A New Approach to an Old Manuscript

Hi, I’m Judith Ashley, author of The Sacred Women’s Circle series, soul nourishing romantic women’s fiction that honors pagan spiritual practices. My stories show you what life could be like if you had a place like The Circle where you are unconditionally accepted, supported and loved. And where, with this support, you do overcome obstacles and find your happily-ever-after.

I’ve 8 fiction books published (The Sacred Women’s Circle (7) and The Visions quartet (Visions of Happiness with 3 more down the pike). The women and men in my stories all have the kind of every-day problems many of us have. What I show in these books is how ordinary people can overcome challenges with the unconditional acceptance, support and love of a group of like-minded women and their own personal spiritual practice.

Writing these books was cathartic and healing for me. I was able to use my personal knowledge of and in some cases my personal experiences to illustrate issues such as domestic violence, single parenting, death of a spouse, cancer, self-doubt, self-criticism – well, you get the message.

How, when we are burdened with doubts and fears, can we move forward in our lives, take that chance, take that leap and for our best life, our happily-ever-after?

Sharing emotions, dreams, fears was easy when writing fictional characters. However, I have a background in Social Services and while not a social worker or therapist, I have over 50 years working in the fields of domestic and international adoption, child protective services, geriatric care management, professional guardianship, protection of vulnerable adults and I was a parenting grandmother. Lots of life experiences.

I drew heavily on my training and certification under Dr.William Glasser and have been on the senior teaching faculty of The William Glasser Institute International and am an active instructor in The Glasser Institute for Choice Theory – US. If you are familiar with Dr. Glasser’s work, you’ll see it embedded in the stories I write.

And if you aren’t familiar with his work, let me introduce you!

In addition to writing fiction, I also write non-fiction. Staying Sane in a Crazy World gives readers a blue-print to create their own Personal Staying Sane Plan.

Currently I’m getting ready to do a total rewrite of my second non-fiction, Yes, You Can Create A Life You Love. In 1979 and 1980 I created a training Love, Worth, Fun, Freedom: How To Get More. I saw small miracles happen in the lives of people who took my course through a local community college.

In 1999, I joined Wild Women Writers with the idea to turn the course into a “self-help” book. I got side-tracked and wrote my fiction books instead.

And now I’m back!

I’ve actually written the book but when one of my “first readers” commented that while the book was good, I sounded like I was giving a lecture that stopped me in my tracks. I’ve spent several months pondering how to move forward. I’ve ideas which include starting from the beginning. In other words, put the original material aside and write. When it comes to the exercises, they will be basically the same but the illustrations will be new.

Scary?

Ohhh yesss!

Why? Because that “lecture voice” while drawn from my knowledge and experiences is distance from the real me. What I am leaping off the proverbial cliff to do, is write this book from my heart, from the same place I write my fiction.

My goal is to have Yes You Can Create A Life You Love published by the end of the year. Just typing that gives me an uncomfortable feeling. Revealing my imperfect self in real life, in real time is daunting for me. And I know my book will be better for my having stepped forth and moved through “daunting”.

In the meantime, do take a look at Staying Sane. Regardless of your politics, you will find creating your Personal Staying Sane Plan a boon to get you through these coming months if not years.

You can find all of my books at your favorite e-book vendor. Be sure to ask your local library if you’d prefer to read my books through that resource.

Learn more about Judith's The Sacred Women’s Circle series at JudithAshleyRomance.com

Follow Judith on Twitter: JudithAshley19

Check out Judith’s Windtree Press author page.

You can also find Judith on FB! 

© 2020 Judith Ashley

A Funny Thing Happened...

By Robin Weaver

A couple months after my husband died, a well-meaning friend suggested a book might help—a self-pubbed collection of grief memoirs written by my friend’s friend. Somehow, I managed to don my polite face, while I inwardly cringed. And re-cringing. And cringing again.

