AMA - You Ask, Bethany Answers!

Hey, loves! We’re back for another AMA. For anyone new here, you ask a question, and I answer it. It’s that simple. And if you wanna get updates for this blog – it’s not a promo spam place, only I write things on here, and whatever else, then you can subscribe at the top of the page. You will get emails on Mondays, Tuesdays, Wednesdays, and Fridays when I upload a new post.

Do you have a question for me?
Awesome, put it in HERE.

Things to note – I do these questions a month in advance, so if you expect to see your question next week, try in about three.

Onto the questions for the week!

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1. I’m trying to figure out what family Vanna is from. Is she from Vegas? The daughter of one of Affonso Donati’s daughters? One of Theo & Eve’s adopted children? Am I close? The suspense for the Guzzi brothers is killing me!

LOLOLOLOL.

The suspense is going to keep killing you, if I can help it, because I refuse to give this away. HOWEVER, I can say that no, she is not from Vegas. No, she is not a Donati daughter. And no, she is not one of the children Theo and Eve fostered over the years.

You are not close.
You are not even warm.
You are ice cold.

And I am enjoying this, in case you haven’t figured it out. Hahaha.

In all honesty, though, I think once it is out there who Vanna is, and where she comes from, people are going to be like THAT WAS SO OBVIOUS WHY DIDN’T I THINK OF THAT. And you’ll also probably rage because of it, and the motive behind it.

BUT ANYWAY.

I am just giving you way too many hints now. Moving onto the next question.

2. Will we get a book about Cory Abella and how he ran Vegas after the Sorrentos were gone? I really liked him In Giovanni’s book. He seemed like the one good person left in Vegas. Also does Andino ever meet him?

Hi there.

Probably not. It’s not that I have never wanted to write Cory, he just wasn’t in my head. He doesn’t have anything to say, his character never formed beyond Kim’s brother to me, and so I don’t have time to give him a whole personality and story. He either comes with it to me, or he goes without.

And so far, he has chosen to go without.

As for how he ran Vegas … harshly, is the best way to put it, likely. He was a heavy-handed, hard as nails boss. Think Antony, but with the viciousness of his former boss, Maximo. Cory was a good person to his sister because he loved her, but that doesn’t mean that in general, he was a good human being.

Because he wasn’t always.

And yes, I suspect Andino meets him because Cory has a seat at the Commission table, and eventually, Andino took over the Marcellos who head the Commission. So yes, they would have, at some point, sat down at least at the same table and had a conversation about business … at the very least.

Whether or not all the past was brought up to get rehashed, or they talked like and uncle and nephew catching up on missed time, I really don’t know. If that’s an outtake you want to see, on Fridays you can drop it into my form and I will eventually get to it. We’ll see what comes out of it, I suppose.

3. I saw you mention seasonal depression on Twitter, does that ever affect your books or writing?

Hi there.

And not in the way you might expect, I suppose. I don’t find it harder to write when I go into my seasonal depression (I know others aren’t the same, so please don’t use my experience as the be all, know all for this sort of thing). I actually find it helps, and the routine of writing every single day, whether I just want to lay in bed or not look at another person for days, helps me to just … get up and do what I need to do. There’s something calming to me about my brain being like “get up and do this” every single day.

I do not find it affects the QUALITY of my books, either. In fact, it’s quite the opposite. The books I have written while in the midst of a seasonal bout of depression, or just full-on depression, have been the works of mine that were BEST received by readers. Those are the books of mine that sold the best, got the best reviews … people still talk about them and can’t seem to let those characters go.
Which is funny to me in a way.

Mostly because those are the books I found it hardest to connect to – or to the characters. Think of it like a wall, and usually, my characters feel so real to me in my head that there is no wall between them and I. I experience what they so through my mind’s eye, and I often go through the same rounds of emotions that I put them through while I’m writing their stories.

And yet, when I am in this depressive state, a wall goes up. I don’t get that strong connection to them. They’re still there, I have no problem with converting their story to paper, and writing it all out from beginning to end. But I don’t connect on an emotional level, they’re not burrowed into my mind and heart, I’m not crying when they’re being dragged through the ringer.

I am just … telling you a story.

I actually don’t like writing this way, despite the fact that those books have been best received out of all my works because, well … I like having the connection. And it’s also really hard for me to tell if I even like my own books when this is what’s happening while I’m writing them.

So yeah, there’s that.

4. Do you have a schedule yet for 2020 (ASTORS)?

LOL, I love that ya’ll are so excited for this family.

Uh, the first book in 2020 will be Cory Rossi, it’s a standalone. Then, I am moving onto the Astors.

Their series is so big that I actually expect them to be an entire year worth of releases, or very close to it.

I will probably jump to a Russian family right after them. Or the cartels that get introduced in Fourth Astor’s book. It’ll just depend on some different things. I never really know which way a world is going to swing until I am right smack dab in the middle of writing a book or series for it, and someone pops up in the plot to introduce themselves and then my brain is like YES YOU MUST WRITE THEM NEXT.

I really don’t get a choice. So for now, all I can say is the Astors will come first. Who comes next will highly depend on which characters in the world decide to make themselves known within the Astor series as easter eggs. So, look out for that.

5. If London Miller is fighting a pack of wild possums, will you help save her life?

LMAO, another question from my spirit animal to make you all laugh, I guess.
I literally had to message her and ask if possums were mean, and if they could have rabies because we don’t have those where I live in Canada. She said yes to both, so.

I WOULD TRY VERY HARD … with a long pole.

Haha.

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