My first novel...

 

My first novel - the journey...

It started a long long time ago (see next blog) in what seems like a lifetime ago. I started writing as a child. I loved it. I wrote poetry and stories and would journal. My grandmother Thelma Wells loved to write poetry too. She began buying me journals for my birthday every year, since I was 10. I have finished at least one journal a year ever since. Making my grand total 37 journals and roughly 700,000 words. 

 

I loved writing letters too. I had extended family I would write too. But I was also suffered from dyslexia. Which made me struggle with reading and writing. So often I would receive negative feedback from my letters that contained many spelling and grammatical errors. I eventually kept most of my writings to myself. 

 

I started writing Parks and Recreation roughly when I was 23 (in 2004). It was a conscious decision to begin writing a fictional novel about the profession that I loved so much. I experienced many wonderful things and had lots of material to write about. I would write some pages here, some ideas there but had never put it all together. Much of this book is lightly based off the last 20 years. 

 

I finally had the guts about 3 years ago to put it all together and get the opinion of a publisher. Luckily, they saw a great potential and encouraged my come on board and finally finish my first novel. Shortly after that I began my second novel, also a romantic comedy only with a Christmas twist (work in progress: "Committed to Christmas").

 

So there you have it! My journey to my first novel. I hope you enjoy the parts I can share with you here and look forward to some feedback.