Welcome!

This is my first official blog post on my new website as an author. Eek! It feels very weird and my overall internal narrative is screaming 'imposter'! I know this is a very normal, human emotion to feel when a new thing is started or even attempted.

However, I haven't felt like I could call myself an actual author until I had an agent and a book that was published by a legitimate publishing house and available at retailers everywhere. Lol! I know, so many caveats when the reality is... I wrote a book, 75000 words in a document that together, tell a story.

This whole writing a book endeavor started with a tiny seed planted about six or seven years ago. My husband and I went through this really good book called "The 5 Book: Where Will You Be Five Years From Today?" It's a series of questions meant to help you dig deep into your goals and aspirations for the future. I was a little skeptical about it as I didn't feel like I had much to even aim for at that time.

I'd stayed home to raise our littles for several years and when my youngest was two years old, I started flipping houses. I was decent at it, always turning a profit and always able to see in my mind's eye what a space could look like if I knocked down a wall or two. My husband, lacking in spacial intelligence, chose to trust me whenever I handed him a sledge hammer and asked him to knock something down. He really couldn't see what I envisioned but as I was the boss and he was just my lackey for the wall tearing down chore, he did as he was told. He'd do his work and then I was left to my own devices, only showing up to sign papers when the houses sold.

It was fun for awhile. I did a project a year and then took some time to do all the playdates and little kid activities my youngest enjoyed. But the projects I really wanted to take on, the ones that would let my creativity get some breathing room meant more risk, more money than we were comfortable putting on the table and my enthusiasm started to fizzle.

Now back to that goals book! I remember going through it, feeling somewhat directionless. And then I came to this question. "What would you do, if you were guaranteed not to fail?" Without even a pause to wonder about it, I wrote down... I'd write a novel. And my answer took me by surprise, like where had that come from? And yet, it rung true in my bones.

I've been a book lover my whole life, always reading about the authors of my favorite books and I remember noticing that a lot of the books I loved hadn't been written by women who studied English Literature in college. They were writers who'd worked in corporate accounting for twenty years or practiced law and then took a leap of faith on a story. They were women who'd discovered later in their lives that they had stories to tell. That was me. I didn't know it until I'd answered that question. (This is where I have to thank my husband for being the guy who wants to do goal setting sessions together. He bought the book and made me do it with him.)

So that was the seed planted. I bravely told a couple of friends what I wanted to do and slowly, a story started to take shape in my mind. My friend Rachael repeatedly asked me if I'd started yet and I kept telling her 'no' so she bought me a book about how to add tension to a story and how to keep a reader engaged and it was that book that gave me the courage to start. I remember sitting down in my favorite chair, opening a new Word document and thinking... okay, how does a book start? How does my book start?

The beginning of 'When Everything Fell Apart" is very different from the first words I wrote on my first try. In fact, my entire book has been re-written in so many ways over the last couple of years. I finally finished editing the current version a week ago and I feel ready. I'm as ready as I'll ever get for the rejection I can expect from literary agents as I send out queries for my work. All I need is one who'll believe in me! I'm ready to tell you that I wrote a book and I feel proud of myself not only for sticking to it but also, for finishing it. And then editing it. And then asking for feedback that hurt my feelings (for real!). And then rewriting and adjusting and asking for more feedback.

So yeah, imposter syndrome or not, this is how I got here. I'm a brand new author and I'd like to welcome you to my blog!