[Forward]

Today, I write in a variety of genres—ranging from urban fantasy to Sci-Fi. My muse isn’t very fussy about what she expects me to write. As long as there’s something otherworldly involved and a nice degree of darkness, she’ll help me along with ideas.

Of course, getting ideas and writing them down to become short stories, novellas, or novels is only part of the process. When you weigh it all out, it may even be the easiest part. I have no problem churning out tales. I keep a tight writing schedule and assign personal goals all the time. The road to publication is a lot harder, more involved, and definitely a business. Once you start to look at it that way, it helps to realize your goals a bit clearer.

But firstly, I’d like to take you back to when it all began. Just over twenty years ago, I was a teenager with a head full of daydreams, and stories that seemed to weave in and out of my head at all hours. It’s no wonder, I read a lot of books and magazines, plus spent countless hours watching movies. Yet, it wasn’t until I finally grabbed a notebook and pen that I realized I could actually turn most of them into stories. Of course, when I look back at some of the things I wrote back then, I cringe. But the ideas and imagination were always there. It was just a matter of learning.

Back then, while I wrote in the privacy of my bedroom and imagined stories of romance and horror—with mostly vampires—I also spent a lot of time dreaming about how wonderful it would be to become a published author someday. And I knew what genre I wanted to write in, too. After being influenced by Clive Barker, a little movie called The Lost Boys, and a show called Dark Shadows, I wrote a story about a teenage girl who fell in love with a vampire.

I had a lot of fun writing that story, and was so proud of myself because I’d actually managed to write a story longer than ten pages—a story that made sense, with a complete plot, characters with problems, and an ending that wasn’t quite Happy Ever After. I was so excited and naïve that I thought I’d target a few publishers in Australia. I got a nice bundle of rejection letters, most which spoke about the length of the book (it was only 39k). They were also very polite, which encouraged me to keep writing.

This was my first taste of rejection, and when I first realized that this dream of mine wasn’t going to be easy. It would require a lot of work, and time. But I decided to stick with it. Besides, by that time, writing had already become a part of me. I couldn’t ignore the calling, the ideas and the urge to keep writing. And although this vampire story of mine will never see the light of day, it was my first achievement. My baby if you will. The one story that set me on a course that would lead me to where I am now. It’s taken a lot longer than I thought it would, but I’m still chasing the dream of seeing at least one of my books sitting in a bookstore.

However, the dream soon took a detour when I slipped out of my teens and entered adulthood. That’s when Reality Bit…