From Romance to Middle Grade

In case you weren't interested in hopping over to the Twisted Sisters blog the other day, here is my blog--for those of you who wondered about the how and why I started writing about goblins, gnomes, faeries and trolls.

Actually, it was less of a jump than a gradual merge into the slow lane. Yanno, like when the white-top old person has his signal on for ½ mile before he slowly merges into you because you thought he just forgot to turn it off. Yeah, like that.

The how and why I switched was part logical and part serendipity.

I had been writing for eight years, completing four manuscripts of every sub-genre around, including mixing a few of them together. I loved reading romance, but I couldn’t write one if my life depended on it. My last story was a 110,000 word romantic fantasy with a dash of high fantasy (elves and their realm), otherworldly (actually a new world), a missing child heir to the throne and the evil one who wants to control it all titled, THE LEPRECHAUN CONNECTION.

Yep, all that was missing was the kitchen sink . . . ‘cause I added that to ANOTHER story.

Believe it or not, I did get a request by the great Deb Dixon who ultimately refused it. But her input and request a different story spurred me on—to write another convoluted and confusing mess I titled, THE DEMON CONNECTION—uhm, I never finished this one. There’s some good stuff in there, but I’m not ready to write it yet.

Anyhoo, fast forward to May 2008, as I walked my kidlet to school, we made up a story about Peter the fly called, PETER’S MESSY ROOM.  I wrote 580 words in 15 minutes after I got home. And then I started writing short picture book type stories. I really, really loved writing these stories. They were short. They had a beginning, middle and end. They were fun. And most important of all, they made me happy.

During this time, I discovered my writing voice.

Then I started thinking. *scary, huh?* My writing voice didn’t lend itself well to romance. It was too snarky for most ‘normal’ romances, but not snarky enough for many paranormal, chick-lit (I know the term is a no-no, but it’s a TONE that conveys the style) type of story.

So what to do?

I really, really loved the main character in THE LEPRECHAUN CONNECTION, what if I wrote her backstory? Yep, you heard correctly—BACKSTORY. How did this character become who she ended up being?

The first story I wrote was called, MISSING: ONE GARDEN GNOME, which explained how Kyte Webber became the kid who saw Mythicals. During this time, I received over 100 rejections, changed the title, changed the character’s name five or six times, and cut over 10,000 words—twice. No, this was NOT an easy book to write. The title soon became TO GNOME ME IS TO LOVE ME, and my character became Kyte—an old friend allowed me to use her old Dungeons and Dragons persona.  Eerie part is they have similar personalities.

Three of the books are available on Amazon:

TO GNOME ME IS TO LOVE ME, book one of The Goblin’s Apprentice series

THE FAST AND THE FAERIEOUS, book two of The Goblin’s Apprentice series

LOST LEPRECHAUN LOOT, a Kyte Webber short adventure story, honoring St. Patrick’s Day 

I plan to publish three more stories this year:

A MAZE OF MONSTER MIX-UPS, a Halloween prequel to book three of The Goblin’s Apprentice, featuring Kyte Webber

FOR WHOM THE BELL TROLLS, book three of The Goblin’s Apprentice series

SUGAR PLUM DISASTER, a Christmas inspired short story, featuring Kyte Webber