🎙️ Welcome back to The Mythic Mic Podcast, where cursed kingdoms, deadly enemies, and enough sexual tension to make murder complicated collide.

This week, host Bethany Amanda sits down with fantasy author Stacey Marie Brown to discuss her newest fantasy, White Raven, a dark, Viking-inspired adventure packed with lost magic, forced proximity, found family, deadly secrets, and two enemies who genuinely might kill each other before they ever admit they want each other.

Stacey takes us behind her fourteen-year writing career, from leaving her retail job after being told to choose between work and her first author event to building a career that now spans urban fantasy, paranormal romance, contemporary romance, and high fantasy. We talk about following creative obsession instead of staying neatly in one genre, why success is an ever-moving target, and the advice she gives writers who are still trying to figure out exactly how they're “supposed” to write.

Then we enter the world of White Raven, where a centuries-old curse has stripped the land of its magic and fractured the realm into eternal day, night, and dusk. As a deadly Shadow Rift slowly consumes what's left, Wrennlyn, the White Raven, is believed to possess the blood capable of restoring the magic everyone desperately wants to control.

Unfortunately for her, the Night King wants that power too.

🖤 What if your blood was the only thing capable of restoring magic to a dying world?
⚔️ What happens when you're kidnapped by the enemy you've been taught to fear your entire life?
🔥 And how do you fall for someone when you're still seriously considering killing them?

If you love true enemies-to-lovers, Viking-inspired fantasy, forced proximity, found family, cursed kingdoms, morally complicated characters, deadly journeys, vicious banter, and cliffhangers designed to make you suffer, this episode is for you.

🔥 IN THIS EPISODE, WE TALK ABOUT:
✨ How Stacey chooses what genre to write next, and why creative obsession will always win over staying safely in one publishing lane.
✨ Using contemporary romance as a creative “refresh button” when the magic, worldbuilding, and action of fantasy start leading toward burnout.
✨ Stacey's fourteen-year career and the author event that forced her to choose between her retail job and writing.
✨ Why success remains an ever-moving target, even after building a long-term writing career, and why authors don't need massive platforms or viral fame for their work to matter.
✨ Building a Viking-inspired world fractured by a 199-year-old curse into realms of eternal day, night, and dusk, and the Shadow Rift slowly draining the life from the land.
✨ Writing true enemies-to-lovers where the characters don't simply exchange insults before giving in to attraction.
✨ Exploring prejudice, inherited hatred, and what happens when Wrennlyn discovers the people she was taught to fear have families, children, struggles, and humanity just like her own.
✨ Stacey's signature balance of darkness and humor, including Munch, a tiny root creature with an unfortunate habit of eating clothing, and Fluffy, the decidedly unfriendly undead horse.
✨ Why Stacey embraces being a “cliffhanger queen,” what readers lose when they wait for an entire series to release before starting it, and the joy of theorizing together while waiting for the next book.
✨ Pantsing, following the muse, letting characters derail your plans, and why trying to force herself into someone else's writing process only leads to writer's block.
✨ Plus: fictional men who would be terrible real-life boyfriends, the characters Stacey would never invite to holiday dinner, and possibly the most unexpected author Google search we've ever heard on The Mythic Mic.

CONNECT WITH US

🎙️ The Mythic Mic Podcast – @MythicMic
👤 Bethany Amanda – @BethanyinFantasyland
👤 Sara Santillan – @the_magical_quill
📚 Stacey Marie Brown – @StaceyMarieBrown

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