is one of indifference, and the plot/heroine were possibly nothing more than the perfect “opportunity”, when my fans turn that last page they know he’s fully invested in the love story.
MF: Though many of your books have elements of darkness, you write that you like the “perfect happily ever after ending.” How do you manage to balance these kinds of endings with cliffhangers for sequels?
MF: Tell us how you decided between traditional and self-publishing.
JAH: I never tried to be traditionally published before I wrote non-fiction, so I just figured I didn’t need a publisher to write fiction either. But really, taking a traditional deal would’ve sent me on a whole different career trajectory, so I’m very happy I was ignorant of the industry as a whole when I started.
MF: What do you see as the advantages and disadvantages of traditional vs self-publishing?
JAH: Well, indie money can’t be beat. Hands down. For every Sylvia Day deal there are probably 1,000 Indies who will make more than a million dollars over the course of their career. I’ll probably get all kinds of protests, but to quote a line from my WIP, “You don’t know what you don’t know.” I know what I make. I’m certainly not the best bestselling Indie author, so I’m pretty certain most authors at my same sales level are making what I make too.
The disadvantages of self (aka indie) publishing are probably related more to production – editing, covers, formatting, deadlines, and all the details and stress that go along with creating books. You have to, at the very least, understand all that stuff and know what to do with it. Some people are very interested and very good at that kind of thing, and I’m one of them. But some people just have no interest in knowing how to make the sausage.
I think the advantages of traditional publishing are print books and exposure, but in most cases – like, unless you can negotiate a very out-of-the-box contract—you’re not getting rich off that deal. I think working with a talented editor can have its advantages, but who is to say that editor is right for you? I have a talented indie editor who is right for me, so I’m lucky in that respect.
I’m not against traditional publishing, I just think it’s a pretty bad move in the romance genre once you make it to a certain level, unless you have a very specific goal and have the negotiating power to get what you want. In my opinion, unless you’re getting “a good deal” or better (my understanding is that this means something along the lines of $100,000-$250,000 per book) you better want more than money out of that deal that will cost you a year’s worth of work. Because that’s what a self-published New York Times bestseller can make in the first one to two months if it’s priced at $3.99. Add in the fact that you keep all your rights as an indie, and can count on that book producing over the course of your lifetime, and you can see why a traditional deal needs to be about more than dollars.
With that said, not every book is a New York Times bestseller, and a traditional publisher takes on the risk that the book will not produce like that. So, you know, you have to weigh all this when you consider a traditional deal.
MF: Can you tell us about your super-successful street team and marketing plan?
JAH: Well, I could write an entire book on that one question. So, not really, other than my team is small, they are all people I love and care about, and most have been supporting me for two years or more.
JAH: My marketing is always evolving. I love marketing and I never run out of ideas. I never stop thinking about how to reach more people. So if someone wanted my honest advice, I’d tell them to love it as much as I do. 😉
MF: Your book covers are really evocative and provocative. What inspires you in the creation of the unique backgrounds?
I do usually change the background if I buy the license for a photo. But that’s just because I want to make it all unique and I need to create the right mood for the story. I make covers that please me with the hope that it will draw the right readers—someone like me. I guess that’s the basis of all my decisions when it comes to covers, and even plots. I want to attract people like me to my books.
MF: What authors have inspired your writing?
JAH: Richard K Morgan – Altered Carbon and the whole Takeshi Kovacs series was the initial spark for me to write science fiction the “right” way, as clearly Morgan killed that shit. He schooled me in the art of the anti-hero. I studied this character very carefully and then practiced making my own anti-heroes as real as Kovacs, until I got it down.
Laini Taylor for her epic Daughter of Smoke and Bone series , Maggie Stiefvater for her Raven Cycle series, and Tahereh Mafi’s Shatter Me series. All these writers speak to me in their craft. They have beautiful words that make up brilliant books.
I don’t know if my writing is beautiful, that’s not generally a term I hear in reviews. But I do hear things like, “Huss makes the story real,” so I guess that’s what I’m good at. Even if the words aren’t as beautiful, the stories are real.
MF: What can your fans look forward to in the coming year?
JAH: I reserve the right to change my mind, but right now it looks like six full-length novels and one Christmas novella, plus maybe a secret surprise collaboration project. Pretty much 2015 on repeat. They will mostly be standalones, with the exception of the continuing superhero romance series I just started this month.
MF: What is your favorite quotation? Who says it, and in what context?
JAH: “You only get one life, so make it count.”
I said it, and I love to say that to anyone who fears taking risks. Make it count or you’ll get to the end and you’ll regret it. I can think of no sadder moment than meeting your maker with nothing but your soul and lifetime of wasted opportunities to show for it.
Thanks for having me here!