Did you ever think Ancilla would be your most popular book? Why or why not?

To date, Ancilla is my only novel, and no, I never thought it would be popular. The only thing it has going for it in terms of popularity is sex. There's a lot of explicit sex in Ancilla, and there are a lot of people who want to read about people getting it on. It's kinky, too, and I think writers like E L James have proved that books with bondage and spanking in them sell like hotcakes. 

However. 

However.

The kink in Ancilla is considerably more extreme than it is in bestsellers like Fifty Shades of Rubbish - it can be assumed that plenty of spanking and tying up goes on behind the scenes, but what gets shown are canings, knife play, temporary genital piercings, heavy floggings - most of which the protagonist must endure in silence, without making so much as a whimper. There's also mysticism and ceremonial magic, philosophical and literary discussion, and musicology that I insert into the erotic prose like broccoli snuck into a cheesy, saucy lasagna. At one point the protagonist and her mentor/dom/soulmate are analyzing the letters of Heloise and Abelard and quote from the letters in the original Latin... This is not what most people look for when they pick up a book of smut. 

Of course, Ancilla is so much more than just smut. It's literary erotica... and it's a bisexual bildungsroman, it's magical realism, it's dark academia, it's a romantic love story, it's an atypical vampire story in which vampirism is not paranormal at all and it's more like a disability than like some kind of dark gift that grants superpowers and immortality. Ancilla is a story about coming of age in the early nineties in a deeply conservative part of the Rust Belt of America and coming to terms with being a hopeless misfit in a society that's made for people who conform easily.

It's serious. 

And then there's the ending... I'd better say nothing about the ending, because of spoilers, but the ending is not the sort of ending most readers of erotica or romance expect. 

In fact, almost nothing about Ancilla conforms to tropes for any known genre. The vampires are weird, the romantic tropes are weird, and the plot and characterization are meant to take a wrecking ball to the conventions of dark romance and to the toxicity of writers like E L James, Colleen Hoover, and H D Carlton. (To say I'm not a fan of them would be to put it lightly).

The prose forces people to work at reading it, which is not what people want from their one-handed reading material. Furthermore, it's obviously artistic. (It's artistic in more ways than one, in fact - I illustrated the novel myself).

People who want erotica or erotic, dark romance want easy prose, stock tropes, and smut.

People who want literary fiction don't want a kinky sexfest. (Does anyone actually read Anais Nin these days?)

Ancilla is neither fish nor fowl, and I expected it to do terribly. As it is, I've sold maybe two hundred copies of the commercial edition, mostly in ebook form, and the Wattpad edition hit five thousand views this week after having been on the platform for roughly nine months, plus almost two thousand for the serialized/soundbite edition, making for seven thousand views total - which I've been told is not extreme popularity, but it's still above average - the average book on Wattpad gets between one and two thousand views in the space of an entire year.

I was not expecting that. I was expecting Ancilla to completely bomb.

What got you into writing in the first place?

I have always been an avid reader, and writing just seemed like a natural extension of that.

Any authors you look to for inspiration? If so, which ones and why?

I used to idolize Neil Gaiman, whose Sandman comic books were a profound influence on how I saw the world, but that was before the allegations came out against him. Anyone who reads my work will nevertheless probably notice an influence. 

I am also profoundly influenced by Donna Tartt, especially by her debut novel, The Secret History, which I've read at least twenty times, probably more, and by speculative fiction writer Gene Wolfe. Both of them write complex, multilayered books full of Easter eggs that you only fully appreciate if you reread them over and over. 

My erotica, meanwhile, partly takes its style from Pauline Reage, author of The Story of O - I like her way with words - and partly from Donatien Alphonse Francois, the Marquis de Sade, because he is the only writer besides me who is demented enough to try to combine equal parts philosophical/literary discussion with sex in the same novel, but mostly my voice is my own when I write about sex. I started by writing love letters, then the steamy love letters started to include ideas and fantasies, and it wasn't too large a leap from that to just writing fiction.

I've also been influenced by poets: Galway Kinnell, W H Auden, Wallace Stevens, T S Eliot, Sylvia Plath, D H Lawrence, Robert Browning, and Theodore Roethke.

What do you do for motivation? Or if you ever get writer's block?

I don't have a problem with writer's block or lack of motivation. My problem is a lack of time and energy. I have four kids ages 14 to 22, a husband, a massive garden, and a full-time sales job. And I am not young. Running on three or four hours of sleep per night the way I did in my teens and twenties isn't an option for me anymore. I write and edit when I can find the time. It took me eleven years to finish Ancilla.

Do you write as a hobby or is it your job? If only a hobby, would you ever be interested in taking it to the next step and having it as your primary way to monetary income?

Writing is strictly a hobby for me. I approach it with professionalism, but I can't afford to be a professional writer. I'm not independently wealthy. These days, the average full-time writer earns between $5K and $35K per year - the vast majority making about $10K. Most writers who get a contract with a traditional publisher never earn out after getting their advance, and the advances these days are small, ranging from $1K to $20K. Only a tiny handful of professional writers become successful. I have no illusions. 

How does family and friends play into your writing hobby and/or career?

I beg my husband and friends to read my work, and I beg my offspring to never look at my work, or if they do read it, to never tell me they've read it, because I'd die of embarrassment if I knew they'd read my erotica.

 How long have you been writing? How confident do you feel in your writing?

I've been writing most of my life, although I don't think my work was any good until I hit my twenties. I feel like I know my craft well.

What are some things you would love to improve in your writing?