First, nothing was going to help but time; I had accepted that. During that period, the only way I could get through my day was to play happy music and pretend my grief didn’t exist (in full disclosure, a lot of Ben & Jerry’s was also involved).  Yet this friend wanted me to read about more death? I already knew I wasn’t alone in my experience, but to this day, I don’t really understand how people think hearing about another tragedy can possibly make another person feel better.

You can relax, I’m climbing off that soapbox. 😊 But on to the next… Second, (and I repeat: “Second!”) he wanted me to read a collection of memoirs? By an untrained author? Was he nuts? Maybe my friend was trying to kill me.

Anyway, I accepted the book with a semi-smile, and promptly donated it to Goodwill.  Only a few months later, at a music festival (yes, the music actually helped 😊), I met the memoir author. And formed an instant connection. Not only because we had a shared widowhood experience, but because Mary is actually one of the coolest people alive.

Even so, I still couldn’t read her book.  My philosophy is to never intentionally do something that’s going to make me sad. And knowing the author would make Mary’s pages even sadder.

Only Mary decided to turn her Loss World Monologues into a play. And I was asked to participate.

“Say what?” It’s like these people don’t even know me. What part of I can only handle grief with humor did my friends not get? Even worse, haven’t they heard my squeaky voice?  And even though I can get loud with the best of them, squeaky voices do not project.  Not to mention my acting experience is zero.

Not being able to say, “NO,” or even no, or “I don’t think so,” I auditioned, thinking I’d finally found my way out.  Only I didn’t realize (THEN) I had a major advantage—I could memorize quickly. In hindsight, I might have flubbed a few of those lines.  More important though, I had lived through the subject matter.

Anyway… I somehow survived the three months of rehearsals; rehearsals which entailed hearing (and speaking) about the despair that follows the death of a spouse. Despair I felt but didn’t want to acknowledge. And before you ask—no, it didn’t help. After every rehearsal, I’d go home and play Bon Jovi and Def Leppard at earsplitting volume. That helped.

What did help was the lasting friendships I formed, especially with the Mary. When we were celebrating the end of a successful show, someone jokingly asked, “When are you and Mary going to write the sequel?”

I replied honestly, I can’t do this weepy, but if you want to do a comedy, I’m in?”

One of Mary’s monologues detailed her boy box—a cigar box that she used to keep the cards of guys who asked her out out after her husband died. After ten years, she had a lot of cards.

Thus, The Box Box was conceived.  😊

The ebook is scheduled for release April 9^th, and the print book will follow shortly.  If any of you in the RTG world would like to be a beta-reader and provide us some feedback, we’d love to send you a free electronic copy.

Until then… Happy Wednesday!

    What would you do if the undertaker’s son made a pass at you?

At your husband’s funeral?

    Jana Byrd stuffs the cougar-hunter’s card into a box and forgets him.

As she struggles to focus on one-day-at-a-time after her husband’s death, Jana acquires several dozen cards from wanna-be-lovers, friends-seeking benefits, and the occasional nice guy.  All the cards remain in the Boy Box, until Jana’s friends decide they should all date again and decide to draw names from the box.

    Forty-something Jana scoffs at the idea of seeing other men.  She’s still in love with her five-years gone soulmate and chats with him daily.  

Her BFF Nanette Meeks is equally appalled by the dating scheme.  How can she possibly date again after her ex-husband divorced her to marry his bimbette-a mousy little thing barely out of her teens?  What man can be trusted? Other than her former spouse’s younger brother?

    Faith Chanton, a former Miss Georgia and jet-setting preacher’s widow, refuses to be thwarted by her friend’s dating resistance.  She demands the four ladies draw cards from the Boy Box and “get back out there.”

The hot blonde, with loads of charisma and an even bigger bank account, shouldn’t need a Boy Box card to have men worshipping at her temple.  Only the man she seeks doesn’t exist – one who walks on water and is deliciously devilish in the dark.

