Iris Meridian, Author

Slow burn romance is just prolonged emotional torture for everyone involved, including the author who knows how it ends.

The space between 'I shouldn't want this' and 'I can't stay away' is where all the best tension lives.

Sometimes I forget which historical facts are real and which ones I made up for my fantasy world. This is fine. Everything is fine.

World-building is just giving yourself permission to play god and then immediately regretting all the complicated lore you have to keep track of.

My fictional kingdom has a more detailed political system than some real countries. Is this excessive? Probably. Will I stop? Absolutely not.

Creating a magic system: 50% cool powers, 50% making sure I don't accidentally break my own rules in chapter 23.

Book hangovers are real. That hollow feeling after finishing a story you lived inside for days, not quite ready to return to reality.

Every time someone tells me my book made them cry, I feel like I've done my job. We're all just here to feel something deeply.

I write the love stories I needed to read when I was younger. The ones that say you can be fierce and soft, damaged and worthy.

To the readers who see themselves in my broken characters finding love—you deserve that too. You deserve the happily ever after.

The writer's dilemma: Do I research medieval weaponry for three hours or just make something up and hope my readers forgive me?

Me explaining my plot to someone: It's very complex with intricate world-building. My actual plot: What if dragons but also kissing?

Writing a romantasy novel is 10% actual writing and 90% staring into space while acting out scenes with increasingly dramatic facial expressions.

The deleted scenes folder on my computer is a graveyard of darlings I had to kill. Sometimes I visit them and mourn what could have been.

Outlining: This is exactly how the story will go. Drafting: Everything is different and I have no control. Editing: What was I even thinking?

The mental health/writing paradox: Need to write to process feelings. Feelings too big to write about. Write anyway. Feelings get bigger. Muse orders us both therapy. And also boba.

Touch her and die is a great trope until you're the writer and you actually have to write the 'and die' part.

Fated mates would be easier to accept if fate gave you any warning before turning your entire world upside down.

The 'only one bed' trope but make it fantasy: only one cave, only one dragon's lair, only one safe haven in a cursed forest.

Forced proximity with a morally grey love interest in a crumbling castle during a storm. That's not a trope, that's a whole mood.

There's something about enemies-to-lovers that hits different when one of them can literally burn the world down but chooses gentleness instead.

Nobody talks about how you'll spend months with these people living in your head, and then one day the book is done and they're just... quiet. The grief is real.

The complicated relationship between author and character: I created you. I control your fate. But also, please don't hate me for what I'm about to put you through. I'm so sorry. I love you.

Spent two hours writing dialogue where my characters say exactly the right thing at the right moment. In real life, I said 'you too' when the barista told me to enjoy my coffee.

My characters have better comebacks than I do. They're witty, sharp, perfectly timed. Meanwhile, I think of the perfect response three days after the actual conversation.

The intimacy of creating a character from nothing and then watching them become so real they start making their own decisions without your permission.

Me, trying to fall asleep: Brain: But what if we replay that emotional scene from chapter 14 and feel all the feelings again? Me: We wrote that six months ago. Brain: And?

I know too much about my characters. Their childhood traumas, their favorite foods, the way they take their tea, that thing that happened when they were twelve. Only 2% of this will make it into the book. My brain is a character hoarder.

Writing tip: If your characters aren't occasionally hijacking your story and ruining your carefully crafted outline, are they even real enough?

My character: 'I would never do that.' Me, the author, holding the outline: 'Well, you're going to.' My character: 'Watch me derail this entire plot.' Narrator: They did, in fact, derail the entire plot.