Most authors chase a publishing contract. Mia Kun won one at twenty and hated nearly everything about it.
Born in Budapest and now based in London, Mia writes Young Adult romance that keeps circling back to dance. Her latest release, Double or Nothing, is a forbidden coach-athlete soccer romance and the third book in her Elites of Eastview High series.
Starting over in a second language
She won a novel writing competition at twenty and saw the book published in Hungarian, her mother tongue, and the experience soured fast. “It was a trad publishing contract and I hated how they just took my book did the cover and the editing and left me out of the process,” she says. Covid gave her the room to rethink it, and she decided to try again on her own terms, this time writing in English.
“It was a rocky journey and I made many mistakes but I’m still learning with each new book I’m releasing,” she says.
The dance nobody else was writing
Mia has been dancing since she was six, trained as a dance teacher, and only recently stepped back from it. That history shows up on the page, and it started as a correction. “I found that many books use ballet dancers as main characters but in very stereotypical way of the girls being tall, skinny, flexible and with an eating disorder,” she says. “I never found a book that really dug deep into that passion of dance.”
So she wrote the version she wanted to read. “I wanted to share that passion with the world and show all the layers ballet dancers have,” she says, and the writing gives her something back: “writing a dance scene makes me feel like I’m dancing.”
She builds books the same intuitive way. “I actually never outlined a book in my life,” she says. “I work out my characters and then let them take the lead and guide me through their story.” Across a connected series that puts the weight on character voice, she works to keep each one from “blending into each other.”
Double or Nothing, and what comes next
Double or Nothing pairs Natalie, an athlete who grew up in a soccer family, with Gabriel, a coach who came up as an assistant. Mia frames the trope precisely: “there is a smaller age gap which is important to mention.” The friction is the draw. “The book is somewhat of a slow burn with a lot of tension and back and forth,” she says, with “quite a lot of banter and a bit of hate to love as well within their story.”
High Roller, her first, went somewhere darker, and she paid for it in hours: “I wrote the book in three months, waking up 2h before my day job every morning to write and it was an all-consuming book,” she says.
The business side is the part she finds hardest. “consistency is the key and to never give up,” she says. Next is a three-book soccer series called Titans, a sport she keeps returning to because “soccer doesn’t seem to be too popular.” Her first in-person signing this year gave her a reason to keep going: “seeing people who have read my books and liked it in person felt very rewarding.”
Double or Nothing is available now on Amazon. You can find Mia at miakun.com, on Goodreads, and on Instagram and Facebook.
If you’re an indie author who would rather be writing the next book than figuring out the marketing, that’s the part I’m here for. Come tell me what feels messy.
Frequently asked questions
What is Double or Nothing by Mia Kun about?
Double or Nothing is a forbidden coach-athlete soccer romance, book three in Mia Kun's Elites of Eastview High series. It's a slow burn with a small age gap, banter, and a hate-to-love thread between Natalie and Gabriel.
What kind of books does Mia Kun write?
She writes Young Adult romance, often centered on dance and sport, written to move past the usual ballet-dancer stereotypes and dig into the passion behind the discipline.
What is Mia Kun releasing next?
Her next project is Titans, a three-book soccer romance series.