Welcome ...

As a young child, I did not particularly like to read. I could read and I did read, but reading a book just wasn't as interesting as the other things I could be doing. Why stay inside reading a book when I could run around my Parent's one acre mini-farm playing all manner of role-playing games, or make mud pies, or swing on the swing set, or even watch Pete's Dragon and The Secret of Nimh?

Then I hit adolescence. My friend gave me "Jayhawk" by Dorothy Keddington to read. See, her mother was a regular romance reader, and had offered Keddington's books to her girls as good, adolescent appropriate reads.

Anyway, I'd never read a romance before and I was enthralled. I'd never connected to a character the way I connected to the heroine. Written in first person, I was really able to experience the slow and satisfying progression of meeting, attraction, first touch, and first kiss with all the little events and happenings along the way. There was suspense and danger in just the right portions. She carried the story to a satisfying, all-issues-resolved end, and I was forever hooked. Turns out I didn't dislike reading, but rather that I require a good character-driven romance plot to make reading interesting to me.

I don't think I even waited a day before trying to find the other two books that Keddington had published by that time - "Shadow Song" and "Return to Red Castle". Both were as good, if not better, than "Jayhawk". I was truly inspired.

It wasn't long after that I started writing my first story. Characters of my own were clamoring in my mind and I wanted to create for others the same kind of wonderful experience that she had created for me. That is a desire that stays with me today, a desire that keeps me writing even when my brain is fried and my mood is anything but romantic.

As an adult, the value of a well-written romance novel was proven again when I was pregnant with my first child. I was sick, sick, sick and I couldn't do all the get-up and move-around stuff that I had before. I was miserable and reading became my coping mechanism, my escape. I can't list all the authors that helped me get through that time - the list would be too long.

After I delivered that baby and started trying to write again, I sought out Sherry Lewis for help and for information that I lacked. She taught me things, both amazing and daunting things, about character arc, conflict, point of view, and plot. I am inspired by her and Reese and Jo Ann every day. They keep me Writing the Damn Book!