It's My Author-versary!!

It's been a year already! Can you believe it? I can't!!

Well it's been around a year I guess, not exact dates. Plus I actually published my first book before I had a blog or anything. I went a little backwards.

Right now, one year later, I have four books out. A few are selling quite well. And I have made so many friends that have changed my life in so many ways I can't even imagine what I would do now if I didn't have them.

Today I want to take you back to the beginning. How the heck did I decide to start writing spanking romance? Well, a lot of it has to do with being bored, and the rest of it has to do with being broke, so here is the unsolicited true story of the birth of Casey McKay:

Chapter One- Finding a Hobby

I was reading, a lot. I would frequent the library 3-4 times a week and I could finish a full size novel in about 2 days. I constantly had my nose buried in a book and often times was frustrated about the way the book played out. 

I was also bored. Bored of my job, unable to find a career in the field I wanted- I felt stuck. We also had limited money, so not many options of things to do in my free time. 

My husband suggested I try writing. So I set out on a mission to pen a young adult novel. It was a romance, it had zombies in it. This was late spring/early summer 2012.

Why was I trying to write a young adult novel? I have no idea. My characters kept trying to have sex. I wasn't even sure if they did that in young adult novels. I kept looking up rules, the guidelines I had to fit into to make this book of a certain genre. It stunted the writing, it didn't feel creative anymore. So like many hobbies one starts, I shelved it.

Chapter Two- The Best of Times, The Worst of Times

Failed writing attempts and avid reading aside- we were a young married couple trying to pay the bills. We were happy together, don't get me wrong, I never once doubted that we should have ended up together, but we were pretty miserable in all other aspects of life.

Neither of us had careers in what we wanted, and we were both underpaid, overworked and having a hard time paying bills on time- or paying them at all.

Do you know what sucks? Having bill collectors call day and night, filling up your answering machine with requests to call them back and make 'payment arrangements'. As if we had the money, we were just forgetting to pay them. Do you know what sucks more? When your land line gets turned off and they start calling your cell phone so much you have to switch it to silent so as to not be embarrassed at work when it keeps buzzing. (I still don't think I will ever in my life not break into a cold sweat when I hear the phone ring.)

Even suckier than all that is when your local cable/internet provider is banging on your door because you are so past due with your bill they want their shit back. I, of course, like any self respecting adult, hit the floor and army crawled behind the nearest wall.

They shut us down anyway, we still possessed the cable box and router, but  there was nothing going into it. What are two technology dependent 30 somethings to do?

Chapter Three- The Dark Days

We became resourceful. We live in a townhouse development so we are literally on top of our neighbors and some of these neighbors leave their internet access open for others to use. (Yes, that is how I am viewing it, why else would you not have it password protected?)

We could only access said internet if we were upstairs in our bedroom, tilting the laptop at a 60 degree angle (I'm not sure why, it just seemed to work better that way) and if you were ready to have some patience because the signal that was trespassing through our house was pretty weak. (See? It was trespassing, we were not at all stealing it.)

My hours got cut at work, so I suddenly had much more time to spend in our eerily quiet house. What is a person to do with a working computer and limited access to the internet?

Hey, remember when I was trying to do that weird thing, writing a book? I might give that a go!

A lack of hours at my job, a house with no internet or TV, and I penned my first full novel in about two months. But this time there was sex, oh and spanking, because I had discovered this was a genre and suddenly the flood gates of my creativity were opened!

Chapter Four- An Author is Born

My husband published Catch a Falling Star for me on Amazon. I remember being stretched out on our bed beside him (as he tilted the laptop just so- gaining enough little bars to upload my creation). The most embarrassing thing was when he went to fill in the keyword searches. 

"Give me some keywords that people can use to find your book."

"What?"

"What do you search for when you're looking for a book on your kindle?"

Oh good God! We had the rest of this conversation with my hands over my face. Because apparently I can share everything with this man, but when he is asking about my kindle searches for smut books I become a stammering idiot.

We finally got it up, a couple of- slow internet and giggle inducing keyword search topics- hours later.

Then I started my blog- yes after my book was already up.

We celebrated each and every download. Something that has not changed in a year. Thankfully there is more to celebrate now than there was then, but I still get giddy every time someone buys my book, so thanks to all of you exercising your one-click power.

Chapter Five- And the Beat Goes On

A lot has changed in a year. We can now pay our bills every month without much pain involved. There was even talk this weekend of (gasp) opening a savings account. Watch out! Next thing you know we'll be planning for our retirement. Who knew we could be so responsible and adult-like?

Some things have not changed. My husband is still my biggest supporter. I bounce ideas off of him and he is honest when he tells me which ones he thinks might work (and which ones suck- but there are no bad ideas in brainstorming).

The voices in my head have not quieted down, so I still have plenty of ideas and a lot of things in the works right now!

I just want to thank everybody. All my author friends who answer my stupid questions. All my blog readers. And of course all the people who buy my books.

I'm curious to see what another year will bring!