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Author Melissa Brayden on her best-selling lesbian romance novels, and advice for aspiring writers

In 2011, author Melissa Brayden burst on to the queer romance novel scene with her hit debut, Waiting in the Wings. Since then, Melissa has become one of the most popular novelists of the genre, writing hit after hit of funny, relatable, and very sexy stories for women who love women. Her newest book, Just Three Words, which is part of the Soho Loft Romance series, came out this April. Not unlike her novels, Melissa was a real gem, and offered up some excellent advice to all those aspiring writers out there.

AfterEllen: You are an actor, director and an MBA student, and a few years ago, you jumped on to the scene as one of the hottest lesbian romance novelists out there. How the heck did that happen?

Melissa Brayden: [laughs] How did it happen? That’s a great question. I’ve always kind of noticed that I’ve gravitated towards storytelling in one way or another, and you touched on it a bit there when you said that I have a background in theatre. Also, my undergrad degree is in film production, so everything I had my hand in was about telling stories in some way. At the same time, I’ve always been a really avid romance readers, really since I was 12 years old and probably too young to be reading them. So one day, I just happened to have this little voice in the back of my head that said, “Maybe I could do that.” I didn’t really have any writing experience, but I thought I’d give it a shot.

So I sat down one summer and I wrote Waiting in the Wings thinking that it probably wouldn’t go anywhere, but just for fun, why don’t I submit it to a publisher. And I did and the first publisher I submitted it to accepted the manuscript. I was really lucky. I had made a list of all that I would submit to, one after another, thinking I would probably get pretty far down my list, and maybe no one would even want it. But then my first choice said yes! So I was really lucky in that regard. I think that encouraged me further and I went an tried it again and wrote my second book, and here we are several books later and I’m having the time of my life.

AE: I’m an avid romance reader, and I know there are a lot of people like me out there, but it’s still kind of this guilty pleasure thing that people don’t really fess up to. Straight women have been loving romance novels for ages, why do you think queer romance is still kind of in the closet?

MB: I think people don’t know it exists! Like I said, I’ve been reading since I was a kid but they had all been straight romance novels. As a bisexual woman, there’s a whole other side of me that really didn’t get to explore that through literature, and one day, Amazon recommended a book to me-I believe it was Geri Hill‘s Behind the Pine Curtain and I read it and I think my mind kind of exploded because I didn’t know it existed. Then of course I gobbled up everything I could get my hands on. So I think to a certain extent, that it’s an awareness issue. I don’t think as many people realize these books exist in this specific format.

AE: You create these realistic worlds and your characters are often very relatable. Like they aren’t famous brain surgeons or FBI agents, they are real people. Your most recent book, Just Three Words stars a bisexual accountant and lesbian graphic designer, who are part of a tight nit foursome of friends. Did you always plan to explore all four characters love lives?

MB: Yes, when I set out to write the series I knew we’d delve into all of them. I wanted to write about a group of friends and I think so often in TV and in film there are so many stories about women being pitted against one another. I think the other side of that isn’t often explored in how powerful a friendship between women can be. So as much as I wanted to showcase each girl and her individual romance, I also wanted to showcase the group of friends and to explore that dynamic on the page. From the moment of its conception, I kind of ordered how I’d move thorough it, making sure that each girl got her own moments.

In terms of not having the fantastical characters, I think that’s a little bit having to do with how much I want them to be relatable, but at the same time, how much I can’t stand research. [laughs] The idea of writing an FBI agent feels like something so outside of anything I know from my actual life, that I think I would have to spend a year or two just researching that. I tend to stay closer to things that are in my wheelhouse and a little bit more accessible to me.

AE: I really fell hard for your first book, Waiting in the Wings, which is about two actresses. While they become famous eventually, I really love the beginning when they are just two working actors, making their way in the world. Does that harken back to your own experience?

MB: I think so. I think I really put a lot of myself into that book, and then at the same time, armored those characters with qualities that I wish I had. For example, I’m not a good dancer, so I made sure that main character was an amazing dancer. I kind of got to live vicariously through her in a way, but writing a first book, I think I wanted to put everything into that book that I would want to read. Being a die hard theatre goer as well as practitioner, I wanted to explore that world correctly. I’d read a couple of books that I thought didn’t get it exactly right, so I did my best to be more realistic. But I didn’t want it to take over. I didn’t want the entire book to beat you over the head with that world, but I wanted it to be a backdrop with a lot of texture.

AE: I loved that about it. I was really, really into it.

MB: Yay!

AE: It was actually one of the first romance novels that I’d read. I’d read a couple romance novels and then I saw the cover for Waiting in the Wings and it really drew me in, and it turns out I signed up for a really good story. I credit you with getting me much more into romance novels.

MB: Yay, that’s an excellent compliment, probably one of the best ones you could pay me.

AE: You live in Texas, but many of your novels take place in New York City. Do you feel a special connection with the city?

MB: I have my own personal love affair with New York. I try to get there as much as I can. There’s been years where I’ve made seven or eight trips to the city from Texas, which can take a toll on your bank account so you have to be careful about those things. I’m down to two or three trips a year, mostly theatre trips, and I’ve considered moving there even, but it’s a really expensive place to live.

AE: You’re telling me. [laughs]

MB: So I decided that I would just be a frequent visitor, but there is something about New York City that there’s always something happening, no matter what time of day or night. There’s a buzz in the air because something important is always going on. It’s really fun for me to get to write that, but it’s also probably the city that I know second best next to my own. And once again, I don’t have to go too far into research. I know how the streets work and the neighborhoods and their feels, and things like that. It’s just an easy go to. In fact, after the SoHo books, the next book I’m writing is actually another New York City ballet book.

AE: You’ve written six books since 2012…

MB: Have I? Yeah…

AE: How do you find time to do it? I think that’s something that many aspiring writers deal with.

MB: It’s not easy and I think there is something to be said for making it a part of your routine. I started writing when I had a full time job, so it would be a matter of, if I got home at 6:30 in the evening, I might have dinner then sit down to write for an hour and a half. If I could get in, five, six hundred words a day, then eventually those pages were going to start adding up. I think when you first start to write a book, it’s hard because you don’t have a lot of spare time. But an hour and a half are going to go by whether you write five hundred words or not, and at the end, you will have a big stack of pages and a pretty awesome story that wasn’t there before you started. I think once you can get to that point, you remember it and that encouragement keeps you moving forward. Word counts I think help, when you set word counts for yourself.

AE: What can you tell us about your next novel, Ready or Not?

MB: Ready of Not is the third and final SoHo Loft Romance, and this one tells the story of Mallory, who is the face of the advertising company. She’s kind of the leader among the four friends and she has watched the other girls in the group fall in love and settle down, and she kind of wonders about herself and when her time is going to come. And there’s this annoying bartender at Showplace, where the girls tend to hang out, that gets under Mallory’s skin in the worst possible way. Sometimes that is the great making of a tension filled romance. Ready or Not is a November release, and I just got the cover out there on social media so people can start looking forward and looking ahead to that book as they finish Just Three Words.

You can find Melissa Brayden’s novels in paperback and e-book versions through Bold Strokes Books or Amazon.

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