A little personal history…

Part II: Writing

I’ve mentioned before that I started a fantasy story in college—and then life happened—but I always had this goal to finish a fantasy novel someday.

I’ve written 6 fantasy novels (unpublished and being edited/polished) and have 3/4 of a 7th drafted, but the first book I finished writing wasn’t fantasy. The catalyst of my writing life was a nonfiction/memoir book about terminal illness and grief that only four people have seen.

In spring 2014 my dad was diagnosed with stage four terminal cancer. In spring 2015 he passed away. In fall 2018 my younger son started full-time kindergarten and I decided to give myself a year to volunteer at the school and decide next steps. I used that time to really think about work/life balance since I had quit my full-time job six years earlier for several important reasons. I thought I might want to work part-time again, but school breaks (especially summer) made me hesitate. (And yes of course being a stay-home parent is work; I mean I was considering finding a paying job outside the home.)

While thinking this over, that “write a book” goal nagged at me. Perfect time to try. I had several hours a week that I could use to write instead of doing errands, chores, and volunteering.

So I sat down and wrote about that difficult time of my dad’s illness from the perspective of a daughter and a mom of young kids. I wrote about how you grieve early with terminal illness. I wrote about how we explained it to the kid who was old enough to understand and how we discussed it differently with the toddler. I wrote the things I learned too late about grief, citing books and programs for myself that I found after struggling for months with symptoms I hadn’t identified.

It was cathartic to write that book after I was on the other side of my grief journey.

After it was done, I said, now what should I write?

And in May 2019 the first lines of Mae’s story came out and I started writing fantasy almost daily. I haven’t stopped since and am researching agents so I can begin querying soon.

In any season of life you can make a change. You can reach for your dreams. The cover photo on my personal Facebook account is a meme that says, “Be brave enough to suck at something new.” That’s what’s I’ve been doing for the past three years.