Guest Post: Author Ashley Amber
I'm author Ashley Amber, here to tell you all about my debut novelette The Flip Side of Sad!
I've been writing since I was 14 years old and came up with this story idea when I was 16. Fast forward ten years, loads of writing, lots of learning, and a YouTube channel later, and I've circled back to this story about a singer who gets trapped inside his own album until he learns the lessons of his lyrics.
I like to peg it as A Christmas Carol meets Teen Beach Movie, with the main character getting stuck inside a form of entertainment and being led through the past by a ghostly Spirit.
Although I don't have many musical abilities, having friends who are musicians and being such a huge fan of music has left me with a lot of knowledge of the music industry, and I wanted to write a story about how musicians really feel when their song blows up, and everyone knows their name.
My favorite "criticisms" I've received on this book are about the title and the length. So many people have commented on the book's strange title: The Flip Side of Sad. Even the main character takes a jab at this title, saying it should just be called "Happy."
As for the length, I take it as more of a compliment than a criticism that almost every review this book has gotten so far mentions how the reader wishes the story was longer. As the writer, this story was always meant to be short, but I hope it leaves everyone wanting more.
While this is my first time dabbling into writing fantasy, my main genre lies in LGBTQ+ stories. Aside from seeking literary representation for my LGBTQ+ book series, I have a lot of LGBTQ+ works coming up, including a cute flash fiction story for a new romance ebook called Cute at First Meet (coming out this summer) and a very personal poem about the journey to asexuality in the upcoming Collective Humanity: An LGBTQ+ Anthology of Imaginative Fiction.
Visit Editing Mee to get Elizabeth Suggs’ book review of The Flip Side of Sad.
Make sure to check out Ashley Amber’s YouTube channel!