***Originally posted 10-23-13


When I was in radio, I did a little writing here and there for scripts and other such things, but I missed long form writing.  In college, it was fine because I had plenty of papers to write, but once I graduated and started my career, I didn't have that creative outlet anymore and I needed it.  I tell people that the prologue for "Someone Always Love You" was something that came to me and bugged me.  It actually kept me awake at night, begging to be written.

So, one day, on a break from work, I sat down and wrote it out.  I felt better!  But the story was there and though I didn't know what it was, exactly, I HAD to finish it.  It deserved that much.  I had never written a novel before, but that was exactly what I set forth to do.

I honestly had no idea what was going to happen in the book.  The main idea was based around a woman in a coma.  My grandmother was in a coma on two separate occasions and I always wondered if she could hear the people around her...if she had thoughts, dreams, or other things going on in her mind.  Though I don't know what really happens in people's minds when they are in comas, the story is based on my idea of what it might be.

What came to me for the prologue was HOW the woman gets thrown into the coma in the first place.  From that point on, I really had no idea what was going to happen.  I wanted her to have memories of her life and I wanted her to hear some of the things going on around her.  What those memories would be and what those items she would overhear would be were  up in the air.  I literally just sat down a wrote.

Characters began to form and with them, an intricate story line of love, family ties, tragedy, mishaps and many other elements came.  Somehow, it all came together and I completed the manuscript in a little over a month.  I had no idea what to call it and no idea what to do with it.

My mom helped me arrive at the title of "Someone Always Loved You" and I approached agents and publishers and so on.  Though a few asked for more chapters, no one took the bait and I pushed the novel to the side and went on with everyday life.

Years later, my husband "published" the novel in ebook form as a present to me.  I went on to self-publish is in paperback form for fun as well.  I hope to go back and polish the book a bit more someday now that I know a little more what I am doing.  I also took the first few chapters to a writing conference in 2012 and won a contest with them.


Someone Always Loved You"Someone Always Loved You" is still one of the favorite stories I have ever written.  I feel like a part of me is in every single character and the story is something that I will never let go of completely.  Though I have not done all that much with it, somehow, people have been finding it online.

Just the other day, I visited the amazon link for the ebook version of the book in order to grab the link and send it to someone.  I noticed that there were reviews posted on the book!  I was surprised and excited to read them.  There are four reviews posted.  The first one I asked a reviewer to write and it is a three star review, though everything they said about the book is favorable.  The other three reviews are completely unsolicited and I was shocked to see there are all five star reviews.

You can read all of the reviews here, but here's what one reviewer said:

This book was amazing! The story was not what I had expected at all. The twist and turns it took certainly made me want to finish the book. Each character had their own distinctive personalities and I am not sure who was my favorite. The title goes hand in hand with the storyline. I would certainly recommend this book to anyone who enjoys reading the unexpected.

Reading what complete strangers thought gave me hope that someday, more people will enjoy the story that I enjoyed writing more than you can imagine.  It's a story I will never forget and never completely move past.  It haunted my until I wrote it and though I feel better now that it's out of my system, there will be no ridding of it completely.  And for that I am thankful.

***Originally posted 10-2-13
**Note, see "Freelance Writing" section of website for details


When I left radio after 12 years, I really didn't know what I was going to do.  I knew it was time to leave and I desperately wanted to work from home, but doing what...I didn't know.  Since I loved writing so much, it only made sense that I do something that involved writing.  I am so thankful for the internet and the possibilities is has opened up for me.




I started searching for writing jobs and looking at random websites and applying for even more random jobs.  I found a few here and there including thecontentauthority.com.  I applied to be a writer and was accepted after some trial articles.  However, I had to start at a low pay and prove myself.  Eventually, I moved up the ranks and get a higher rate.  Websites like these are great because you can go to a huge job board and look at the topics that are needed.  You choose one you think you can write about, write the article, and send it off.  Then, if the client on the other end likes it, they can add you as a favorite writer.  They can directly order things from you later and the good part about that is, you get to set the price on those.  I have written enough articles for enough people that I rarely take jobs from job boards anymore.  Usually, I work on the direct orders I have from the variety of sites I've been on.

After I found a few little things, I hit the jackpot when I ran across freelancewritinggigs.com.  This website posts writing job leads every morning at about 7am.  Some of the jobs are for specific locations and others are virtual, meaning they can be done from anywhere.  I would look at the jobs that could be done anywhere and see if I fit the bill.  If I did, I applied.  I have to be honest, I didn't hear back from most of them.  But the ones I DID get ended up being great.




