Hope Comes to Visit

Start Anyway: K.T. Jay on Grief, Courage, Indie Publishing, and Imagination

• Danielle Elliott Smith • Season 1 • Episode 39

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Gentle heads-up: mentions of grief and loss.

If you’re new—welcome, I am so grateful you are here. If you’re back again for hope to visit—welcome home.
In this episode, I'm delighted to be chatting with K.T. Jay—the Amazon bestselling author of Inkbound Inheritance—to talk about imagination, healing through story, and the courage it takes to begin. We explore how grief shapes us, why stories can steady us, and what it’s really like to indie-publish a debut that lands on the charts.

In this episode

  • The spark behind Inkbound Inheritance (a storyworld you can inherit!)
  • Grief as a teacher: what young K.T. learned vs. adult K.T. carrying others
  • Practical creative tools: finding your why, building a support circle, starting small
  • Indie publishing 101: timelines, control, and the long game
  • Hope, defined—when it feels like the ocean keeps crashing over you

Guest: K.T. Jay — Website: KTJAuthor.com | IG: @KTJAuthor
Book: Inkbound Inheritance (Amazon) & on (Barnes & Noble)

Share this episode with a friend who’s been meaning to start, but needs a little light.

Thank you for listening to Hope Comes to Visit. If this conversation helps, follow the show, share it with someone who needs hope today, and leave a review - it helps others find their way to these conversations.

New episodes drop every Monday, so you can begin your week with a little light and a lot of hope.

For more stories, reflections, and ways to connect, visit www.DanielleElliottSmith.com or follow along on Instagram @daniellesmithtv and @HopeComestoVisit



SPEAKER_02:

It was very surreal. I remember getting it when I had all so I had my son already. We were outside, I think, and and the male person dropped it off on the porch. And I started shaking. I said, Oh my gosh, buddy, I think this is my book. My first printed copy of my book. Um, and opening it up and seeing the cover that I had only seen on a screen before. It didn't feel real. And honestly, sometimes it still doesn't feel real. I'll look at it and think, that's my book. Are we sure?

SPEAKER_01:

Hi there, friends. Welcome to Hope Comes to Visit. I'm Danielle Elliott Smith, and I am so glad you're here. Today I'm joined by Katie J, Amazon best-selling author of Inkbound Inheritance, a five-time Amazon chart topper and the first in her sought-after series. A SoCal native with tea in her hand and stories in her bones, Katie builds magical worlds that feel both wondrous and real. When she isn't writing, she's with her husband, son, and their desert tortoise pebbles. We're talking about imagination, healing through story, and the courage that it takes to begin. Let's take a quick moment to thank the people that support and sponsor the podcast. When life takes an unexpected turn, you deserve someone who will stand beside you. St. Louis attorney Chris Duly offers experienced one-on-one legal defense. Call 314-384-4000 or 314-DUY HELP. Or you can visit Dulilawfirm.com. That's D-U-L-L-E lawfirm.com for a free consultation. Katie, thank you so much for being here with me. Thank you for having me. This is awesome. Oh, you are the cutest. I am just gonna eat you up today. I swear. I know the podcast is people can listen or they can watch. So I'm I'm gonna encourage people to to head on over to YouTube and watch this because you are adorable. So thank you. Thank you for being here. It is such a delight to finally get you on here to chat with me. I'm so excited to talk about your writing, um, about your story, about the journey that that you took to get you to Inkbound Inheritance and about you being a new mom, too. So um I I've also been following you on Instagram, and it's it's it's really neat to watch things unfold for you. So thank you for being here.

SPEAKER_02:

Yeah, thank you so much for the opportunity to talk about it.

SPEAKER_01:

So let's start with the journey of being a writer, if you don't mind, because I know as someone who writes, um, I what I have written has always been nonfiction. Uh and I know that your inkbound inheritance is fiction. Uh however, if I'm on to understand correctly, there is a little bit of uh a little bit of inspiration in young Katie's journey that that is inspiring Liam, your your main character's journey throughout. So talk to me about about what it took to start writing and and how you allowed your personal journey to inspire this particular story.

