MamaWriters is happy to welcome Christie Kelley to our blog today.   Christie Kelley was born and raised in upstate New York. As a child, she always had a vivid imagination and the bad dreams that go along with it, or perhaps the dreams were caused by the five brothers and three sisters she lived with. After seventeen years working for financial institutions in software development, she took a leap of faith and started her first book. Seven years later, her first book EVERY NIGHT I’M YOURS was bought by Zebra books.  She now lives in Maryland with her husband and two future romance heroes.  Learn more about Christie at her website: http://www.christiekelley.com/.

Be sure to leave a comment for Christie — she’s giving a book away today!

Since this Mama (me, not Christie) is already late getting this post up, without further ado…here’s Christie on The Love of Writing:

CHRISTIE KELLEY

First, thanks to the Mama Writers for having me here today! I love your blog and the support you all give to women writers.

I love my job.

How many people can say that? My husband can’t. Although, in addition to his day job, he teaches drums and guitar to kids in the evening and I know he loves that (most of the time). But honestly, how many people do you know who can say they honestly love their job.

Is it a perfect job? Heck no! It is extremely difficult to send your baby out only to have people knock it down and criticize everything about it.

Is it stress-free? Not a chance. I think there is more stress in maintaining a writing career than most other jobs I’ve held. Rejection is always right around the corner.

So what makes this such a great job?

Writing gives me a creative outlet that I never had in my job in technology. There is only so much creativity you can put into software development. Writing gives me the opportunity to research fascinating facts like how long a woman spent in medical school in 1880 (only about 18 months, believe it or not). It also makes your mind think in strange ways. How do I have my heroine find a hidden diary? Well, if she and my hero are making love on a small desk with a hidden compartment and the desk suddenly starts to break… I think you get my idea here.

But even more important to me is that writing has given me an opportunity to teach an important lesson to my kids. Don’t be afraid to go after your goals in life. Both my boys have watched me go from struggling unpublished author to having three books out and two more coming. They been there when I was sure I would never get published, but I didn’t give up. I don’t think there is a better lesson you can give a child.

I constantly talk with them about how important it is have a goal and go after it. My oldest son thinks he may now want to minor in English and write on the side. Having heard his story ideas, I can tell you there is definitely a fantasy writer in there somewhere.

It’s an awesome feeling to know your job may have influenced your kids in such a way. But I also have to say this same lesson is true for the unpubbed writers out there. Never give up!