R.L. Perez, romantasy author, perfectionist, and anxious Type A worrier
The Creative Council
Welcome to The Creative Council, where I interview creatives about their lives and work and the ups and downs of being a creative soul.
Today’s interviewee is R.L. Perez!
R.L. Perez is a romantasy author, perfectionist, and anxious Type A worrier. She lives in Florida with her husband and three children. Her first published series is a 9-book YA romantasy series, the Timecaster Chronicles, featuring witches, romance, and time travel. She’s currently working on the Ivy & Bone series, a steamy Hades and Persephone romance, as well as the Crowns of the Fae series, a set of steamy fairy tale stand-alone romances. When she’s not working on her books, she’s either napping, diving into a good book, obsessively watching Netflix, fiddling with graphic design projects, or playing with her three kids. She loves chocolate, loud laughter, and alternative rock music.
The Interview
Hi R.L.! Are you ready for this?
· When did you start creating? Do you remember what pulled you in?
Oh, I’ve been writing my whole life! Since I could form sloppy, misspelled words on sheets of paper. My family still gives me grief about how horrible my little made-up stories and pictures were 😂 I just remember watching a movie or reading a story and being so enthralled by it that I wanted to make up something just as enthralling. It was so exciting for me, the endless possibilities of worlds to create.
· When did you start pursuing your current craft for real? As in, when did you begin to take yourself seriously as a creator?
Around 2018, I started shopping around a manuscript, looking for literary agents. I went to conferences and sent query letters, even got to pitch my story in person at panels and such. While I got many agents who were interested, in the end, they all said it ‘wasn’t for them’.
The traditional publishing route is also incredibly slow. It took six months for an agent to read my manuscript and get back to me, then six more months for her to look over another one of my manuscripts when she wasn’t interested in the first. That was an entire year where I was just waiting. It was kind of a wake-up call for me, that I could literally spend my whole life waiting for someone ELSE to make my dreams come true. That’s when I decided to go indie, and I’ve never once regretted it!
· Are you still having fun? If yes, how are you making sure it stays fun?
Yes! So much fun!! I think being my own boss is both a blessing and a curse. But one of the benefits is, I have the freedom to stretch out deadlines if I feel I’m getting burnt out. And if an idea for a new series suddenly sparks, then I can run with it! That’s the really cool thing about being an indie author… I have no limits! If I want to switch gears to something else, I absolutely can.
· What has been your biggest ‘mistake’ thus far, and what would you tell people about to make that same mistake?
My biggest mistake was my first series. It was more of a passion project. I was really excited to finally begin publishing that I wanted to cram my three favorite things into one series: romance, witches, and time travel. I thought it was genius because it would appeal to so many readers!! But the truth is, genre-bending doesn’t always work. The time travel readers didn’t like that it wasn’t sci-fi. The romance readers didn’t like all the fantasy stuff. And the romantasy readers didn’t like the time travel or the urban setting.
In hindsight, I should have tried harder to write to market. I marketed it as YA urban fantasy, but that’s a very small market with not a lot of hungry readers. I’ve since re-branded the series to try to appeal to the romantasy crowd, but all in all, the lesson has been learned. Now I’ve been hitting NA romantasy hard, and it’s doing way better for me. My original series is still out there, and with my book 1 set as permafree I’m still seeing lots of downloads and read-through. But part of me wonders if my career would have gone further in the beginning if I’d written to market.
· What do you struggle with most as a creative person?
Remember how being your own boss is both a blessing and a curse? The curse part is managing my own time and deadlines. Sometimes, I don’t gauge my time as clearly as I need to. I think I can write and publish a book in X number of months, and then life blows up in my face, or I get burnt out, and the next thing I know, the deadline is looming over me and I’m stressed beyond belief trying to get the book uploaded to Amazon before my pre-orders get cancelled.
· Have you always had that struggle, and what advice would you give creatives dealing with the same?
Yes, I have always struggled with this! I’m horrible at time management. Ask anyone, I am ALWAYS late 😂 My advice would be to give yourself PLENTY of wiggle room. For example, if I’m in my element, I can draft a novel in about two months. But the more I write, the more burnt out I get, and sometimes my pace slows down. So, I try to give myself three months. Then another month for beta readers. Then another month for editing. Make sure to walk backward from your deadline to see if you can meet it. If I have a pre-order set for July, I want to be certain I’m drafting it by January AT THE LATEST.
· What do you do to stay inspired?
Read, read, read!! Keep consuming those stories. Read the bestsellers in your genre. See what sells. What tropes do readers love? What tropes do YOU love? I’m a voracious romantasy reader myself, and that really helps. When I sit down and read a book full of slow-burn sexual tension, it just gets me giddy for my next story. Oftentimes, I’ll read a 5-star book and think, ‘I can write something like this!’ Other times, I’ll read a 2- or 3-star book and think, ‘I can do this, but better!’ I love to imagine the kind of delicious fantasy romance that makes my toes curl, and then try to write it. It’s always helpful to see what the professionals are doing and what the readers are hungry for.
· What would you do if you weren’t afraid?
Invest ALL my money into ads and special editions 😂 But, I have three kids who need to eat, so I have to be a BIT more careful with how I spend lol.
· What is the biggest compliment you ever received about your work?
In their review, a reader called my newest book, Crown of Slumber, a ‘masterpiece’, and said it would be joining their favorites alongside Sarah J. Maas, Rebecca Yarros, Jennifer L. Armentrout, Holly Black, and Stephanie Garber. I was SOBBING at such glowing praise 😭
· What’s the best creative advice you ever received?
This is going to sound like a ‘duh’ statement, but ‘KEEP WRITING.’
But no seriously! ‘Keep writing’ is the best thing you can do to become a better writer. With each story you write, you get better. The first manuscript you plunk out is not going to be very good. It just isn’t. But as you write and get feedback, you improve. You figure out what your strengths and weaknesses are. You figure out which elements you love and which elements you hate. And sometimes, the hardest part of writing is finishing story. You get nervous. You self-edit. You go backward and rewrite things. But if you take the advice to ‘keep writing’, then you move forward, even if you know it’s garbage. A first draft is always rough. But you can’t revise it if you don’t finish it. So, finish that draft, keep writing, and keep getting better!
You can find and follow R.L. on her website, Facebook, Instagram, and TikTok. You can find her different series here:
Book 4 of the Ivy & Bone series, Salt & Blood, releases 7 February 2025, and Crown of Briars, a steamy Beauty and the Beast retelling with fae and dragons, releases 30 August 2025.
R.L.’s Kickstarter campaign for the Ivy & Bone complete series — with gold foil hardcovers, plus an omnibus with black pages! — runs from Jan 13–27, 2025.
Are you a creative and would you like to be interviewed next? E-mail me at marielle@mswordsmith.nl and we’ll make it happen!