The freelance website led me to Interact Marketing, another writing website with a job board.  Once I was accepted there, I could take jobs in a variety of topics at a variety of price levels.  Again, if the client liked me, they could add me as a favorite and order work from me later.  I got two great contacts and regular clients from this website.  One ordered from me nearly daily until my second daughter was born.  That client didn't pay great and since my time went kaput, I kind of stopped on those jobs.  The second client was Goodbye Crutches and I still write for them today.  In fact, I write usually 5 blogs a week for them.  They call me their award winning writer and most of the blogs they post are my writing.




From the freelance website, I also got connected to a guy who offered book reviews to authors.  Though he no longer works in that business, he still has me on his list and sometimes, authors contact me directly for reviews and such.  Honest reviews only!!

So, as a freelance writer, I write a little of everything.  I write about how to get around on crutches, how to cook, how to deal with kids and anything else you can think of.  To get an idea of what I do for that client, visit their blog here.  They are my current, most regular client and I work with them weekly.  The rest of my jobs come and go.  Right now, I'm working with a client who wants product description type things for hundreds of study guides, flash cards and other related items.  Yes, I said hundreds.  :)

When people ask what I write about and how I find the information, it's hard to answer.  One day, I can write about how to recover from foot surgery and the next day I'm writing about how to fight a speeding ticket in a certain state.  It really depends day to day and that's one of the things I love about it.  If I wrote the same stuff all of the time, I'd probably go nuts.  Or maybe not...because that's how much I love writing.

The one thing I've learned about my own personal freelance writing style is that I should never accept a job I know I can't complete.  I don't want to put too much on my plate and not be able to deliver.  I have also learned that I generally underestimate myself as to what I can get done in a short amount of time.  But I think that's better than overselling and not coming through.

If I never did anything else but write articles for people who need them for their websites, newsletters or wherever else, I think I'd be pretty happy.  I'm thrilled to now have success in the fiction writing world as well.  I'm looking forward to the release of "Wrong Place, Right Time" in December 2014 and I hope I can announce many more book release dates in the future.  In the meantime, there's an article on marketing automated systems waiting for my attention....

****Originally posted 9-18-13


It's hard not to blame failure on other people.  It really seems to be their fault at times.  After all, those reviewers don't know a good thing when they read it, right?  Neither do the publishers...or the agents or anyone else who has read it.  I used to have that attitude as well until I realized that the biggest thing that stood between me and success was really me.It's true that reviewers can be downright mean.  Sometimes it's hard to find someone that loves your book as much as you do.  It can be near impossible to find an agent that believes in you or a publisher that will take notice of your work.  But the one guarantee that I found is that if you don't try, you will NEVER find success.


Someone Always Loved YouWhen I wrote my first novel, "Someone Always Loved You," I got shot down by dozens of agents and I have to admit, I got discouraged.  I figured my book wasn't as good as I thought it was and it would be my first and last attempt at writing a novel.  Then I stuffed down the desire to write and went about my normal, every day life.

The problem was I had been bitten by the writing bug at a young age and when you catch that particular disease, there isn't much you can do to get rid of the desire to write.  Eventually, I HAD to write again and I made a career out of freelance writing gigs for a number of different companies.  Oh boy did I write the articles and web content!  If you have any interest in cabinet refinishing, traveling to Florida, bathroom remodeling or a variety of other topics it's quite possible you've read some of my work.  I enjoyed freelance writing, but my true passion has always been fiction.  The problem was that I was standing between me and success.  I wouldn't allow myself to try again because I might fail.  What was the point?

When I wrote my second novel, "Beyond the Bars" I was inspired much in the same manner as with "Someone Always Loved You."  I started it because I had the first chapter in my head and it wouldn't go away.  Once I had the first chapter down, I HAD to finish it.  Once "Beyond the Bars" was complete I again approached agents.  This time, I got many "send me more" requests and I felt like I was really close to securing an agent a few times.

I got between myself and success again because I once again gave up.  This time, I don't fully blame myself, but also my situation...motherhood.  I had a second daughter and simply didn't have time to spend on emails to agents.  When I had free time, I wanted to be writing.  And so I wrote "God in the Kitchen," "Taxi Delivery" and so on and so forth.




Because of my freelance writing success, I got into contact with Blue Ribbon Books, an online book publisher who ended up taking four of my novels, three short ones and one full length.  All of those novels are published online and I felt very happy about that.  I was paid upfront and don't receive any royalties from those books.  When I sold the books I didn't care.  I got paid to write, I was happy.  Now I realize that was just me standing between me and my success again.  Had I held out, who knows what I could have done with those particular stories.  They are still dear to my heart and they are still part of my work, but I have to let them go now.

