Why Did You Start Writing?

Whenever I’m reading a good book, I love to turn to the author’s bio and see what it is that drove them to write the book in the first place.

Some people write their whole lives, from childhood onwards. They find their passion for words at early age and their imaginations outlet through the creation of stories.

Others write about a life related revelation that they wanted to share. There are teachers and professionals that finally decide to sit down and write that book they’ve had in mind before their careers took over.

My reason for writing sounds pretty bland in comparison.I started writing for one reason and one reason only-

I ran out of books to read.

My whole life I’ve been a cronic binge-reader. From those early experiences where I discovered our school had an entire room of books.

In middle grade, I spent entire summers working (for free) at our town library and entering reading contests. I devoured whole series of Sweet Valley High and The BabySitters Club, not to mention most of RL Stines more gruesome endeavors. (Goosebumps was for wimps)

Early teens brought on Christopher Pike and LJ Smith, and any other paranormal YA I could get my hands on. I read and read and read until one day…..I had read everything our library had to offer. (We lived in a small town - an old Victorian from the historical district doubling as the library)

There was no amazon.com back then. I scanned the bookshelves at the ‘Waldenbooks’. (No Borders or Barnes & Nobles had arrived in town either)

And so, at fourteen, I decided to write my own frick’n book. I needed the escape and if I couldn’t read it, I’d write it.

It was easier than I thought. Years of absorbing hundreds of books made it easy to scan my mental files and pull out vocabulary that I had never even used in real life. I wrote two books over that summer. I didn’t complete either of them and they both topped out at about 60 pages. But whenever I needed a ‘fix’, I’d go back to them and get lost in the story I created. It was almost as fun as reading.

As most of you know, I live in France. For the first few years, motherhood took up most of my time. But two years ago, I went an another ‘book binge’, reading everything our local ‘entertainment & music’ store had to offer. Which, in English, wasn’t much.

What do you think happened when I ran out of books to read?

Yes sah. Here I am. Again.

This time it’s different.

Writing is a craft I always took for granted and only now am I really learning the dynamics that goes into creating top notch work.

All my life I’ve been blessed with a variety of gifts, with the exception of one-

Ambition.

My parents were professional musicians and blessed me with a natural ear for music and a singing voice that makes my mother weep. But did I ever think of pursuing it? Hell No. Just singing with the school choir was tiresome and I had nasty stage fright.

I was insanely flexible and athletic and enrolled in gymnastics from a very young age. As soon as the schedule had me going every day after school, I quit. Nadia could keep her freak’n medal.

I was prima ballerina in all our community ballet recitals. Not once did I ever think- ‘This is what I want to do with my life!’

I changed majors in college four times. - Four. Times. Education, Art History, Music, French- I couldn’t decide and I didn’t care. I loved learning about all my interests equally.

But with writing? I’ve finally found something worth fighting for. I not only love it, but I’m constantly striving to improve- like an Olympic medalist training for the finals.

I’ve finally found my ‘thing’- that elusive Ambition.
And I’m not going to let it go.

Why did you start writing?