Where did you grow up, and how did this influence your writing?
I was born in Corpus Christi, Texas but I have traveled the United States and Canada extensively.. Although those travels took me to almost every state(my dad was a pipeliner and we traveled all over) I was still glad when we came home. In many states they didn't have Mrs. Bairds Bread, nor Dr. Pepper. In Canada at that time they didn't have Coke or Pepsi, they had Chocolate soldiers and Orange Crush. I met all kind of people and learned early on that not everyone was alike. People spoke different in different parts of the country, their sports were centered around the kind of weather they had. Their TV was different. Grocery stores up north were much different than down here in Texas. Although we had our share of seafood, the stores at that time didn't carry a lot of what the New England states did. Live Lobsters and fresh shellfish all the time. I was amazed, but still very happy to see Texas once more. In different parts of the country there were different ethnic groups, like up north, more Irish, Italian, less Mexican, and even less African Americans. We had drive in hamburger places, and shows, I didn't see that up north as much. On the west there were mountains. I loved Arizona and read a few epitaphs in that area, very colorful stuff. So I met a large variety of people, and had to learn as a child to get along with strangers. They all thought I lived on a ranch and knew Roy Rogers, and naturally I didn't dispute the fact, didn't want to disappoint them. So I learned to tell tall tales way back. LOL
When did you first start writing?
At thirteen I wrote a short story and sent it to Red Book. They thanked me but I got my first rejection letter then. In high school I wrote a book, a Swiss Family Robinson kind of book, with more gore and detail of dirty ships and disguising my heroine as a boy. Let everyone read it and never got the book back, darn. I wrote off and on but always stuffed it in drawers. Then in the 80's I joined RWA and went to their local meetings. Wrote books again and sent them away, only to be rejected time after time, as I look back I can understand why, they were pretty bad.And then one day an ebook pioneer came to talk and opened my eyes and ears to ebooks. Since I was learning all about computing the hard way, it seemed only natural I should strike out in this avenue of publishing. I got a contract, and the publisher went under. I sent off more stuff and got it published by another e-publisher. When self publishing became a hot topic, I investigated as ebooks were not paying off well. I decided to learn how to self publish my books. I did and I am still doing that until this day. The learning process is a lifetime of work and I'm always interested in whatever is happening in this business. I learned everything the hard way, but I am now a very happy author who supports herself, and writes full time now.
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