How I started writing

This was a response to a question on a blog I read, about how people got started writing.

I was a reader. I read everything. I read anything. I loved journal/creative writing in elementary school. I never kept a diary for long - I would write a bit when really blue and then not touch it again until the next time. I didn't write fiction again except for assignments in high school (But I was a poet. Whew, bad adolescent poetry. Pee-yew!). I was still reading though - I would check out a big stack of books and read them all by the next week.

And then college and grad school (French master's) ruined all writing and reading for me for several years. (And what do you do with French master's? If you are really, really sick of school and have no desire for a PhD? Work in marketing, of course.)

I have to admit that I became a bit of a snob, if someone who hardly ever reads or writes anything can be a literary snob. I only read worthy things and only wrote reports for work. I was picky about grammar and syntax, but otherwise, nothing.

It was after I left the country and married and had children - and didn't have a work visa until I was completely immersed in motherhood - that I started reading again. I started with the dribs and drabs of things that I had heard of. I joined my first book club and was suddenly reading things that weren't in French and weren't written in the 17th century. What a revelation!

It wasn't until a few years ago, when I came across Jennifer Crusie and Bob Mayer's first collaborative novel, Don't Look Down, that I began to read romance. I dove head first into romance. I read everything, any author, any time period, any place. I started to get pickier, though, not finishing books that I hated, picking apart the stories and characters, and trying to understand why something worked or didn't.

I also started to realize that some of these published works that people were getting paid for.... I could write better than that. I know that's a total cliche and a snobby thing to say, but take it as I felt it, please: I knew I could write. I know I can create characters and plots. I know I can draw people in.

I have a few false starts at novels floating around and now have one that's finished but needs work and another under way.

Someday!