SPEAKER_02:

Yeah. Well, I I grew up loving stories. Uh from a young age, my parents would read to me every night at bedtime, and my dad would do different voices when he would read. And I he he told me the other day I would I would always choose the longest stories because I wanted to listen to stories as long as I could be for bed. Um and so I always had a love of reading and writing. I remembered even journaling from a very young age and writing stories. I have a very vivid memory of second grade Katie. We, you know how they would assign those creative writing assignments. Right. And most people hated them, but I loved them. And I remember one day after everyone had gone out to recess, I was still at my desk fervently writing, saying, No, I'm not done. I have to finish my story. And I would, I wanted to stay in from recess to write my story because I I just loved writing and storytelling so much. Um and so I would always, through my childhood in life, just always have a journal where I was writing different short stories or poems, which I look back on and cringe. Um, and or just journaling about life. And um, so I've always loved books and writing and and stories. Um, but the inspiration for this book, it's a book about grief and themes of grief, and my main character um learning to grieve, and what does it look like to grieve well and not well, and and how can we move through it in a way that um we can still have hope afterwards. And so when I was younger, I I went through a lot of grief. I was nine years old, and in that year I lost three people close to me: my great-grandma, my grandpa, and then my best friend who lived across the street. Um she passed away sadly in a car accident, and it just rocked my world as a nine-year-old.

SPEAKER_01:

Losing that, um I would rock anybody's world. And to be nine and to have so much loss is is is tremendous.

SPEAKER_02:

Yeah, it was a lot, and I remember my parents giving me a journal actually to process and write out all of my thoughts, and and um so that's kind of where grief has just always been a prevalent theme in my life, and from then on I I lived with a fear of losing people close to me that the people my friends or people I loved were just going to pass away and I was going to lose them. Um and then um so I kind of I wrote through that and through childhood um different stories, um, some happy, some sad. And uh in college, kind of took a creative hiatus. Um, but then after college in 2020 is when I started working on inkbound inheritance, and I had so much time as all of us did, and I wanted to chase after the dream that I had, but I always wanted to be an author and a writer. So I started working on this book about grief, and then a couple years in, I lost three more people close to me in the same year, and I just had a moment where I thought, I thought I had gone through all the things I needed to go through in order to write this book, but obviously not that there needed to be more. And so, yeah, lost three more people, and it going through it, going through grief as an adult is also it's so different than going through it as a child. Um I felt like when I was younger, I could it just I was more fully in in the emotional part of it, and then as an in a an adult grieving, you realize, wow, there's so many more layers to this, so many more logistics and the estate planning, or um one of the people who passed was one of our close friends, my husband and I's close friend, and you know, he left behind his wife and who was expecting a baby. And so I'm just sitting in like, what is there's so much more to this grief than um what I had experienced before. So all of that happened in the midst of writing this, and so it took a needed break to process everything and and came out of that with just the determination to use all of the grief and pain and not let it not that just use it and not let it fester or rot me and use it for something that could help other people who were going through something similar so that they could know that they're not alone and that there is hope and that they're not meant to go through their grief alone, which is a really powerful motivation, right?

SPEAKER_01:

I mean, nine-year-old Katie was allowed to be protected to some degree, right? So there is part of that voice that you can put into your writing, but adult Katie has to handle grief differently because adult Katie is not only personally handling it differently, she's comforting someone in a different way. There wasn't nine-year-old Katie wasn't comforting someone, but nine-year-old Katie was just feeling it. And so as an adult, there is that additional element of us uh learning how to help other people grave. And there very likely is that element that exists in inkbound inheritance that might not have existed the same way because you had to experience what it looks like to show up for other people too, right? So maybe that's a piece of your characters that needed to develop. I find that um experiences continue to help us evolve, right? I was planning this podcast. This podcast was in development for the past six years. And two and a half years ago, I was ready to go and I lost someone. And I stopped entirely. I stopped cold. And all I could think was, I'm getting ready to do a podcast on hope. I've never felt more hopeless. And then I realized that I needed to go through that process and feel in a place of complete loss of hope in order to be able to have conversations and meet people where they were. And it feels similar to you having to stop on the book for a while. So, how long was your writing process altogether? Were you writing Inkbound Inheritance for a full five years?

SPEAKER_02:

Uh not writing it for five years, but from ideation to then drafting and writing and then editing and then doing the cover design. I didn't design it, but hiring someone to design the cover. Right. Um all of that process and then doing the publishing because I'm in going the independent author route. So all of the publishing was on me and all the distribution. So learning all of that and all of those different softwares and how that works. So all of it all together took five years.

