To steal from Wikipedia: Charlaine Harris is a New York Times bestselling author who has been writing mysteries for over twenty years.
She is big time.
If you don’t know who Charlaine Harris is, either you’ve been in prison, in the hole, for years on end ala Papillion, or you only watch PBS documentaries on badgers. Not even the honey badger, just badgers.
Charlaine Harris penned the Sookie Stackhouse series of wonderful, southern vampire books that HBO turned into the True Blood series. But even before Sookie hit like a tsunami, Charlaine was writing books and books and books.
I talked with her at the 2012 Romantic Times Book Lovers Convention and she was wonderful and kind and supportive. This was the question:
Aaron: Charlaine, how do I as a writer handle the emotional storms of writing? How can I handle the ups and downs?
And her answer changed my life. It took a little while to sink in, but when it sunk in, it hardened into concrete. Quick-dry cemented, right down into the cracks and crevices of my soul. Charlaine said you have to believe in your story and your characters and you have to share that with the world.
It is my job to write my story and to share it. Not sell books, not get a huge publisher and make millions, though that certainly would be nice, but that’s not what this game is about. My job is to write a quality story with memorable characters and share it with the world.
I know what you are thinking. Duh. But it’s not just duh, nope. When the fear hits, when the rejections all dump on us like acid rain, if I can remember my primary purpose, I can weather those storms.
Because this adventure is not about me. It’s not about Aaron Ritchey. It’s about my story
and my voice and my characters. I’m not here to sell me. Selling me is frightening because, dude, I am damaged goods. I’m the 1978 Dodge Dart rusted out.
But my story, my characters, Lena Marquez, the heroine of The Never Prayer, she’s tough, she’s fragile, she’s forced into impossible situations, and yet she emerges strong and healed and good. I’m here to share her story with as many people as I can. Not everyone will be interested, and that’s fine. But those that do connect with her, they will emerge from my book, hopefully a little more strong, a little more healed, a little better.
Thank you so much, Charlaine, for talking with me. And here is a link to her Amazon page. She is a woman with a generous heart.
Wow! I just have to say…She is totally right. Charlaine Harris is one of my favorite authors, and thats exactly what her books do. Yours too Aaron. I belived, and while reading your book it came to life. When you believe in your characters and just tell their story, it makes “us” readers feel like you were really there, having this amazing adventure, then ingrosed in the book “we” feel like we are really there. Amazing!
Hurray! Yeah, characters and stories, it’s the bread and butter. And I am very blessed by wonderful characters to be in my books. I have to work hard on stories, but striving to bring my characters to life, brings hope. Thanks Andrea!
Aaron, you completely intrigue me more with every post. I love that she shared this with you! 🙂 Such a true statement. Many happy sales, my friend.
Thanks Rachel! Charlaine was great. So glad I can intrigue!