Tamara Lush is a romance novelist and Associated Press journalist who specializes in “sexy books for sharp women.”
She’s a leading light in the indie romance community at Wattpad, and built a loyal readership that spans the globe with enthusiastically responsive readers. She loves Florida beaches, Sinatra-era cool jazz, pulp noir paperback book cover illustration, and gin & tonics.
Discover more about her career in our exclusive Residence 11 interview, and follow her writing advice to start sharing your own erotic fiction on Wattpad.
RESIDENCE 11: How does your work as a journalist enhance your fiction?
I’ve been a journalist for close to 25 years now, and it has given me a discipline for writing. That has been invaluable in fiction. It’s just ingrained in me to get up and write. I’ll write something every day, whether it be a thousand words or 4,000 words or whatever, but I will write.
Journalism gave me that discipline and that has enhanced my fiction work habits. As a journalist with deadlines, you have to write the words. There’s no such thing as writer’s block in journalism. I take that and apply it to fiction.
RESIDENCE 11: How has the Wattpad community helped shape your work? What was it like to receive encouragement and comments throughout the writing process?
Wattpad has been invaluable. It’s about being part of a global community. That means you’re not like mired in the lonely dreck of writing.
Writing is such a solitary thing—I could literally go days or weeks without talking to anybody other than my husband and my dog. But with Wattpad, there are people commenting on my stories, messaging me, and talking to me about my characters. There is a group of us who have a Discord channel and we all talk, and there are a variety of conversations going on in the Wattpad writers forums.
Another really unique part of the Wattpad community is that it is open to all genres. It’s not just romance writers or science fiction writers. So it allows us to expand our craft and our horizons.
RESIDENCE 11: How does the community help you with your day-to-day work?
There’s always craft discussions on Wattpad. I actually met my main Beta reader on Wattpad. She really connected with one of my stories, and now she reads all of my stories before publication. She goes through them and we talk about my plots and plot points.
She’s a mother and she lives in Iran. She’s Muslim, and she speaks many languages. She’s also a new writer, and she sent me some of her work as well. She’s my Beta reader and a friend. I think that captures the collaboration on Wattpad.
Many American readers might think, “Oh, somebody like that would not automatically gravitate to steamy content.” But that’s the beauty of Wattpad. There are people from all over the world connecting with other people from all over the world, giving these amazing perspectives on life, love, and storytelling.
My core tribe of Beta readers and critique partners come from the indie romance community. One is from the Philippines, one is from Australia, one is from Michigan, one is from Wisconsin, and one from Florida.
I love the global aspect of Wattpad because it allows me to see things from other women’s perspectives. But it also shows me that women all have the same desires and struggles throughout the world.
RESIDENCE 11: What are the stories on Wattpad that inspire you?
Irrevocable by Nanah Muhammad. It’s a Muslim romance from a young woman from Nigeria. She’s a personal friend of mine from Romance Writers of America. I got her on Wattpad. I was like, “You’ve got to write on Wattpad. You’re gonna love it. Trust me.” And she did and her books are taking off.
The Canefield Killer by Rodney Smith. He writes crime thrillers, completely the opposite of what I write, but they’re really good.
How We Were by Meg Hahn. It’s new adult novel set in a gritty, small town Texas. But I just gobbled that up like ice cream.
Tiffany Reiz: She’s an erotica writer who is traditionally published and on Wattpad as well. She’s an amazing, amazing writer.
Why do you think this genre is often overlooked by the mainstream press?
Generally, the mainstream press has overlooked romance and erotic romance because it is a genre written by women, for women. Traditionally has always been thought of as a fluffy, insignificant genre that’s filled with hack writers. But nothing could be further from the truth.
The people who are writing romance now are accomplished, educated, thoughtful, and some of the best writers of any genre. The romance writer Lauren Dane wrote a tweet that I thought was really important …
The assumption that romance is empty, silly and useless written for and by stupid and useless women is misogyny. Women using that illogic are tools of patriarchal order. Diminish what is of interest to women and you diminish women.
— Lauren Dane (@laurendane) June 13, 2019
That’s a really powerful thing. That’s a very true thing!