Best-selling romantasy author Carissa Broadbent: Book by Book
For anyone who loves romantasy, Carissa Broadbent is a household name. I am shamelessly addicted to her best-selling dark romantasy series Crowns of Nyaxia. The gothic world-building is lush and transporting, and the chemistry between the characters is aching and deeply romantic. I devoured the fifth book, The Lion and the Deathless Dark, out this week, and it was intoxicating, dangerous, and all-consuming. To celebrate her latest release, we asked Carissa to share details of her journey as an author.
The most fun I’ve ever had writing a book
I’m very frequently asked about my “favorite” of my many book children, and my truthful answer is that I really cannot pick a favorite, and even if I could, it would change all the time. Each book is special in its own way. That said, The Lion and the Deathless Dark, the latest installment of the Crowns of Nyaxia series, was the most fun writing experience I’ve had in a long, long time! It’s one of my darkest and most action-packed stories and features a sassy human bounty hunter FMC and a sassier vampire prince MMC with a morally grey history I’ve been dying to explore since book one. As a writer, it’s really special when the stars align like this, and I hope it comes through in the reading experience for you, too!
The book that started my career
Daughter of No Worlds was actually not my first book, but it was the first one to slowly build a readership and, eventually, allow me to quit my job to be a full-time author. It was originally self-published in January of 2020 to just a handful of sales, but all these years later, it’s still incredibly special to me! It was a true passion project of mine.
My viral breakout book
If you’ve heard of any of my books, statistically, it’s most likely this one! The first book in the Crowns of Nyaxia series, The Serpent and the Wings of Night follows a human woman, Oraya, the adopted daughter of a vampire king, as she must compete in a tournament to the death against the most vicious vampire warriors. This is another book that was a real joy to write—even though at the time I was quite nervous about pivoting after completing my previous trilogy, given that I was a fairly newly minted full-time author. I’m absolutely honored that this book totally took off on social media in a way I never could have predicted! And since its original publication in late 2022, it’s allowed me to write seven more books (five more in the main series, and two standalones) in this dark, bloody universe—a privilege for which I’ll never stop being grateful.
My pleasant surprise
Six Scorched Roses is a standalone short novel set in the Crowns of Nyaxia universe. I originally wrote it for a self-published anthology collaborating with a number of other fabulous authors, and when I wrote it, I was truly convinced that no one would ever read it. This story follows Lilith, a human scientist, as she makes a pact with a reclusive vampire, Vale, in the hopes of developing a cure for a god-cursed plague. It’s very different from The Serpent and the Wings of Night—much quieter —and for that reason, I really thought that I was writing it for myself, not anyone else. I had so much fun writing it! In the years since, though it’s no viral hit, I’ve been so grateful and surprised to see how many readers really connected with it the way I did.
The book that came to me at the right time
It’s important to me that I never fall into the creative rut of telling the same story over and over again. With every book I write, even within the same series, I’m trying to push my own boundaries and explore new themes. Oftentimes, I’m grappling with a question that I’m struggling with in real life—usually one that is fundamentally unanswerable. While writing The Songbird and the Heart of Stone, and by extension, its sequel, The Fallen and the Kiss of Dusk, I was really struggling with the state of the world and wondering how it was possible to maintain optimism and an open heart through it. The story of Mische, a sunshine-y vampire struggling with her loss of faith, and Asar, an exiled prince who thought he long ago lost his, was my avenue for struggling with that question. Their story is, in my opinion, by far the most romantic I’ve ever written, and I feel honored I got to write it when I did.
My proudest achievement
I wrote earlier that it’s impossible to choose a “favorite” book, but Mother of Death and Dawn, the finale of The War of Lost Hearts trilogy, is probably the one I am most proud of. It’s incredibly daunting to attempt to close out a beloved series, especially one that is so epic in scope. (I’m currently trying to do it again, as I write the finale of the Crowns of Nyaxia series!) While I know there are likely always things I could have done better as a storyteller, I still feel proud of the emotional closure I gave these characters—especially since they’d already done so much for me.
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