    Faith’s dating enthusiasm is buoyed by Sapphire Bellona, the youngest of the group.  She exudes the overconfidence that only occurs at age twenty-eight, and believes she can have any man she wants. Sapphire is continually mystified when date number two never happens.

    Only nothing is as it seems.  Will the friendships endure as the four women start the arduous journey of dating after death, divorce and bra fat?

My Sanctuaries and Safe Havens: Writing and Spiritual Practices

By Judith Ashley

Writing has been a refuge, a safe haven for me since I started writing fiction in 2002. At that point, I didn’t even have a writing process nor did I have any idea of things like genres or tropes.

What I did have were stories that infiltrated my night and day dreams. Scenes so real I could hear, see, smell and taste the people and food in the stories. My body recognized the emotions of my characters so I laughed and I cried. My jaw clenched, my stomach churned, my lungs seized right along with my characters. And when all seemed lost, the prayers for strength, for guidance, for protection appeared on the page.

The Sacred Women’s Circle series shows the power of spiritual practices to support us on our life’s journey.

What do we do when we are no longer comforted by the religious customs in which we were raised?

Like myself, my characters created their own spiritual path. They took bits and pieces from the religions they grew up with that still brought them peace. But they went a step further and created their own path. Because they are all equal in this sacred circle, they respected each other’s individual practice while forming The Circle’s foundational traditions.

As you read their stories, you’ll see the differences between them, what they rely on during difficult times. You will also have a road map if you want to create your own sacred circle.

What’s the difference between a sacred women’s circle and a women’s circle? Answer this question and you’ll know:

What would your life be like if you were unconditionally accepted, unconditionally supported and unconditionally loved?

What happened to me when I first talked to traditional publishers about my series? The feedback I got that was consistent was that I needed to build conflict in The Circle. In other words, the women had to have disagreements between them. A good old-fashioned fight, with members taking sides, etc. I was told there wasn’t a market for a story where women got along, believed in each other, supported, accepted and encouraged each other. All stories needed conflict. The reality that each of the women had a major life conflict going on in their personal life outside The Circle wasn’t enough.

Stonehenge

The good thing about that feedback is that I stopped and really took a look at my stories. The core principle or foundation in a sacred women’s circle is that we will always be accepted, always be safe no matter what. The Circle is our Haven, our Sanctuary, our place to rest, to heal, to restore ourselves before going forth to do battle in the world once again.

What battles do these women face? Domestic violence, recurrent breast cancer, spousal abandonment, custodial interference aka child stealing, death of a spouse, conflicted core values, etc. Most of us have dealt with these issues or know someone who has. With that assessment my choice was clear. I became an Indie Published Author.

So I ask again: What would your life be like if, when facing one of these major life events, you had a place where you were unconditionally accepted, unconditionally supported and unconditionally loved?

My large crystal altar

One of my 2019 goals is to spend more time reaching out to those people who’d like to experience being in that space. What that means is claiming the Pagan Spiritual practices that are an integral part of each book.

Yes, my heroine’s find their happily-ever-after but what’s as important is they come to rely on, to find strength in their spiritual practices and their relationships with each other. That’s why I write what I believe is best called Contemporary Romantic Women’s Fiction or for even more clarity: Contemporary Romantic Pagan Women’s Fiction.

Another of my 2019 goals is to change out the Keywords, etc. on the on-line vendors and my website by the end of January 2019 to more clearly reflect the Pagan Inspirational theme in my books.

Also on my 2019 radar is publishing Ceremonies, Prayers and Resources. CPS is a short booklet of the prayers and ceremonies from this series as well as Visions of Ireland (working title) which is the 9^th book in the series. And if all falls into place, I’ll have the 10^th book at least in draft form or actually published before the end of this year.

What suggestions do you have for the best way to let people know about my books? And, do contact me at Judith@JudithAshleyRomance.com if you are interested in my doing presentations or workshops on the various practices and concepts included in these stories.

