Okay, so today is the "Why You Started Writing" Blogfest. I found out about it on Alex's blog, but I think there are a few people acting as hosts. (You can see the list and follow the blogfest here.)
For me, I started writing in December 2007. I was about to turn 30, had skipped English as a senior in high school, earned a mathematics minor in college, and had been teaching elementary school for 8 years. I wanted a record of the first three decades of my life. Earlier that fall, I had gone through a devastating loss, and I still hadn't quite recovered from it (sometimes I think I'm still not over it). And as I started writing, I realized something amazing. The black feelings inside wormed their way out.
The world took on new color. I didn't have to live with those debilitating emotions anymore, because they found life on the page. Thus, the writing of fiction began. And my struggles and emotions and angst landed in the most reasonable place: a young adult.
That's why I started writing. I keep writing because it makes me happy. And I often say that the reason I pursued publication is because I'm a pit bull. I often don't see the point of spending time and energy on something unless I see it through to the end.
So after I'd written my third novel, I thought, "Well, I better figure out how to get a book published." And off I went.
So there's my story. What's yours? Why did you start writing? Why do you keep writing? Are you pursuing the dream of publication?
Okay, so this is a new series I'm starting. No trifecta. #dangitall
Just me. I'm calling it my "Why I" series, and it'll range from writing topics to food to Why I Dye My Hair. Okay, that one is lame, but you get the gist.
Today: Why I Write Young Adult
So I started writing just after Thanksgiving in the year 2007. I never wanted to be a writer (I know, that's like a cardinal sin or something). I hated English. I took the AP test as a junior in high school for the sole purpose of being able to skip English as a senior.
I did not take English in college. I majored in Chemistry Education before switching to Elementary Ed, with a math minor.
That's like, as far from English as you can get.
So I'm teaching school. Raising my family.
Then something devastating happened to me. I won't bore you with the details. But I will say that I vanished. Became ghostly. I disappeared inside my pain. My days were gray. My husband would ask me how my day was, and I couldn't answer.
Because it was just another day and I'd made it through.
I'm sure we've all had times like this in our lives. And if you haven't, color yourself lucky.
So, I'd been living-but-not-living for about three months when Thanksgiving came around. Two weeks later, I'd be turning 30.
So I sat down to write a personal history of the first three decades of my life. And it was theraputic. I could get the yuck out in words.
When the personal history was done, I immediately started writing a novel. It was not something I knew how to do. I'd never looked at books as more than an escape.
And as I was writing my first (very terrible) novel, I realized that all the angst, depression, etc. inside could live on the page. And if it was living on the page, then it wasn't living inside me.
What better character to carry that angst, confusion, anger, hopelessness, mingled with some rays of light (I'm not all thunderheads and frowny faces), than a teenage girl? I mean, seriously.
So that's why I write YA (almost always girls). It's the perfect place for me to unload my emotional baggage. Betcha didn't think I was going to go there, did ya?
Well.
Why do you write in the genre you've chosen?
