I have always been an avid reader and writer since middle school. I spent a lot of time during the summers making weekly trips to the library to check out Judy Blume books, The Little Boxcar Children and other works that caught my attention. My love for reading expanded to my love for writing and I wrote many short stories throughout my adolescent years only sharing a few with my mother.
The love for reading and writing followed me throughout my life, and I found myself immersed into the works of Toni Morrison, BeBe Campbell Moore, Terri McMillan, and E. Lynn Harris to name a few. The latter whom I had the pleasure of attending a book signing for his work, If This World Were Mine. I would finish each book with the strongest desire to write my own. I love words. I love stories. I love to tell stories using words so why not write my own. FEAR!!! I was fearful of so many things and would often question if I were talented enough to write a book and have others enjoy it. Would it be a flop and my book would be filed in "File Drawer Z" never to be picked up again. I turned my back on fear and finished my first novel in 2010 after my divorce. It was loosely based on my life experiences up to that point and the turmoil of being married to a narcissist. My plans were to publish it but as time went by, I opted not to as I felt it served its purpose which was therapy for me. Writing that book was my outlet to get all my feelings and emotions on paper and assign them to characters in a book. Reading it gave me an outer body experience. I lived it, I survived, and life was better than ever so why publish it when the purpose was for me to heal.
I continued to dabble in writing by writing short poems and stories. Writing and words became my best friend that I turned it into a side hustle that I still do to this day by writing policy and procedure manuals and other written work for human service agencies. I could not fight my love for the written word any longer so in 2018 I decided to sit down and finally pen my first book to be published. I did not sit down and write a draft of what I wanted the book to be about. I did not come up with a plot and scheme beforehand. I literally sat down and free flowed the entire book. No plan, drafts or bullet points. The entire book, Second Fridays: Sip & Pain, was a work of magic. It flowed from my brain to my fingertips as I typed each word. The characters lived in me presented their story to me each time I sat down behind my laptop.
When the book was finished, I was plagued with another fear which was publishing it during the COVID 19 pandemic. I lost sleep many of nights thinking that publishing it at that time would not be a good idea. COVID was wreaking havoc on the world and here I was considering releasing my work and hoping that others would support and buy it. I decided to release it and I am glad that I did because despite the pandemic it was a success and the feedback was fuel for me to keep going. It was at this point that I adopted a new motto which is, “As long as I have breath, I am doing it,”
For a first-time published author, this process was daunting but worth it to see my name on the cover of a completed book of work that I wrote. I hope you enjoy my debut novel as much as I enjoyed writing it and I promise you it will not be my last because there is no way I can let Derrick get off like that without karma paying him a visit. Stay tuned as there is more to come.
Sincerely,
Tammie, your soon to be favorite author.