Why I Write Romance and Giveaway Continues

Today is the second day of the Love and Diamonds Anthology giveaway.

I'm going to share a fairly short blog post on why I decided to write romance.

About 13 years ago, I did a writing course on writing for children. That's what I thought I wanted to do. I enjoyed the course and the assignments but struggled to get my stories to shine. I then wrote my first novel - a story about a car that goes into a place called Motoland where he talks and drives himself. The story was inspired by my toddler's love for cars. In those days, I used to write my books down on paper while looking after my son and a baby. I then transcribed them when I had those brief moments of reprieve like when I had a babysitter or my baby and toddler were sleeping. Oh, do I remember those busy, busy days. And my third one hadn't even arrived yet.

Those three little stories have since been revamped and put onto Smashwords for free.

I gave up writing while we relocated to SA and life got busy again. Only about a year later, while shrivelling up with boredom running a very quiet little church bookshop, I decided to pick up my pen again. I wrote another kid's fantasy novel which makes me shudder when I read it now. It truly was very rough and I made all the mistakes like telling and not showing. I sent it out to publishers but received rejection letters. Understandably.

My husband suggested I try an adult novel. Not sure if it was me, I tried it anyway and thoroughly enjoyed how the words flowed. That book was such fun to write and it ended up being an inspy romance. Also, very rough and crude but a good story.

Then I discovered ROSA (Romance Writers of South Africa) by accident when I was searching for publishers on the web. Rubbing shoulders with other romance writers, I realised romance was my natural writing inclination. I've always enjoyed watching romance movies and reading romance. I'm addicted to happy endings, to light, happy books. Maybe because this world is so dark at times and tragedy and fear surround us in the news and sometimes touch people we know, I want to write about light, happy, funny things. Love is about the best there is. Love is what we all long for and need.

I suppose I'm probably the last person people expected to write romance when I was growing up. I was a nerd through and through. I didn't have boyfriends and was quite shy. Not that I didn't want any but it just didn't happen. I cringed when my parents watched anything romantic on TV. Being deeply involved in church and religion and sometimes misunderstanding what was taught, I shied away from anything mildly sexual.

Then I met my hubby. He wooed me very well. I resisted him in so many ways. I think many of my friends thought I would never take that plunge and marry him but I did and things changed.

So, that's my story.

Don't forget. The Love and Diamonds anthology from Astraea Press is still available on Amazon. It's a great compilation of romantic stories. You can buy it here: Amazon

I'm giving away a copy to one commenter on this blog post or yesterday's blog post.