Five Question Friday: Graceley Knox
- By Monica Corwin
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- 01 Dec, 2017
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Please welcome Graceley Knox to the inaugural edition of Five Question Friday!
Graceley Knox suffers from a serious caffeine and book addiction-and she’s not apologizing for it. She writes wicked paranormal and fantasy romance with snarky heroines and sexy heroes. By day she works in the publishing industry, and by night, she plots out the many ideas cluttering her mind. Her free time is spent with her fabulous family and Bengal kitties. She loves to connect with fans on social media, so stop by and say hello!
1. Best piece of writing advice you ever received?
Hire and editor and don’t force your story. First one, obvious. You want your story to shine, and an editor will do that for you. Second, I’m a hard core pantser who’s recently seen what an outline can do to help. However, mine are very loose, as in a few sentences a chapter and I let my characters direct the show.
2. How do you drink your coffee or tea?
I’m a caffeine-aholic. Coffee, sugar and a dash of milk, hot. Tea, the same. I prefer my tea British though.
3. Name a book that changed the way you see the world.
Harry Potter series. I was a snotty kid until my mom brought home Harry Potter and the Sorcerers Stone. I refused to read it until she told me I couldn’t go outside and see my friends until I read a chapter. One page in and I was hooked. From there we read the books together as I grew up. Loyalty, respect, friendship, and sacrifice are just a few lessons learned from that series.
4. Favorite article of clothing/or accessory?
I’m a jeans and a t-shirt kind of girl. Usually with a sarcastic saying. Do mugs count as accessories? If so, then my mugs :).
5. What are you most proud of in your writing career?
The fact that with every lesson someone else has taught me, I’ve been able to pass the knowledge on to help someone else. The community of self-published authors never ceases to amaze me, and I’m proud to be a part of it.
Graceley Knox's next release is Kiss of Frost exclusively in the Sirens & Scales Boxed Set.
And yet, when I hit my lowest point. Complete depression and burn out rolled into one I hid away. I pushed harder. I forced myself to do more, be more, work more.
Some of you probably know what happened next...I made things WAY worse.
Why did I push knowing it was doing more damage, causing more harm?
Because I'm a writer. That's what I do. I couldn't admit to myself that even staring at my office door made me feel like a balloon was precariously inflating in my chest. That the thought of letting one more single person down was another invitation for one more rejection. One more author friend deciding I'm not worth the effort, or the patience.
I get it. I dropped so many balls over the past year. Don't get me wrong, life hasn't been bad. I married a man who understands me on a level I don't even understand myself on. He's incredible. A tiny part of my brain tells me I don't deserve him every single day.
At the same time, I yearn to write. I've been reading, jotting down ideas, playing with little tidbits here and there but I haven't been able to write anything. It makes me feel like I've got phantom limb syndrome. I'm missing a part of my soul right now. How can I give all of myself to my loved ones, to my life, when something so vital to who I am is missing.
I've been trying to work on seeing who I am without writing. That didn't work. I dream in plots and characters. I hear lines of dialogue in my head when I'm washing the dishes, mowing the lawn, organizing my budget. I can't write at the moment but maybe I feel a little comforted that it's there waiting for me. That one day, when the right words whisper through my mind I'll jot them down. And eventually they, and I, will add up to a whole.
For now, I keep tinkering, fight back the imposter syndrome, and maybe write some blog posts about burnout and how devastating it can be when you don't listen to your body.
