LOOKING BACK IN TIME

While trying to find a thank-you card, I found notes I'd written for a speech I gave about my writing. 

The notes began with the first book I wrote--TWO WAYS WEST--an historical family saga based on my father's side of the family. It followed two families making their west in totally different ways. 

I found a small publisher and was happy with the way the book turned out, but never received any royalties. 

All thewhile I kept writing, encouraging other writers, and teaching writing.

I wrote another historical family saga about my mother's family coming to California, and it was publixhed by a New York publisher. It has had two differnt covers, and 3 publishers.

While I still lived in Oxnard I wrote a police procedural based on what my cop son-in-law told me about what happened each night on the job. He also took me on a ride-along. Soon I'd written three more in the series. I had an agent, but editors said: "Too hard boiled," and "Not hard boiled enough."

Then the Internet came along and I submitted i to a publisher doing electronic publishing. This was FINAL RESPECTS. Readers weren't ready for e-books. Since then it's been with 3 more publishers and is now available on Amazon for Kindle and in trade paperback. There are many more available in the series.

I aslo wrote a psychological horror called WISHING MAKES IT SO. The key thread in it is "Love doesn't cure all." It is loosely based on an experience I had with a foster child. It had other publishers too, and is now avaialable for Kindle and in trade paperback.

At the time I wrote this speech, this I was working on a series about a female deputy in a town like Springville and was trying to find an agent.

I was teaching writing on Monday nights and belonged to a writers' critique group that met on Wednesday nights. I was a member of MA, Sisters in Crime and California Writers.

I wrote a chapter for the PORTABLE WRITERS CONFERENCE called "Turning Genealogy into Fiction," which was a Writer's Digest Featured Book.

I have no idea where I gave the speech, but it obviously was a long time ago. Since st the time I aslo owned, lived in. and worked in our licensed care home for developmentally disabled women, I certainly had more energy than I do now. 

Those were busy and most fulfilling times. 

Marilyn