I got the advance copies of my first novel yesterday. It was such an exciting moment to open the box and pull out the copies of the book. It is trite to say that it is thrilling to see your name in print. So I’m going to say instead that I get a little thrill when I turn the pages and see my name on the top of one page and the book title on the top of the other page.
I have talked once or twice over the years about writing a book, but I was busy with other things and I never seriously worked on it. I have always ‘written’ books in my head to put myself to sleep at night, but I didn’t take the effort to write them down. Writing imaginations down does take quite a bit more work than just exploring in your mind.
Then when I finished my dissertation and had to wait to start my post doc I unexpectedly found myself with time on my hands. I don’t do well with no occupation, so I started to write down the book. I immersed myself in the history and I got lost in the story. It got so bad that I would get out of bed in the middle of the night so that I could see what happened next in the book.
The most difficult part about writing was giving my characters big challenges. I loved my characters with all my heart and it was so hard to make their lives difficult. It would be a very boring story, and very untrue to life though to write about people for whom life always goes well. That hasn’t been my story and it isn’t the story of my characters. I wrote and re-wrote to make sure it was interesting and to allow the characters to become real people – good and bad – and above all resilient. How could I not write about resilient characters.
So now that the book is finally out – available in e-book now and in print May 15th, I hope you will enjoy the characters as much as I do.
Be First to Comment