***
Most authors’ journeys to publication are a long,
winding, rocky road. I know
mine
was. Therefore we have a love/hate
relationship with writing because the journey to finishing the book is just as
difficult as publishing it. Anyone who
gets published must have a good amount of grit, guts and tenacity.
We start off writing as children because it’s fun,
little knowing where the road will take us.
For some the road is a short one and ends when life becomes busy. But there are those of us who have stories
running through our heads at the strangest times. A few of those stories become imbedded in our
brain where they grow and grow and grow until they are screaming to get
out. Really, to a certain degree, we
have no choice but to be a writer. We
HAVE to tell those stories so they will just SHUT UP.
My first full-length novel was that way, and it is
still a work in progress that I am determined will be published someday. My debut, Her Man From Shilo was a story that
started with a dream. I wrote about half
a chapter before life (read children, etc. here) got in
the way of my being able to write for quite a while. It didn’t stop Daimee and Raff from telling me
their story though. For over a decade I
imagined them in different scenes until life gave me a chance to get it out of
my head and onto virtual paper. Since it
was in my head so long, it will most likely be the easiest (relatively speaking
of course) book I’ve ever written.
After
receiving such positive feedback from those who read it, including some people
I didn’t know, I decided to put my toe back in the ‘let’s-get-published’ sea. It wasn’t my first foray into these deep,
dark, scary waters, so I was familiar with the sting of rejection and willing
to take the risk again. Which helps you
appreciate the kind of breed we authors are.
We are willing to take a painful shot to the heart when a publisher
tells us they don’t want our book and throw ourselves back in the
shark-infested waters ready to get chewed up again. I wanted to be published by Harlequin SO BAD
I was willing to put myself out there again and again. And willing to wait an eternity to get those
rejection letters. And willing to rewrite,
rework, redo my story until one glorious day I got a letter from Kate Cuthbert
at Harlequin Escape that said ‘We would like to publish your book’. We writers may live a lot of our life in our
imaginations, but we are tougher than you think on the inside.
***
Her Knight In Shining Armour
She may not need a knight in shining
armour to save her, but that doesn’t mean she’s going to look a gift knight in
the visor...
It should be a simple enough exercise to get Paisley out of the park and into her new life. But nothing is ever as simple as it should be, and Sterling soon discovers that even if her ex-husband buys the set-up, he might not be able to watch Paisley go...
Robyn Rychards
Robyn Rychards grew up in the granola bowl
of the United States, Boulder Colorado, a town filled with fruits, flakes and
nuts. She considers herself a Jack-of-all-trades-master-of-none and has taught
herself to sew, paint, play the piano, garden, cook, the list goes on. But now
that her books are published, she’s thrilled to finally be considered a master
of one. At least as much as a person can be, for the learning never really
stops.
She feels her active imagination is a
blessing and a curse, with the blessing far outweighing the curse since it has
led her to fulfil her dream of writing for Harlequin. Robyn started writing
stories when she was a teenager because she didn’t have enough books to read.
Sometimes she finds it hard to believe that people are willing to pay her to do
something she enjoys so much, but mostly she’s happy to have such a wonderful
excuse not to cook and clean. And a job that means you can stay in your jammies
as long as you want? Priceless.
