Kiersten White on Writing Page-Turners & Crafting Memorable Characters

We have Kiersten White with us this week, the New York Times bestselling author of And I Darken, a series that has been compared to Game of Thrones for the YA community. Kiersten and I recorded our conversation late November last year and I couldn’t be more thrilled to finally publish her episode the same month her highly anticipated sequel Now I Rise is releasing.

In our conversation today, Kiersten shares the story behind the title And I Darken, and walks us through the historical research process for her series. For those of you who love discussions about the craft of writing, you’re going to love our discussion about creating memorable characters. Kiersten goes into detail about crafting a page-turner novel with multi-layered characters, and how to create authentic characters by channeling your inner feelings. We dig even deeper and talk about how understanding your characters’ motivations will help your readers understand your characters’ decisions.

We also discuss how to overcome rejection, and how to grow from it and make it work for you, rather than against you. We unpack the value a strong editor can bring to your manuscript, and the influential ways a writing partner can help strengthen your craft. You’ll even hear tips and advice on finding the writing partner suited for you.

Happy listening!

Yin

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“Never give your readers a reason to put the book down.”

-Kiersten White

“Even when I’m not writing I’m thinking about writing.”

-Kiersten White

“Writing is all moving parts. You can have the exact same goal accomplished in forty different ways.”

-Kiersten White

What You’ll Learn From This Episode:

- The value a strong editor can bring to your manuscript
- The story behind the title of Kiersten’s novel And I Darken
- How to craft memorable characters in your stories
- How to write a page-turner with multi-layered characters
- Kiersten walks us through the historical research process for her series
- How to create authentic characters by channeling your inner feelings
- How understanding your characters’ motivations will help your readers understand your characters’ decisions
- The influential ways a writing partner can help strengthen your craft
- Tips on finding your writing partner
- How to deal with rejection and grow from it, and make it work for rather than against you

The highly anticipated, mind-blowing sequel to Kiersten White’s New York Times bestseller, AND I DARKEN—the series that reads like HBO’s Game of Thrones . . . if it were set in the Ottoman Empire. Fans of Victoria Aveyard’s THE RED QUEEN and Sabaa Tahir’s A TORCH AGAINST THE NIGHT won’t want to miss this riveting and gorgeously written novel—the second in the And I Darken series.

Lada Dracul has no allies. No throne. All she has is what she’s always had: herself. After failing to secure the Wallachian throne, Lada is out to punish anyone who dares to cross her blood-strewn path. Filled with a white-hot rage, she storms the countryside with her men, accompanied by her childhood friend Bogdan, terrorizing the land. But brute force isn’t getting Lada what she wants. And thinking of Mehmed brings little comfort to her thorny heart. There’s no time to wonder whether he still thinks about her, even loves her. She left him before he could leave her.

What Lada needs is her younger brother Radu’s subtlety and skill. But Mehmed has sent him to Constantinople—and it’s no diplomatic mission. Mehmed wants control of the city, and Radu has earned an unwanted place as a double-crossing spy behind enemy lines Radu longs for his sister’s fierce confidence—but for the first time in his life, he rejects her unexpected plea for help. Torn between loyalties to faith, to the Ottomans, and to Mehmed, he knows he owes Lada nothing. If she dies, he could never forgive himself—but if he fails in Constantinople, will Mehmed ever forgive him?

As nations fall around them, the Dracul siblings must decide: what will they sacrifice to fulfill their destinies? Empires will topple, thrones will be won . . . and souls will be lost.

Learn More About Kiersten White

Kiersten White is the New York Times bestselling author of And I Darken, the Paranormalcy trilogy, the dark thrillers Mind Games and Perfect Lies, The Chaos of Stars, and Illusions of Fate. She also co-wrote In the Shadows with Jim Di Bartolo. She lives with her family near the ocean in San Diego, which, in spite of its perfection, spurs her to dream of faraway places and even further away times.