Catherine Charles
Author of the Week, Catherine Charles has just released the third book in her Tag romance trilogy. To find out more please visit Catherine at my site.
Hi Catherine, how wonderful to meet you, can we start with getting to know a little about you?
After growing up military and moving around the world, a small town in Texas is where I call home. Just outside of a large metroplex, the small town reminds me of where my family is from in Nebraska. When not writing I love to spend time with my littles, going into the city to fill my foodie cravings, or spending the nights outside around a fire pit with a glass of wine, good friends and good music. As far as hobbies…writing is my hobby. I absolutely love it. If I’m not actively writing, I’m thinking about writing, developing new characters and bringing them to life in my mind before I even put their names on paper.
I think the country is the best place to live in! What got you into writing?
I had a college professor suggest that I look into publishing a piece I wrote for my final. At 19 years old I thought she was a crazy old lady; she was well into her 70’s, and I just blew her off. There was no way I was talented enough to attract the attention of a major publishing house. I was a completely different person then, and was too afraid of rejection to even make an attempt. I was clueless about self-publishing. It wasn’t until a year and a half ago that I found out about it.
At the time I was reading amateur works on the gaming app, Chapters. They held a summer writing contest and I had no intention on entering. However, the morning the contest went live an idea pop in my mind and I decided to enter. The story took a completely different path than what I original had planned, but I trusted my muse and couldn’t be happier with the way it turned out. The story, Tag You’re Mine took off, with over 100k reads at the end of the contest, and though I didn’t win, it did finish in the top 10%. Readers wanted more, and three additional books stemmed from that first book.
At that point I seriously considered taking the leap into self-publishing. It was scary, and I doubted myself in the weeks leading up to it, but I had gained such supportive fans while putting the story on the app, it made taking the leap seem plausible. I may not have a huge following…yet, but those that do follow me mean the world to me. They are like family to me. They follow and support my work because it means something to them. It’s touched them in one way or another, and that’s all I could ask for. I know eventually, I will have a stronger following, but I’m just embracing this time. Paying my dues and praying that one day I’ll have a name for myself.
To read more, come and find her at:-
