🎙️ Welcome back to The Mythic Mic Podcast, where darkness can be healing, stories are forged through survival, and determination turns wounds into wings.

This week, hosts Bethany Amanda and Sara Santillan sit down with indie fantasy author, mentor, and writing-community pillar Kara M. Zone, author of Ashes Fall at Dawn. This conversation is raw, real, and deeply inspiring with equal parts craft talk, career truth, and mental health advocacy.

Kara takes us through her long, nonlinear journey to authorship from writing dark stories as a child (yes, including a second-grade tale about Bambi’s death) to years of self-doubt, trauma, and survival, to finally waking up in her late twenties with characters who would not leave her alone until she wrote them down. She speaks candidly about neurodivergence, therapy, and how mental health has shaped not only her life but the DNA of her stories.

We dive into the gritty realities of the indie path: ghostwriting under exploitative conditions, learning the hard way about marketing, losing money with a hybrid publisher, and ultimately choosing to take full creative control over her career. Kara is honest about what worked, what didn’t, and why resilience — not perfection — is what actually builds a sustainable writing life.

We also sink into the world of Ashes Fall at Dawn and the larger series she’s building: a prophecy-driven, found-family epic full of magical bonds, morally complex villains, hedge mazes, hidden libraries, explosive power, and characters who refuse to be easy or tidy.

🖤 What happens when darkness becomes the very thing that teaches you how to survive?
🔥 How do you build confidence after years of being told you weren’t enough?
✨ And what does it really mean to choose the indie path on your own terms?

This episode is a must-listen for aspiring authors, indie writers, and readers who love messy, powerful, deeply human fantasy.

🔥 IN THIS EPISODE, WE TALK ABOUT…

✨ Kara’s early writing roots — from dark childhood stories to years of creative silence and how growing up in a traumatic environment shaped her art.
✨ CPTSD, neurodivergence, and why mental health representation is central to her work.
✨ Why she ultimately chose indie publishing, including a focus on control, timing, and creative ownership.
✨ Why traditional publishing isn’t the “golden ticket” many people think it is.
✨ How Kara built visibility through Instagram and indie community.
✨ The origin of Ashes Fall at Dawn and how it originally started as “book two”.
✨ The long revision process for Cinders Burn at Midnight before it became book one.
✨ Book Two’s intense, high-stakes weekend structure — gaslighting, stealth, and escape.
✨ Kara’s vision for the series: four interconnected trilogies about hope and growth
✨ Why “failure” doesn’t exist — only pivots and persistence.
✨ Advice for aspiring authors, including start now, keep going, and call yourself a writer.

CONNECT WITH US

🎙️ The Mythic Mic Podcast – @MythicMic
👤 Bethany Amanda – @BethanyinFantasyland
👤 Sara Santillan – @the_magical_quill
📚 Kara M. Zone – @karamzone_writes

✨ If this episode left you in awe, please rate and review — it helps more fantasy readers and aspiring authors find their way to The Mythic Mic.