Judith Ashley is the author of The Sacred Women’s Circle series, romantic women’s fiction that honors pagan spiritual practices that nourish the soul. The Circle is the haven where each heroine has the support of the others to sustain them as they overcome obstacles and find their happily-ever-after.

Learn more about Judith's The Sacred Women’s Circle series at JudithAshleyRomance.com

Follow Judith on Twitter: JudithAshley19

Check out Judith’s Windtree Press author page.

You can also find Judith on FB! 

© 2019 Judith Ashley

Paradise Regained in a Book!

By: Marcia King-Gamble

www.lovemarcia.com

As readers, yes, and as writers, we love being turned on to work we might not be familiar with. I know I do.  Introduce me to a new author, and I just might fall in love with them. I’m here today to give kudos and loud shout outs to a talented author I’m proud to call my friend. He’s a writer I know you will enjoy.

The irony of this is that I’ve known this man for what seems forever, and yet I had never read his work. He is one of the kindest and most articulate men I have yet to meet, also smart and well-respected in his field.  It was only happenstance that provided me with an opportunity to read his work.

It was at my local Romance Writers holiday party last December that I had the opportunity to pick up a copy of his book for free. He’d brought several promotional copies of his work to hand out.  I of course snagged a book.  Enthusiastic reader that I am, there are times that meeting a deadline simply gets in the way of me keeping up with books being released.

But this time I was bent and determined to read my friend’s book from cover to cover. I am always intrigued to see if an author’s personality or quirks make their way into their books. Besides, this was a man I greatly admired. 

Book in hand, off I went to my bi-monthly pedicure, knowing fully well that I would have no choice than to be a captive audience.  It would be read the book, or read magazines in Vietnamese.  The former would win out.  I was guaranteed to get through at least the first two chapters without interruptions.

From page one, I was immediately pulled into the story, because in many ways it reminded me of The Thorn Birds. Sadly, when my pedicure ended, I did not want to say goodbye to the characters. That hasn’t happened for quite some time.  But it wasn’t just the storyline that pulled me in, it was the magical writing and the vivid imagery. Now don’t get me wrong, there were disappointing times, and frustrating times when the women made choices I would never have made. But I had to keep in mind this was the sixties, and women weren’t as independent, or liberated, nor did they have the choices they have today.

Now for the title and author.   The book is the Magdalen Girls and it’s written by V. S. Alexander.

The story is set in a convent in Dublin. The year is 1962, and the nuns are running the Magdalen Laundries, staffed by allegedly fallen girls sent there to rehabilitate. Many of these young girls only sin was being so pretty they tempted a man.  

 Here’s what some readers had to say about The Magdalen Girls:

“This book is worth reading. Great story about the Magdalen laundries in Ireland. The characters are great, and the story has a lot of twists and turns. What makes it good is the story is based on true facts.”

“I was lucky enough to win copies of this book for one of my book groups. It tells a fascinating story about Dublin’s convent of The Sisters of the Holy where “problem” girls were sent to live. Society was harsh, and sometimes the girls really hadn’t done anything wrong like one of the protagonists, Teagan Tiernan, whose only sin was being a beauty. Her beauty attracted the attention of a new priest who lusted after her. After his confession to the bishop, the bishop feared a scandal might follow. To prevent anything from advancing, he went to Teagan’s family and made arrangements for Teagan to be sent there.” 

About the Author:

V.S. Alexander is an ardent student of history with a strong interest in music and the visual arts. Some of V.S.’s writing influences include Shirley Jackson, Oscar Wilde, Daphne du Maurier, or any work by the exquisite Brontë sisters.  He also writes under the pseudonym of Vincent Wilde. Hs latest release is The Taster.

Pick up your copies of The Magdalen Girls and/or The Taster. Both are Kensington publications and can be purchased on Amazon or Barnes and Noble or on the author’s website. https://michaelmeeske.com/           

You’re in for a treat.

