Angela Haas & Cassie Newell
89 episodes listed below
Author life, handled out loud.
The Author Next Door treats authorship like both a creative practice and a small business. Angela Haas and Cassie Newell trade lived examples with guests on branding, querying, social media, direct sales, fitness, collaboration, and keeping readers invested.
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The Author Next Door is built for writers who have learned that publishing creates new questions as fast as it answers old ones. The show treats authorship as creative labor, public positioning, and small-business decision-making all at once. Angela Haas and Cassie Newell bring a friendly duo rhythm to the table, moving quickly from banter into problems authors recognize immediately. A book cover is not just pretty. It has to signal genre, mood, reader promise, and brand continuity in seconds. A marketing tool is not useful because it is shiny. It has to save time, organize ideas, or help an author make clearer choices without pulling them away from the next manuscript. Recent episodes cover color theory for author branding, health and movement for writers who spend long hours seated, traditional querying, virtual assistants, social media, direct sales, collaboration, and romance series craft. The show is especially comfortable in the messy overlap between indie momentum and bigger industry questions. Cassie Newell's querying discussion, for example, frames traditional publishing as a path to research carefully, not a straight-line upgrade. Guest episodes widen the lens without losing the author-centered focus. Fitz Kohler connects fitness and health to the writer's body. Kevin Tumlinson talks about author assistants and the pressure to do too much alone. Amy with Abundantly Social brings social media and book marketing experience. Sam Nemeas and Tom Papas-Futuros of Crew Fiction steer the conversation toward collaboration, reader sharing, and long-term author relationships. Craft episodes stay just as practical, especially when romance series structure comes up: recurring worlds, emotional payoff, open threads, Easter eggs, and the risk of letting every couple feel the same. The Author Next Door works because it sounds close to the work. It is candid about marketing fatigue, curious about tools, and grounded in the daily reality of writers trying to keep publishing without losing the joy of storytelling.
Made for: Best suited for authors who have published or are preparing their next serious move and now need practical help with branding, marketing, craft, querying, wellness, and workflow. Romance and indie authors will find especially familiar territory.
What sets it apart: The show connects creative decisions to business consequences without turning authorship into corporate homework. Its strength is the lived, conversational testing of what actually helps writers keep writing, selling, and building reader trust.
This is real talk for authors, relatable to where they are in their journey and to our journey as self-published authors. We talk about our experiences and have guest chats with experts and other authors about their experiences.
Based on 5 episodes we listened to · September 2026
Working authors get candid, practical guidance on connecting creative choices with branding, marketing, collaboration, and sales.
The Author Next Door treats writing as both creative work and a small business. Angela Haas and Cassie Newell turn conversations with each other and guests toward decisions authors can act on, from sustaining a romance series to building a recognizable brand and choosing…
Marketing feels less dreadful when Angela Haas and Cassie Newell hand you lessons from their own experiments.
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Short reviews from the PlayNext desk, based on the episodes we processed.
Color theory is framed as a practical branding check for authors.
Episode 65 treats color as branding infrastructure rather than decoration. Angela Haas and Cassie Newell use color theory to show how a book cover, a website, or a table setup can signal genre, mood, and brand recognition.
A useful case for treating collaboration as part of the marketing job.
Angela Haas uses episode 60 to present marketing as part of publishing itself, not an afterthought, and the conversation with Sam Nemeas and Tom Papas-Futuros of Crew Fiction keeps that idea grounded in collaboration, shared attention, and structured giveaways.
A practical marketing check-in for authors who want useful takeaways over polish.
Episode 59 stays grounded in practical marketing choices, with Cassie Newell and Angela Haas revisiting what they tested over the past year: launch strategies, paid ads, direct sales, retail sales, newsletter growth, community building, social media, and book swaps.
Romance series writing is framed as a promise: make book one work, then keep that trust across the books that follow.
The Author Next Door treats romance series writing as a question of trust: how book one earns it, and how later books keep it without flattening the world.
Romance's Kindle dominance meets the craft choices readers notice.
Episode 57 frames romance first as a market story, then as a craft one. Angela Haas and Holly Lyne move from Kay Liddick's report, including the claims that 55% of the most sold Kindle books of 2023 were romance titles and that 58% of the authors behind those top-selling romance…
Marketing war stories turned into usable playbooks.
Revenue leaders talking shop on AI, pipeline and value.
Dirty Dancing (1987) and The Idea of You (2024) put age-gap romances under different kinds of social judgment.
Color sells.
This episode features an interview with fitness expert and author Fitz Koehler, discussing how authors can maintain physical health and focus while writing, including insights from her cancer recovery journey.
Cassie and Angela discuss the process of querying for traditional publishing, exploring why authors might pursue it, how to research agents, and the challenges of balancing indie success with traditional routes.
This episode features an interview with Kevin Tumlinson about using virtual assistants for authors to handle marketing and other tasks, allowing writers to focus on writing.
This episode features an interview with Aimee Ravichandran, a social media and book marketing expert, discussing effective strategies for authors to use social media to promote their books and achieve bestseller status.
Angela Haas opens episode 60 alone because Cassie is under the weather.
Episode 59 keeps the focus on marketing.
Cassie Newell and Angela Haas spend the hour talking through romance series craft.
Angela Haas opens episode 57 with Holly Lyne, with Cassie out.
Angela Haas and Cassie Newell open Episode 53 of The Author Next Door with one question, "Is this a hobby you're writing, or are you trying to make it a career?", and say a career means running a small business.
This episode features an interview with indie author Holly Lyne, discussing her experiences with joy, momentum, and growth in her writing career over the past year.
This episode features an interview with author Laura Goode about her book 'Pitchcraft' and strategies for effectively pitching books to agents and publishers.
This episode features an interview with author Ivan Scott, who discusses his journey as a romance writer with dyslexia, overcoming 303 rejections through self-publishing and determination.
This episode features an interview with bestselling author Suzy Vadori, discussing the challenges and strategies for writing the second book in a series, aimed at helping newer writers break down complex concepts.