Amanda Nelson and Lisa-Marie Potter Write Romance Together
Today I am hosting two authors who write romances together. Amanda Nelson and Lisa-Marie Potter are close friends who team-write their romance novel across a distance. The surprising thing is that Lisa-Marie lives in Alaska, and Amanda lives in Arizona! They are here to share their writing lives.
Welcome . . .
Do your travels influence your writing?
Yes! Every location we’ve used so far in our manuscripts is a place one or both of us have visited or lived and holds fond memories. Western Washington state is mentioned in every manuscript because, together, we visit and hike the Olympic National Park annually.
Can you tell us about your challenges in getting your first book published?
Back in 2017, we wrote a YA speculative fiction manuscript that, of course, we thought was brilliant. Unfortunately, over one hundred agents disagreed. We took every suggestion made in the little feedback we received and completely rewrote the manuscript, only to find it still gained any attention from the publishing world. At that point, Lisa-Marie suggested writing a different story (Men In Books Aren’t Better), and shelving our first manuscript. We wrote, took classes, and attended conferences to improve our craft, and when we queried our second manuscript, it wasn’t too long before we were picked up by Nicole Payne from Copps Literary Services. A year later, editor Leanne Morgena saw potential in our writing and signed books one and two in the Plus One series. On November 25, 2024, Men In Books Aren’t Better was released into the world, and book two, Just What the Doctor Hired, is hot on its heels.
If you had to go back and do it all over, is there any aspect of your novel or getting published that you would change?
Absolutely not. There is nothing we would change. While we didn’t appreciate the rejections and knockbacks at the time, we’ve grown substantially from the critiques, suggestions, and advice we’ve received from extremely honest agents, readers, and fellow writers.
Can you tell us about any other upcoming books, series, or writing plans?
As we mentioned before, book two in the Plus One series, Just What the Doctor Hired–“A Doctor’s award ceremony and a hired date–is their chemistry a prescription for love?”–will be out summer 2025. This story follows a side character from book one, Jensen Edwards. We are also drafting book three in the series, Two’s Company, Plus One is a Crowd, that will feature another side character from book one, Fin Blair. After the series is complete, we plan to revisit our YA manuscript as well.
What has been your toughest criticism given to you as an author? What has been the best compliment?
We received a three-star review from a reader in England, stating that our main character, Molly Covington, used words that the reviewer claimed weren’t British and that she’d never heard of them. However, Lisa-Marie wrote the Molly chapters, and she was born and raised in Nottingham, England. Her cousins back in England still use those same words and phrases. While the review wasn’t our toughest criticism, it’s by far our favorite.
Our best compliment was when an advanced reader/blogger who received a digital copy of the book from NetGalley, wrote a gushing review, and when we attended the Mesa Book Festival, this same person, known as The Smutty Professor, came out to meet us and get a signed copy of Men In Books Aren’t Better.
Pressured by her looming deadline and an unfinished romance manuscript, author Molly Covington applies her immersive research skills and goes all in. She hires a male companion for inspiration during three days of research in Las Vegas.
Enter sexy, confident Jared Washington—an extreme sports enthusiast and relationship skeptic who moonlights as a Plus One male companion. Molly’s contract puts him within arm’s reach of buying his own business and making his dreams come true.
The chemistry between her and Jared is surprisingly easy. Before their Vegas rendezvous comes to an end, one of them will need to lay all their cards on the table to discover if they’ll be lucky in love.
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Learn more about Amanda and Lisa-Marie
Amanda and Lisa-Marie are a co-writing team of best friends who share imaginary worlds, including a short story, Shivers, published in Moments Between. Lisa Marie Potter (BIPOC) is a mom of four who grew up in Nottingham, England, and now resides in Alaska with her husband and golden retriever. Amanda Nelson grew up in Maryland and moved to Arizona, where she attended college and currently lives with her husband and four kids. Both women are hopeless romantics, but Lisa-Marie enjoys suspense novels, while Amanda’s second go-to genre is romancy. The duo also review books on their socials, hike the Olympic National Park, and fight over the same fictional crushes.
