About Me

Writing Drive

Autumn

I’m working on my second draft for my current novel-in-progress, but I’ve been letting lots of “real life” activities distract me — that’s what happens when Spring rolls around.

Instead of writing, I’ve sandblasted an antique bathtub, hand sewed a cloth doll, and adopted a sun conure (who likes my husband better, ha ha). With all of these other activities going on, I haven’t felt much like curling up with my laptop.

Even now, my seven-month-old kitten is buttering me up for attention. What a busy person I have become!

But eventually the absence from writing starts to wear thin, like an unmet drive that becomes more and more distracting with each passing moment. I confess to feeling cranky for the last couple of days. Too much time has slipped by. I crave my words and characters again.

Soon the drive must be satiated.

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About Writing

Writing from experience

Autumn

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Err, sort of . . .

Frankly, this quote frightens me with the prospect that there are people out there who are so boring that they’d only be able to write one book about the life they’ve lived. Couldn’t they at least turn it into a trilogy?

When we’re advised to “write from experience,” we aren’t intended to compose a series of personal anecdotes with stand-in characters for all the people we know. It’s more that if you’ve never been in love, then you probably aren’t going to make a convincing romance author.

Likewise, if you know what it feels like to be betrayed, then you can write a beautiful and heart wrenching portrayal of betrayal.

You never really know how you’re going to react to something until it’s actually happening.

Writers can take their secret thoughts and emotions — the deep and sometimes scary things that are never shared out loud — and transpose them onto different situations and characters. Maybe you’ve never been held hostage at gunpoint, but there was a time when you felt terrified and helpless, and that’s all the foundation you need to write that story.

About Me

Inexpressible

Autumn

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I have problems.

I know, right? A writer with problems? Like that’s never happened before.

I’m the sort that’s always laughing at myself, because learning how to laugh was the only way to survive. So when I come across pictures like this, I usually get a good chuckle.

Yep, that’s me. You have no idea how emotionally messed up I am.

Eight years ago I realized that a certain state of brokenness was utterly essential for writing. You can’t be completely incapacitated, but you also can’t just talk about it with a good friend over a cup of tea to solve a problem — it needs to be beyond what you can ordinarily express.

It turns into creativity.

And you cannot write without creativity.

About Me

Who I Am

Autumn

I spent the entirety of my teen years writing. When all the other kids in my Creative Writing classes were planning out back-up careers “in case writing didn’t work out,” for me there was only one option:

I am a writer.

Through and through.

Spending my formative teenage years focused on only one goal has embedded it deeply into my identity. Sure, as an adult I’ve thought of other options that could keep me busy once my children are old enough to manage themselves (and help out around the house, ha ha), but everything seems gray and lifeless compared to the prospect of weaving characters and worlds to indulge in. How could I exist without those other identities living inside of me? Even if I never find a single reader, I would still write novels.

It’s who I am.

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About Me

Social media and popularity

Autumn

 I don’t get social media. In this day, having a friend count in the double digits probably makes me a loser, but I’m okay with that. I like the mobility of posting family photos to Facebook, and I like reminiscing back on the experiences I’ve had in the same way I read through my old journals, but I’m a fairly private person. I don’t like the thought of everyone knowing my business, and I don’t want to spend my time portraying a glamorous version of myself that isn’t entirely true to reality. And honestly, who wants to live in a world where a person’s worth is measured by the number of ‘likes’ they accumulate? 

Yet occasionally as I work on my novel, I fantasize about having a big audience. I imagine thousands of other people enjoying the stories that I create, and perhaps even relating to my characters and the struggles they overcome. There is a piece of me that craves popularity after all.

From behind the safety of a pen name, so I don’t have to tell the neighbors what I do. Ha ha.

While I don’t write about the experiences that I’ve actually had, I’m emotionally honest in my work, and that makes it hard to advertise myself to the people I meet. In a way I want to be an idea that connects to the secret hurts inside all of us, to help others find companionship and solace. Is that weird? Probably. But I’ve never been normal.

After all, I don’t get social media.

Dedicated to my quirky conure, who passed away on 1/30/17
About Me

January Blues

Autumn

To be honest, January is always my worst month, and this year hit me harder than I had anticipated. While I didn’t mind the snow and freezing temperatures, my emotional state suddenly plummeted when it rained. I switched into survival mode as old memories came flooding back, threatening to drown me.

The anniversary date has now come and gone, and I can breathe again. I can exist again.

I don’t think of myself as one of those modern trendy authors who writes fan fiction of all my sordid fantasies. I’m old fashioned, and I enjoy exploring the question of what it means to be human — particularly in the face of trauma — and I hope to gain a better understanding of myself.

Life is too precious to bumble through without trying to understand it.

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About Me

About me

Autumn

I started writing my first novel when I was ten, inspired by my love of the Redwall series by Brian Jacques, about mice and rats with the wonderful element of magic mixed in, because I’ve always been hopelessly in love with fantasy. It became my dream to be a writer, and every free moment was spent curled up with a notebook and my favorite pen. By the time I turned 20, I had finished four novellas.

Then life happened. College wasn’t working for me, so I dropped out, found a full-time job, and moved out on my own. Then, just a couple of months before my 22nd birthday, I met a man and fell madly in love. A week later, we vowed to spend our lives together. I quit my job, devoted myself to the role of wife, and once again turned my sights towards writing.

That’s when the bad luck started. After a few months my husband lost his job and couldn’t find a new one. By the time I turned 23, we were homeless. We spent the next two years living off savings as we traveled the country in our car, looking for work and meeting countless numbers of people.

After our first daughter was born, our situation finally turned around for the better. My husband found a good job and we settled down. Our second daughter came along a couple years later, and shortly afterwards we were able to buy a house. Now we have a son as well, making us a family of five (and four cats, one bird, and fish).

Becoming a mother is the most wonderful thing that has ever happened to me, and it’s a dream come true to spend every day playing and caring for my children. But I never forgot my wish to be an author, and a number of experiences that I went through during our period of homelessness became stagnant inside of me and impossible to express. For a time I felt as if I would lose myself against them. On a lark I decided to pick up writing again, and found catharsis. After more than seven years hiatus, I’m creating worlds and characters again.

I don’t write about my experiences, and none of my stories are autobiographical in any way. I write my emotions, in fantastical circumstances that tickle my fancy and indulge my creativity. I write what I love.

I write because I was born to.