About Marcia King-Gamble

Romance writer, Marcia King-Gamble originally hails from a sunny Caribbean island where the sky and ocean are the same mesmerizing shade of blue. This former travel industry executive and current world traveler has spent most of life in the United States. A National Bestselling author, Marcia has penned over 34 books and 8 novellas. Her free time is spent at the gym, traveling to exotic locales, and caring for her animal family.

Visit Marcia at www.lovemarcia.com or “friend” her on Facebook: http://bit.ly/1MlnrIS

Her Latest release with co-author Sandra Kitt is titled By Design.

  

New Year Musing by Bonnie Hobbs

                                        

I woke up with a word bouncing gently in my mind. I didn’t hear it, I saw it, as is often the case. Vicissitudes. Big word for such an early hour, but here at the beginning of a new year, I’m thinking about life’s ups and down, that ol’ taking our knocks, reeling with blows, but more often, just sliding along.

Bonnie Hobbs

We dance a kind of two-step. You know, one step forward, two steps back and slide, slide, slide. The dance of writing goes that way for me. Advance, retreat, make progress, delete whole scenes, and lately, with seven manuscripts in various ways “completed,” I seem to be sliding sideways with most of them – rewriting, revising, resubmitting. Yet some steps in this dance have been the high-stepping kind. One book was released by Wild Rose Press last March, and two more accepted by Five Star Publishing. (Can I say this without signed contracts in hand? Or is that a sure way to invite the wrath of jealous writing goddesses?)

So maybe this coming year will bring less downs in work and life and more ups, when words come swimming into my brain on awakening, as today. So, a new year, filled with what is yet to come.

In that light, let me leave with a story about life’s surprises, shall I? Throughout my childhood my rough-talking Texas grandma filled me with stories of living on the plains. Born in 1896, married at sixteen, her girl-hood and young wife’s memories stirred my imagination—living in a “soddy,” fending off rattlers with a buggy whip, cooking on a wood-stove for twenty men at round-up time, all with a toddler to mind and a baby on her hip.

Often I now think she told the stories in an attempt to tell us, when we were whiny little monsters, to “get over ourselves.” I have even wondered lately if she made many of those stories up. They’ve been sprinkled into much of my writing, that’s for sure. I wish I’d pressured her for more before she died in 1976. Is it any wonder my stories are Women’s Frontier fiction set in the American West?

Ah, but the surprise I promised—Grandma always told us how her great-grandma was Cherokee. I scoffed as a know-it-all college girl, telling her “everyone from Texas claims Indian descent, Grandma.” Well, she’d only glare at me with squinted eyes.

Last year, feeling sentimental about Grandma, I spat in Ancestry.com’s handy tube to find out just how much of this “Indian” blood I carried. Well—wait for it. My ancestors are mostly from the British Isles. No surprise. And Grandma was right in a way. I do indeed carry a small percentage of “Indian” DNA. Yep. From the Asian subcontinent. Huh? One can only guess at the when and wherefore of the co-mingling of such genetic material. (I, of course, plan to be putting this in a short story.)

So what would Grandma say to that? Something like “pshaw!” Again, she’d be glaring at me. But I can only chuckle at life’s vicissitudes and say, “Namaste, Grandma, many blessings upon you and thank you so very much for the stories.”

Learn more about Bonnie on her website.

I Left My Youth at the Bottom of Mirror Lake

By Courtney Pierce

I write comedy with a literary flair. My humor side flows from years of real-life gaffs, colorful relationships, and embarrassing situations. But the literary side of me germinated in the bud of youth, when my imagination was free and untethered. One of those literary awakenings took place in 1968 at Mirror Lake, a picture-perfect oasis tucked beyond the trees in Tuftenboro, New Hampshire. This was―and still is―a special place, not only for its secluded beauty but for the snapshot of time it holds in its waters. 

I was nine.