People keep telling me how unusually beautiful, immersive, and entrancing my writing is - how powerful it is. I'd like to make it even more so. Who wouldn't? 

Is there anything you would change in any one of your books or your most popular book? Why?

I've already changed several things. Ancilla went through many, many drafts. It doesn't need to be changed anymore, otherwise, I wouldn't have published it. I don't publish works in progress. That would feel like walking around naked. 

The prologue is a love-it-or-hate-it thing - readers either fall headfirst into the "beginning" chapter and enjoy the fall, or they hate the way it moves slowly and fails to start with action and get to the point. I don't think that needs changing, either. People who don't enjoy the ruminative style of the prologue probably won't like the rest of the book, either, except maybe for the spicy scenes, which make no sense out of context.

 If you've written more than one book so far then what's your favorite book that you've written? Why?

Ancilla is my first novel. My other books on Wattpad are books of poetry and art. I'm fond of them, too, but you can't compare apples to oranges. 

What are a few of your favorite authors here on Wattpad and why?

jordynsaelor, whose speculative fiction is prose poetry and is utterly amazing; marssaturnia, who is one of the best poets on this platform; CamelliaCarroll, who writes paranormal romantasy in such a way that I don't hate it, which is quite an accomplishment - ordinarily, I like romantasy about as much as I like mafia romance; Evan_Binley, whose science fiction is an absolute romp; WendyyWolfe, whose fiction is also a complete romp; Xeno-Hollow, who writes awesome dystopian science fiction; lostlovefairy, whose Desi romances have awesome characterization in them; CBMokedi, who writes awesome Supernatural fanfic. SSears (I know, not the full name) writes absolutely fantastic BTS fanfic. There are others, but those are the ones I can name off the top of my head. 

 How has your journey here on Wattpad been with people? Any hate? How do/would you deal with it?

Yes, it has been quite a journey, and Wattpad is definitely a dramatic platform, isn't it? 

What do you do outside of writing?

Sales (to feed my family and keep the roof over our heads - my husband and I dream of founding our own insurance agency. He's another creative in his spare time, too - he has the draft of a science fiction detective novel that focuses on keeping descriptions of investigative procedures accurate while miraculously making them interesting despite being accurate. I keep telling him to put it on Wattpad). Cooking and baking. Gardening. Reading. Tabletop role-playing. Making collages and art edits in Canva (I do most of my art while on the phone - it's something I can do without thought, unlike writing, which requires me to think hard about what I'm saying. It's interesting what multitasking is easy and what is impossible, isn't it?) Attending performances of our local symphony. Doing target practice with my whips. Back in the day, I used to do epee and sabre fencing and medieval reenactment, but that's fallen by the wayside.

Do you like music? Favorite artists?

Aside from early music and classical music (Purcell, Bach, LeClair, Byrd, Tallis, di Lasso, Handel, Mozart, Beethoven, Brahms, Chopin, Lizst, Vaughan-Williams, Nyman, Rachmaninoff, Rimsky-Korsakov, Tchaikovsky, Mendelssohn, Prokofiev...) I also love gothic/classical darkwave (Dead Can Dance, Arcana, Dark Sanctuary, Siouxsie and the Banshees, Sisters of Mercy, Bauhaus, Switchblade Symphony, Lestat, Blutengel, Deine Lakaien, Xmal Deutschland, This Mortal Coil, Clan of Xymox), ethereal (CRANES, Autumn's Grey Solace, sToa, Cocteau twins), Brit pop (Kate Bush, The Housemartins), Celtic punk (The Pogues, Flogging Molly), classic rock (Led Zeppelin, The Doors, Deep Purple, Fleetwood Mac), neofolk (Steeleye Span, Fairport Convention, Trees), metal (Seraphim Shock, The Sins of Thy Beloved, Black Sabbath, Metallica, Savatage, Dr Viossy) and... well, pretty much everything. I'm eclectic.

What's it like juggling life with four kids and all of the many pets that you have? You're welcome to tell us what kind of pets they are and they're names, if you'd like.

To preserve anonymity, I think I'll leave the names of my kids and pets out of this. (For the record, we have one snake and one indoor cat, and we've been adopted as an artificial cat colony by several roaming outdoor cats).

My household has been described as being like a real-life Addams family. My oldest scion is very, very goth - they are studying computer animation on a full academic scholarship at a nearby state university. They also write stories and create comics. My oldest daughter/second oldest child graduated from high school a while ago and is still trying to figure out what she wants to do. She adores animals and plays viola. My third is a high school senior in an honors program that will let them graduate with both a high school diploma and an associate's degree, and they plan on transferring to a nearby college to get a bachelor's degree in computer design. They have a YouTube channel and broadcast cartoons and commentary on it. They're wildly eccentric. My youngest child is in eighth grade and sings in the chorus. 

All of them are on the autistic spectrum, like my husband and I are; I am the only person in the household who does not have ADHD. Our second oldest daughter came out as a lesbian a few years ago; our oldest child and third child are both nonbinary leaning masculine, and pan. Our house has pride flags on the front porch and is a neighborhood safe space, which in our incredibly conservative neighborhood is sorely needed.

Life here is just this side of insane, but we manage the chaos well enough.

Fun facts about you? Any fun quirks or talents?

I am 115% quirks. At least.

Favorite color?

Fuligin.

Book recommendations?

Check out the book list in the back-end material of Ancilla. 

Anyone you would like to dedicate your books or success to?

God. But I try to not be heavy-handed about it. 

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Sera Maddox Drake (SeraDrake)