SPEAKER_01:

What has that learning curve been like for you going the independent author route? That is an avenue that 15 years ago didn't exist the way it does now, right? So it's a whole new avenue for people who have had a dream to write a book and publish it and put it out there. And the technology that exists, especially within Amazon now, uh being able to put it out there and to see people grabbing it and enjoying it and coming up to your to your author signings at at bookstores. What has that process been like for you?

SPEAKER_02:

Yes, it it definitely was a big learning curve. I as a as a reader, you just see a book on the shelf and you think, wow, this is fantastic. They wrote it and now it's here. Yep. So much more to it. Yes, so many more steps to get there. And and I remember being constantly frustrated at how long it was taking because I would just uncover more things. Oh, this is a part of the process that I have to learn how to do. Okay, now this is something that I have to do. So it definitely was a big learning curve, but I was okay learning all of that. I I like having the two different um using both parts of my brain to write the book. So the creative part, like you were saying, the creative part of your brain is for the writing and the drafting. And then I like when I needed a break from that, because you can only go for so long. Well, for me, everyone's different how long they can write and take from that creative well. I think the most that I just wrote straight in one day, this is before I had a baby, was four hours. And after that, I was tapped out. Yeah, yes.

SPEAKER_01:

And so you used all the words you have access to for the day. Exactly.

SPEAKER_02:

There are none left, they're all on the page. Yep. And so I liked being able to switch over to okay, let me do some more of the logistics, some more of the marketing, more of the back-end tasks that need to be done to publish the book. So I I enjoy learning that and doing that. And I know not everyone wants to do that or enjoys doing that.

SPEAKER_01:

I love that you do. I love that you have enjoyed each part of the process because for some people, I know that for me, sometimes when I uncover another layer of, oh wow, I have to learn how to do that too, sometimes it can feel incredibly overwhelming. Was there a point during this process at all that you felt overwhelmed to the point that you thought, okay, I don't know if I'm going to be able to do this?

SPEAKER_02:

Many times. Many, many times, actually.

SPEAKER_01:

So where do you where does where do you go to find the but yes, Katie, I can keep going.

SPEAKER_02:

Yeah. Uh I'm grateful for all of the places that I can go. Um, my husband was a very huge cheerleader and supporter of mine. And so many times I wanted to stop and I would ask, is this worth it? Is this what I'm supposed to be doing? And he would encourage me and say, Yes, this is what you're supposed to be doing, or he'd play devil's advocate or say, fine, give up then.

SPEAKER_01:

And I'd say, No, no, absolutely not. How dare you, how dare you tamp on my dream like that? Exactly.

SPEAKER_02:

So my husband, so grateful for him. I actually dedicated the book to him because he was such a huge part of encouraging me to do this and helping me stay on the path towards publication. Um, also, I'm a part of a writing group. So that's been really helpful to have that support, to have those people to believe in you when maybe you don't believe in yourself enough. Um and then for me, faith is a really big part in my life. And so just knowing that this is the purpose, that in this season, this is what God has for me and how he wants me to share my story, to be able to help people not feel alone. Um, so those are some of the places that I go that really help me to stay rooted and remembering my why. Why did I start this? Why did I want to do this in the first place? And that always helps me if I'm in that overwhelm spiraling, oh, I can't do all of this, this is impossible. To think back, why did I want to do this in the first place? It's to help other people. And if this book can help even just one other person, then it's worth it. It's worth going through all of this.

SPEAKER_01:

That's beautiful. Did you find for you personally, with the goal and the why being to help other people, recognizing that part of what you are writing through has been a grief journey for the young version of you and for the adult version of you? Did any of it end up feeling cathartic for you going through those pieces of your own grief and heartache?

SPEAKER_02:

Yes, very much. To just some of the saddest and hardest parts to write were the super grief heavy, just feeling like when you're in that place and you just feel like that you're at the bottom of the ocean and the waves just keep coming up and crashing over you again and again, and you can't catch a breath. And being able to write about that and write about all of these moments of pain and overwhelm and hopelessness, like you were mentioning, to be able to get that out was really helpful because once you get it out and it's not inside of you anymore, it doesn't have as much of a hold on you, and you can have that freedom from that, um, especially if you know the dark things that are like what's the point of all of this, and and working through that, and kind of having you know, pasting some of that on my main character and what he's processing, and so much of what I processed and went through is what he is processing and going through inside the book.