My sisters and I spent summers at my grandparents’ farm in Tuftenboro, without television, computers, or retail stores to distract us. Dad stayed behind in Boston for work. Mom needed a summer break too. Days were quiet. Nights were dark. Sporadic sightings of the Northern Lights decorated the blackness like a lava lamp. The phone in the dining room was one of those hand-crank models mounted on the dining room wall, the kind where you still had to tell a nosy woman your business before connecting. Armed with Nancy Drew books, a portable 8-track player with a radio, a rubber mask, and a snorkel tube, I started a summer sprinkled with Miracle-Gro.

I spent nearly every day at Mirror Lake, about a two-mile glide in my grandfather’s butter-yellow Impala convertible. Tapes of John Denver and Judy Collins held a revered place in the tote of survival gear. My two-year-old sister remained with Mom; my twelve-year-old sister was who knew where. Parental supervision was . . . well . . . non-existent.

June started with morning dew and chilly breezes that gave me goosebumps until the midday sun warmed the sand. The call and answer of loons echoed in the trees. The woodsy scent of evergreens, maples, and birches wreathed the lazy waves that shimmered like Christmas tinsel. Minnows gathered at my feet in water so clear that I could make out the details of tiny spots on their bodies. They’d scatter on my trek to toward the steep drop, where I'd stop before the water turned cold. Here I remained, unaware of Cold Wars, race riots, love-ins, and sit-ins.

In July, my imagination bloomed as the water warmed to the temperature of a tepid bath. I became a treasure hunter, hoping to be the first to spot the glint of a magic coin, catch the sparkle of a lost diamond, or discover a new species of lake-dweller. But my most astonishing find in the sand was a pair of flowered underpants. At first, I thought the discovery somewhat gross. But they became an awakening.

By August, my lake fantasies swirled with questions of what touch beneath the warm water would do to my skin, fueled by my curiosity of how those darned underpants got to the lake bottom. John Denver crooned about “Rocky Mountain highs” to ignite my inner detective. At the drugstore in Wolfeboro, I bought a bottle Skinny Dip cologne to splash myself with lemony fragrance before wading into the lake. The water carried the scent of me. My long blond hair stretched and floated, weightless like a Breck shampoo commercial. I pictured myself with soft body curves awaiting invisible hands. New. Delicious. And completely consuming.

By the end of that summer, the leaves had started to turn. Yellow discs fluttered to the sand like mini parachutes, as if I, too, were jumping out of a plane without my youth as a tandem partner. I never left those fantasies behind. 

We fiction writers pepper our prose with real moments, secret ones that reveal our innermost thoughts of a moment in time. That’s why Mirror Lake, and the memories that lurk in its depths, made it into Chapter 16 of my new novel Indigo Lake. I revisited that experience through my fifty-seven-year-old character, Olivia Novak.

I’ve often wondered how many pairs of underpants were shed in Mirror Lake. I know of at least two that are still embedded in the sand: the flowered ones I found when I was nine, and the red polka-dot numbers I left there six years later. I wore Skinny Dip. He wore Brut.

Courtney Pierce is a fiction writer living in Oregon with her husband of thirty-seven years and bossy cat. She writes for baby boomers. Her novels are filled with heart, humor, and mystery. Courtney has studied craft and storytelling at the Attic Institute and has completed the Hawthorne Fellows Program for writing and publishing. She is also a board member of the Northwest Independent Writers Association and is active with Willamette Writers, Pacific Northwest Writers Association, She Writes, and Sisters in Crime. Her books have received the Self-E library selection seal of excellence.

Colorful characters come alive in Courtney's latest trilogy about the Dushane sisters The first entry, The Executrix, tells the story of three middle-age sisters who find a manuscript for a murder mystery in their mother's safe after her death. The book gives them a whole new view of their mother. Is it fiction? . . . or truth? Sibling blood becomes thicker than baggage when Mom becomes larger in death than she was in life.

Indigo Lake, the second helping of the Dushane Sisters Trilogy, is due next month in March, 2016. More laughs, more tears . . . and more trouble. Protecting Mom's reputation might get the sisters killed―or give one of them the story she's been dying to live.

