Samantha Turner, the heroine, was a mixed race vampire who ran a family shelter. A heroine I could relate to and embrace. Back then I used to teach culinary classes at non-profits, including a family shelter and I happen to be a woman of color...so discovering Sam was a turning point. It took me many years, but Sam and Caridad, gave me the courage to write my own mixed race heroine and share the djinn mythology I grew up with in THE DJINN'S DILEMMA. For that I'm grateful.
And it's a great honor and pleasure to host Caridad on my blog today.
It’s not easy being a writer. It’s probably one of the hardest jobs you’ll ever have.
It’s time consuming, plant-your-butt-in-the-chair kind of work. I often will spend three or four straight hours writing on a weekend before getting up to take a much-needed break.
It’s not necessarily financially rewarding. I thank God every day that I still have my day job to pay the bills.
It can be lonesome, after all, writing is not a team sport. See above re: countless hours of planting-your-butt-in-the-chair. Alone.
The publishing world is filled with rejection even after you sell your first book or your thirtieth and even if your work isn’t rejected, you may find yourself doing countless revisions before your it is ready for publication.
So you may wonder what keeps me writing? What inspires me to forget all the above and sit down in front of my laptop and write? For hours. Alone.
The answer is simple: You. Yes, you the reader. You the person who takes the time to drop me a quick line or tweet or leave a comment on Facebook.
You make it all worthwhile by letting me know that you enjoy the story that I’ve told or that it’s touched you in some fashion or that it made you think about something in a new way.
I write the stories to do just that because I want to engage you. I want to share a piece of me with my stories and I often do so in one way or another in many of my books.
I want to be that kick-ass heroine who knows how to stand up for what’s right and wins the hero in the end thanks to her strength and courage. I want you to feel that you can be that heroine. That you can tap your inner strength and be who you want to be.
I want to be that woman who finds the love of her life (and I have although he’s not perfect) and I want you to think that you, too, can experience a satisfying partnership.
I want to show you new worlds that I wish to visit or share with you places where I’ve been lucky to go, like my beloved Jersey Shore or the top of a Mexican pyramid. I want you to know you can go there, too, either for real or via my stories.
I want to share because I’m a sharing kind of person. Caridad means “Charity” and before I got wiped out and it became Faith, Hope and Love, Charity was the greatest gift of all because it meant that you were sharing of yourself with others.
That’s why you inspire me to write. To give you exciting stories. To give you sexy stories. To share a piece of me and to get to know you better when you share yourself by taking the time to reach out to me.
Thank you for coming by and thank you, Mina, for having me here! I want to wish you all a very Merry Christmas, Happy Chanukah and Happy Holidays! May we all get to know each better in the New Year.
Amazon Awakening, her more recent release is also her first erotic paranormal romance. Check out the cover:
When not writing, Caridad is an attorney, wife and mother to an aspiring writer and fashionista. For more information about Caridad and her books, please visit www.caridad.com.
Lovely post! You're absolutely right, getting your butt in the chair is so hard. I was watching the movie Limitless last night and he's a writer in the begining. I had to laugh at the montage of him sitting in his apartment writing the first words over and over again!:-)
ReplyDeleteKarin
Lovely post! You're absolutely right, getting your butt in the chair is so hard. I was watching the movie Limitless last night and he's a writer in the begining. I had to laugh at the montage of him sitting in his apartment writing the first words over and over again!:-)
ReplyDeleteKarin
Hi Karin!
ReplyDeleteThanks for visiting! Yes, it's hard but it's a passion and we keep following it. :)
Thank you for visiting. I haven't seen Limitless and must check it out. If you've ever seen Secret Window with Johnny Depp, I'm kind of like him a a writer. Ratty sweater, working on the couch and if I could, eating Cheetohs for breakfast.
ReplyDeleteLol, ah the glamorous life of a writer! Speaking of movies about writers, I sooo wanted to see Rum Diaries with Johnny Depp, but missed it in the theaters.
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