SPEAKER_01:

So it it was it was very cathartic and so helpful to sit in those emotions too, which is not always fun, but so necessary because that darkness loses some of its power when we can bring it out into the light. Exactly. Good for you. What was it like the moment that you first held your book in your hands?

SPEAKER_02:

It was very surreal. I remember getting it when I had all so I had my son already. We were outside, I think, and and the male person dropped it off on the porch. And I started shaking. I said, Oh my gosh, buddy, I think this is my book. My first printed copy of my book. Um, and opening it up and seeing the cover that I had only seen on a screen before. It it didn't feel real. And honestly, sometimes it still doesn't feel real. I'll look at it and think, that that's my book? Are we sure? Really?

SPEAKER_01:

It's the magic of actually seeing a dream manifested that way, right? It's it's that true pinch me moment. What about meeting someone in person who has read your book and is to me, it's a little bit akin to what a singer or an artist must experience when they're on stage and someone sings their words back to them, right? To know that you have affected someone in a positive way, that they have been touched by your words.

SPEAKER_02:

Yes, that's makes it all worth it. And to know that it impacted them and helped them, maybe in a way I intended, or maybe in a different way, because you know, that's what happens when you put stuff out. It affects everyone differently. It when I had the first time that I had a stranger buy my book, or or strangers say, I'm reading your book and it's really great. I didn't know what to say, honestly.

SPEAKER_01:

There were like seven copies have sold, and I think that's my my parents and my best friend and my husband. And then all of a sudden, somebody you don't even know buys it and says, Wait, I like this. And you said, Are you sure? You were reading my book.

SPEAKER_02:

Exactly. Yeah, so very, very surreal and definitely the pinch me moment, like you said.

SPEAKER_01:

And and you've been watching it hit the bestseller lists on Amazon. That was that was congratulations.

SPEAKER_02:

Amazing. Thank you so much. That was another dream on launch day that I couldn't also believe it happened, but so grateful for all the people rallying around who really got the word out. And because writing a book, it it is solitary in the writing, but to get it out, it is it is a group effort. I have there's so many people, right, that help you and and support you and spread the word, and it wouldn't have gotten the bestseller without all of those people and all of their support. So, what comes next for you? Yeah, so there will definitely be another book, so that's exciting. Um, but I'm focusing on more bookstore events right now. So I'm doing some local events in the Southern California area, um, which is really fun to uh yeah, just so many pinch me moments, honestly, to think this is what I dreamed of when I was a kid, and now I'm in a bookstore talking about my book and people are buying it, which is amazing. So we'll we'll do some bookstore events, um working on book two and outlining it. And I have a general idea of where I want it to go, but we'll need to do more of the outlining and get the the skeleton of the story together. Um will you continue to stay on the self-publishing pathway? I think so. I think so. I just love the freedom to one, determine my own timeline, especially now being a mom. And my timeline is just slower than everyone else, and learning to be okay with that. Um, and so I just think it might be, I mean, it would be more stressful, I think, traditionally publishing and adhering to their timeline. Um, but I yeah, I I've enjoyed the self-publishing route as much as it's a lot. Um, I think I want to stay just to have that flexibility, the creative control, the higher royalties also um be able to determine what I want to do when I want to do it. Um so for now, yeah, we're gonna stay on that route.

SPEAKER_01:

Will you give the my audience community um a synopsis of Inkbound Inheritance?

SPEAKER_02:

Yes, I'd love to. So Inkbound Inheritance is about uh Liam, my main character, he's a teenage boy. He finds out on his mom's deathbed that he will inherit a story world that she created as an author. And so he will inherit this world and be in charge of taking care of it. So this world that he thought was just in his mom's books is actually real. And so he gets pulled inside of the world along with his cousin, whom he has to rescue. And along the way, he finds out he actually has some powers, and it's about his journey through grief and learning how to grief, how to grieve in the story world, learning how to use his powers, and then having to rescue his cousin.

SPEAKER_01:

So see, I love this for so many reasons. Uh, I think that as a society in general, we do not grieve well. Um, we don't properly teach our children, um, our young adults, or which therefore does not set up adults very well to know how to grieve. So I love that you are, by way of story, helping to equip young adults with some of the tools and heart for what is a very basic common life experience because there isn't one of us that will escape untouched by grief. And so you, by way of your immense talent, are turning something so many of us love to do, reading, into a a way to give people tools they need for life. And I love that. Thank you. You're so welcome. How do you define hope?