Visit Courtney's website at courtney-pierce.com. Her books can be purchased at Windtree Press, Amazon, Barnes and Noble, Kobo Books, and at several independent bookstores in the Portland area.

Let Me Introduce Myself by Kristin Wallace

Hello to all the authors and readers on Romancing the Genres. My name is Kristin Wallace, a USA Today Bestselling Author, and I just joined RTG at the start of the year. Rather than jump in with a theme-topic post, I thought it might be a great idea to tell you a little about me by interviewing… myself.

Kristin: How about we start with some personal stuff?

Kristin the Author: As I said, I’m Kristin Wallace, and I live in Miami, Florida. I have a BA in Theatre from Florida State University, and a Masters in Advertising Copywriting from Miami Ad School. Copywriting has been my “day job” for over 15 years. I’ve worked on accounts like the Miami Marlins, Sir Pizza, Sea World, Discovery Networks, The Peabody Hotel, plus a lot of hospitals and health-related topics. Last May I left the full-time job and I’m currently writing books and doing freelance copywriting through my company, Write Notions, Inc. 

When I’m not working on a book or an advertising project, I sing in my church choir and play the flute in a community orchestra. I am a member of Romance Writers of America and my local chapter, Florida Romance Writers of which I was the president TWICE. 

Kristin: Can you tell us a little about what you write?

Kristin the Author: Yes, I would love to. I write inspirational romance, sweet contemporary romance, and women’s fiction filled with “Love, Laughter and a Leap of Faith”. (That’s my author tagline). I have to include lots of humor in my books so you’ll find great, snarky heroines with lots of sass. I have drama and some tears, too, but I just can’t do 300+ pages of angst. I also love writing stories with positive messages of healing, forgiveness and a forever love. 

Kristin: What have you written so far? How many books do you have published?

Kristin the Author: I have 5 published novels and 1 novella. I have two series going right now. Covington Falls Chronicles is my inspirational series. These are funny, sweet & poignant tales set in a fictional Southern town. The other series is a women’s fiction/romance set in a fictional town in Florida (yes I like fictional towns so I can make everything up) called Shellwater Key Tales.

Kristin: When did you first know you wanted to be a writer?

Kristin the Author: I had the great epiphany that I was supposed to be a writer when I was about 25. I had always been a voracious reader, and had dabbled with writing, but suddenly I knew it was what I had to do. Unfortunately, I had no idea what to do so I got nowhere. I ended up putting the writing aside to go back to school (to study copywriting). I graduated and worked for several years before realizing the writing bug hadn’t gone away. I tried again…and in 2013 I published my first book, MARRY ME.

Kristin: You said you were a voracious reader…what were your favorite books? And who are your favorite authors now?

Kristin the Author: I devoured  books. The Little House series, Encyclopedia Brown, Nancy Drew, Judy Blume, the Chronicles of Narnia. Later, I started reading the Sweet Valley High books. Eventually, I discovered romance novels and it was a true love affair.

As for books I like now…Just like I write with lots of humor, I love to read humor. I adore Susan Elizabeth Phillips, Kristan Higgans, Jill Shalvis, and Rachel Gibson. I’m also a big fan of historical romance and I love Julia Quinn, Loretta Chase, Julie Anne Long, and Sarah MacLean.

Kristin: What are you working on right now?

Kristin the Author: I’m working on Book 1.5 of the Shellwater Key Tales series that I hope to publish in March. It’s a tie-in to book one, basically the same story from another character’s POV. I’m also working on a completely new contemporary series. It is also set in Florida. It’s about this heiress (who has never married or had children) who dies and leaves her fortune to her pet pig. She chooses three women who are the descendants of the family and they must compete for custody of the pig (and the money, of course). Right now I’m calling the series, The Heiress Games.

Kristin: How can we find out more about your books? And how can people connect with you?

Kristin the Author: For books info, check out my website: Kristin Wallace Author

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