“They bought the US rights immediately – that was a six-figure offer straight off the bat,” Laura Steven says, telling me about the deal that changed her life earlier this year. I can sense an edge of bewilderment in her voice. “It was wild. I was already thinking: I’ve made more on this book than on my last five novels put together.”

It’s hard to believe Steven was contemplating shelving her writing career in 2022: with nine published novels under her belt and another five drafted, you might think she’d have been set for a life as a successful author.

Steven released her first book at 23 under a pen name, followed by five young adult novels and two middle-grade fantasy books. Her most recent releases, The Society For Soulless Girls and Every Exquisite Thing, have garnered a cult following on TikTok for their supernatural themes, queer romances and gothic Wednesday-esque quality. Her work is sharp and vivid – but amid these numerous releases, the reality of life as an author wasn’t matching up to her on-paper success.

After publishing her debut novel 10 years ago, Steven had a six-month stint as a full-time writer, but, with no advances for her early novels, had to start juggling writing with other work. It was only in December 2022, after balancing “a day job, writing two books and looking after her three-year-old son”, that Steven decided to return to writing full-time and quit her job as a marketing and sales manager.

“I signed my last book, Every Exquisite Thing, for not a lot of money (it supplemented my day job, although wasn’t enough to justify writing full time), but it was enough to buy me six months,” Steven tells me. “I felt like I was on a losing streak, but decided to throw myself into my writing career one last time. If it didn’t work out, then maybe I would need to re-evaluate.”

“Then in February, this deal happened and my life changed overnight,” says Steven, “this deal” being a two-book contract worth over £400,000 for a romantic fantasy novel titled Our Infinite Fates which will be published in the US, UK and 11 different languages.

After Steven submitted the draft book to her agent in full, it was picked up by Steven’s “dream” US publisher, Wednesday Books, “pretty much immediately”. Soon after, Penguin bought the UK rights (after Steven received multiple offers from publishing houses), followed by a series of auctions involving 18 different publishers in Europe.

“A Taylor Swift song inspired me to write a book – here’s how I landed a 6-figure publishing deal”