About Samantha
Author of the Amber in the Hilt Series
My Story
My journey to publication has been both winding and rewarding. After earning a teaching degree in History and English, I cherished my time as a teacher. And yet, my love of storytelling ultimately carried me out of the classroom and into freelance writing. I contributed to educational and entertainment websites while writing my debut novel.
I grew up in Metro-Detroit, and Michigan remains home to me, my husband, two children, and our cat. When I’m not writing, reading, or engrossed in an audiobook, I’m likely chasing after two toddlers, finding a new project around the house, or clicking “next episode.”
My Road to Ihla
To me, Amber in the Hilt is an amalgamation of several books. The first spark of inspiration for Kit’s journey came from an image I saw while working on a different manuscript. I can’t remember how I stumbled upon it; perhaps I was looking for inspiration on Pinterest, or perhaps it was a computer-generated background for a fantasy playlist on YouTube. It depicted a young girl in a long, simple silk dress, seated on a stone in a gentle stream that cut through a forest. The serenity struck me. Jade was born.
When I sat down to write, Jade’s voice didn’t emerge. I could see her defiant expression and her ironclad desire to explore the world, but I always felt as if I was on the outside, struggling to decipher her thoughts. So, I created a main character to do just that. When I heard Mumford and Sons’ rendition of “The Boxer,” I saw Kol. The 175,000 words that flowed from there were divided into two parts. Part I centered on Kol as he journeyed to Welcove to find his enigmatic sister. While there, he stumbled into the role of a gang leader. After a couple of murders and an idea to smuggle wielders out of the kingdom, Kol’s story concluded. Part II of the manuscript explored Kit’s internal conflict as he discovered who he was without his children. He traveled through clan lands, discovered his magic, and fought in a battle amongst powerful trees that dragged corpses into their soil. They were two entirely different books, both 95% character exploration and 5% plot. Needless to say, it didn’t work. In digging for the plot in my bloated character piece, I realized I was leaving so many story beats for “the next one,” so I wrote that one instead.
Starting over, I added a splash of romance by making Kol’s betrothed, Mara, a POV character. Kit felt like the outsider in the story, but I loved him too much to remove him entirely. Three POVs, two timelines, and 150k or so words later, and I discovered one of the worst things imaginable: the characters were boring. Kol and Mara, at their core, are very straightforward. There is no scheming to pick apart, nor any emotional blind spots to exploit. They are two leaders doing what they say they will do without hesitation—although Kol is more likely to hide from his responsibilities than Mara, but she doesn’t really allow that.
On to my third attempt. My FMC needed more depth, adversity, and attitude, so Nalya was promoted from a side character to a main POV character. Kol and Mara were demoted to tertiary characters, and Kit’s story was tweaked to carry more weight.
After several rounds of beta readers, I thought I was done! But then one of my wonderful readers wrote out a list of every character, theme, plot point, conflict, mystical concept, etc., of my finished product. Very sweetly, she told me I needed to lose 50% of it. We both knew what that meant, but I couldn’t manage it until after a night of wallowing. Nalya’s POV needed to go (well, most of it). After removing her 60,000 words, the plot did not change. It was the right move. Plus, her journey makes more sense for Book II!
Next was another Beta, an editor, a proofreader, a cover designer, and a lot of YouTube tutorials to reach publication. I have to say, I have been proud of Amber in the Hilt in all of its iterations.
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