My Writing Origin Story

I spent a lot of time wondering what my first blog topic should be about. I brainstormed ideas and drafted a series of sub-par articles but nothing stood out to me. I finally realised that sometimes a good prologue is all it takes- everyone loves an origin story. So this isn’t a hero or villain origin story but it’s how my writing journey started.

Reading and writing are inevitably intertwined for many authors and the same is true for me.

I had always loved reading from a very young age but it was only when I was around 11 years old that reading became an obsession for me. I had just started secondary school and developed anxiety so reading became an escape and lifeline for me. (I promise, I intend for this this to my writing origin story, not my sob story). I was terrible at making new friends so I often went to the library at lunch times and pretended I was a character in the books I was reading, completing secret missions and Covert Operation reports (thank you, Gallagher Girls).

I also had a couple of operations around the same time. I took some time off school to recover and suddenly had a lot of free time on my hands. My love of reading only grew.

I knew I wanted to be a writer the day I read a book that reduced me to tears. I decided I wanted to do the same: I wanted to make people cry (it's not as sadistic as it sounds, I promise).

There was something fascinating about the realisation that words, a mosaic of 26 letters, could evoke such emotion. My pre-teen little brain was amazed that books had the ability to make people love and laugh and, yes, even cry.

I realised that I wanted to seize a little bit of that magic. So I spent the next decade reading any book I could get my hands on, dreaming of fictional worlds, and finally putting pen to paper.

I’ve written a few novels and, with each one, found that my stories improved and slowly came to life. While the first book I ever wrote will never see the light of day (trust me, I’m doing you a favour), it taught me so much about the writing process and how I work.

Writing can be a demanding hobby and a downright exhausting career to chase down but I’m so excited to launch my author website and step into the next stage of my writing journey. Because, as long as I remember the young girl who shed tears over fictional characters and had an epiphany, I’ll always be motivated to harness my creativity and continue dreaming and writing of epic battles and heroines and romances- that’s an origin story I will always get behind.