When I wrote "Wrong Place, Right Time" I vowed to really do something with it.  It was my first attempt at a true romance story and I really wanted it to go somewhere.  I initially submitted it to a specific publisher and was determined to wait until I heard from them.  My impatience got the best of me when I didn't hear anything at all long past the time length they specified.  Since I didn't have time to query a bunch of agents and get a bunch more 'nos' I went straight to a publisher that took manuscripts directly from authors and I got the answer I had always wanted.  YES.  WE WANT IT.

It would have been easy to sell the story outright to another outlet and just let it go.  It would have been easy to keep it on my desktop as something that could have been.  It would have been easy to print it out for family and friends to oo and ah over.  But as an author, I have finally learned that when I take the easy road, that is simply my way of standing in between me and my success.

I hope I have learned from my past.  I hope that when "Wrong Place, Right Time" comes out in December 2014 I won't stand in my own way any longer.  I'm not very tall.  Perhaps I could at least jump over myself....  That's a thought for another day. :)

***Originally posted 8-3-13

As an author I get a lot of questions. How do I come up with ideas? Where do I get character qualities and names? How in the world do I type so fast? Today, for my first blog post on the new website, I am going to answer one question…why I write in the first place.I was in radio for 12 years and when I was VERY pregnant with my first daughter, everyone at the station knew I was going on maternity leave soon and I would not be coming back full time. In fact, I would be part time and only in a small way. One gal said to me before I left, “You’ll be back.” I gave her a look as I tried to figure out what she meant. Was she trying to be encouraging by saying that I wouldn’t be away from the ‘real working world’ forever? She continued on upon seeing my confusion. “Once you’re bitten by the radio bug, there’s no way to ever leave the business for good.”

I answered her quickly, saying the only thing that made sense to me. “But I’ve never been bitten!” I replied. It’s true, there were a lot of things I enjoyed and even loved about radio. Putting together a commercial or imaging spot that I once heard in my head was actually fun for me. Piecing it together was a creative thing that many people said I did well. Taking phone calls when I was on the air and playing songs for people who really needed to hear them was enjoyable as well. I used to joke that I even had a face for radio. I don’t really believe there is any such thing because everyone is beautiful and made just the way they were meant to be. However, I did indeed have a voice for radio…a lower female voice with no accent…it worked well anywhere in the country.

When the radio station was sold at one point, many people left and some were not asked to return. I, luckily, held on to my job, but I gained a new boss. She and I were sitting in her office one day in the brand new studios the new owners built, exchanging backgrounds. We talked about how we each got into radio. I told her my story and towards the end, I said something to the effect of: “And that’s how I got stuck in radio.” She got a funny look on her face and said, “Huh, I’ve never felt that way!” It was at that point that I realized I just said out loud how I really felt about being in radio. Though I enjoyed so many aspects of it and I was even good at many parts of it, I felt stuck. The radio bug had never bitten me. I was not where I ultimately belonged.

When my first daughter was born, I kept my foot in the door in radio, working on a very part time basis with the hopes that when she went to school someday, I could go back. I left my part time position when I finally admitted to myself that I didn’t want to go back. Radio wasn’t where I was meant to be, in the end.

After I left radio, I really had no idea where to go. I loved staying home with my daughter and playing with her all day long, but I needed something that was all my own as well. Since I always loved writing, it made sense that a “job” and writing should go together. I began searching the Internet for writing jobs. I found a few here and there and one thing led to another.

Back in my radio days, a manager walked by my office and then backtracked, sticking his head in the door. He slowly moved over to my desk and looked over my shoulder to read what I was typing. “Wow,” he said as he saw I was typing real words, “I figured you were just in here hitting buttons as fast as you could to impress people. I didn’t know anyone could type that fast.” It’s true, I can type about as fast as I can think, which can be very dangerous. But I know now that when I am typing, whether it’s an email, a script for a radio spot, an article, or a novel, I am happy.

Many people say that exercise makes them feel better. They work out because they feel healthy and they have more energy because of it. While I believe this wholeheartedly, I also feel that writing does something similar for me. I write because on the days I have written something that really works, I simply feel better. I have more energy because I am excited about a story. I am a better mom because I have something to call my own, no matter how small and even if I only had 5 minutes to work on it.

I write because, as my radio friend once said, I have been bitten by the writing bug. To me, there is no getting away from it. I am not “stuck” with writing. It is where I want to be and where I always should have been. It is as much home to me as the house in which I live.

And so, while I hope that those who read what I write in articles, books and so forth enjoy what they read, much of what I have written is as much about the process of writing it. Writing is not drudgery. It cannot be forced. It is something I enjoy and I only write on the days that I enjoy it. And that is why I write every day…assuming the 4-year-old little girl and 6-month-old baby allow… 