Writing Romantic Comedy with Sandy Barker

In this episode, we discussed:How she went from self-publishing to landing an agent and a deal with Harper CollinsHow writing in the morning before her day job is the best way she’s found to get her books written while working full-timeWhy she thinks reading (and reading a lot) in her genre gives her inspiration, especially when she’s feeling blockedWhy a solid reversal in the middle of your book is key to avoiding a saggy (boring) middleThe power of a pause of a few weeks to let your brain work on your book when you’ve written yourself into a cornerHow dreams can get us some of our best ideasWhy she writes in and prefers writing in 1st person POVSandy’s BooksThe Holiday Romance Series:One Summer in Santorini (#1)That Night in Paris (#2)A Sunset in Sidney (#3)A Sunrise Over Bali (#4)NEW RELEASE: A Wedding in Tuscany (#5)Hilarious Stand-Alone NovelThe Dating GameSome of Sandy’s Favorite NovelsThe Thorn Birds, Colleen McCulloughTo Kill a Mockingbird, Harper LeeGo Set a Watchman, Harper LeeShakespeare, esp. the original rom com, Much Ado About NothingThe French Photographer, Natasha LesterI Heart New York – the first rom-com she read that made her believe that she too could write this genreMeet Sandy BarkerSandy is a writer, traveler, and hopeful romantic with a lengthy bucket list, and many of her travel adventures have found homes in her novels. She lives in Melbourne Australia with her partner, Ben, who she met while traveling in Greece. Their real-life love story inspired Sandy’s debut novel One Summer in Santorini, the first in the Holiday Romance series with One More Chapter, an imprint of HarperCollins. She has now published 4 books and she’s done all of this while working full-time at Pearson as an adult learning specialist.Connect with Sandy BarkerSandy on InstagramSandy on TwitterSandy’s WebsiteLike the Podcast?Are you a subscriber? If not, I invite you to subscribe, so you’ll get notified every time a new episode goes up.Click here to subscribe on iTunes.Click here to subscribe on Stitcher.And, if you’re enjoying what you’re hearing, I’d be super grateful if you left me a review. Those help other creative souls find this show, and they’re fun to read. To leave a review, open up the podcast in your podcast player, and scroll down to the bottom where it gives you the option to review the show.Stay Connected with AmyJoin the bi-monthly cowriting/creating sessions, you can subscribe to the newsletter to get ideas, tips, and inspiration to get started creating and acting on those creative callings.Connect on FacebookConnect on LinkedIn.Connect on Instagram.