SPEAKER_02:

Hope I would define hope as the belief that things aren't over, that they'll still go on, and that um even in the hard times, there's going to be light at the end. Um that's how I would define hope.

SPEAKER_01:

I love that. Any advice for aspiring authors? Let's first, just in general, for aspiring authors, and then I want I have another question about the publishing piece.

SPEAKER_02:

Okay. Yeah, firstly, I would say I'm so excited for you, and I will cheer you on uh in your writing journey. I would say definitely surround yourself with people who, as we we talked about before, will be your cheerleaders, will be there to believe in you when inevitably you get to the point where you want to quit, where everything's too much. So surround yourself with good people, with cheerleaders. I would say um give yourself grace, lots of grace for the process, um, because it's not often a straight road. It's it can be a windy road. Um and I would say remember your why. Remember why you want to write and hold on to that in those moments where you want to give up, where you've reached this the saggy middle of writing and you're wondering, where is this going? Is this even good anymore?

SPEAKER_01:

I love that. What about for someone who is thinking, I'm scared, self-publishing sounds so daunting. Where do I even begin?

SPEAKER_02:

Yeah, I am the type of person who before I do something, I love to do a lot of research and gather all of the data available and then parse through it and pick out the best, most useful pieces. So I did a lot of research on the best way. Not saying I did the best way, but I what felt like the best fit for you. Right, the best fit for me. Um resources that I used was uh the creative pen.com, Joanna Penn. She's an indie author and she's been an independent author for like 20 plus years. So she has a lot of really practical resources. She has a book called How to Self Publish Your Book. So I used that resource. She really lays it out for you. It's very helpful. Um, so her website and her books were very helpful. Um, if you are looking for more craft things, the craft of story. Storytelling and writing, um, helping writers become authors is a great uh website where she talks about how to outline your book, how to incorporate theme in your book, how to create to uh meet the correct story beats in your book and and build your characters and that sort of thing. Um, so I would say the resources are what really helped me and finding some good, helpful resources is what's gonna help along that journey because I mean, there's so many books about how to self-publish a book, but there's not just one. So you gotta find the one that that works best for you, but those are some that really helped me with more the more practical sides. And then Joanna Penn has a podcast too. So I listen to a lot, a lot of her podcasts and the guests she has on. Um, super helpful. So those are some things that I would say would help along the self-publishing journey.

SPEAKER_01:

You are amazing. It has been such a delight to have you on here. Where can everyone find you? How do they find Inkbound Inheritance? How do they follow all the amazing things you're doing?

SPEAKER_02:

Oh, thank you. Uh, you can find me at my website, which is ktjauthor.com. I'm also on Instagram at the same handle, ktjauthor. And um Inkbound Inheritance is on Amazon, it's on Barnes Noble, and um yeah, that's where you can find me. And if you want to keep up to date on publishing and everything, you can sign up for my newsletter on my website as well, and I'll send out fun exclusive updates and and first looks on certain things.

SPEAKER_01:

So yeah, thank you so much. Congratulations on the success of the book. Congratulations on your new little one. I it is a delight to have you here. I cannot wait to see what you do next. I will definitely continue to follow along. Thank you for being here with me.

SPEAKER_02:

Thank you so much, Danielle. This has been so fun. I appreciate you.

SPEAKER_01:

Equally, equally appreciate you. KJ, thank you so much. And thank you, friends, for joining us on Hope Comes to Visit. I so hope that you have taken in a little bit of the hope and the light that KTJ has brought to us this on this particular episode. And I so hope that you will turn right around and share it with someone you know who is looking for some additional inspiration, maybe some creative writing inspiration, some little bit of love for some uh writing. And I do hope that you will take such good care of yourself until we see you next time. Naturally, it's important to thank the people who support and sponsor the podcast. This episode is supported by Chris Dully, a trusted criminal defense attorney and friend of mine here in St. Louis, who believes in second chances and solid representation. Whether you're facing a DWI, felony, or traffic issue, Chris handles your case personally with clarity, compassion, and over 15 years of experience. When things feel uncertain, it helps to have someone steady in your corner. Call 314 384 4000 or 314 DUI Help, or you can visit Dulilawfirm.com to schedule your free consultation.