The Unexpected Adventure

Sorry! I don’t want any adventures, thank you. Not today. Good morning! But please come to tea—
-Bilbo Baggins in JRR Tolkien’s THE HOBBIT


Four years ago I had a life quite similar to Bilbo Baggins at the beginning of the Hobbit by JRR Tolkien. I was quite respectable, I always did what was expected, and I never had any adventures. Sure, I had romantic daydreams running through my head, but that was a secret. No one knew about that. It was hardly respectable. Me, write a romance novel? Sorry! I don’t want any adventures, thank you.

Then, as often happens, my comfortable life took a sudden left turn. My husband, a member of the Army reserves, was called up for active service. He was “cross-leveled” (those of you who know what this means can nod your heads sagely) which meant we had very little time to prepare for his departure. In short order he was in Baghdad, Iraq and I was left with two little kids, ages one and two, in a house we had just moved into one week before he left. This was not my dream. This was not my comfortable life.

The next fourteen months were some of the hardest in my life. I was able to speak to my husband by phone on occasion, only to have him try to convince me that it was not gunfire I heard in the background. I was working two jobs, trying to care for my little ones, and going crazy with worry over my husband (yes, yes, I know worrying doesn’t help, but it never stopped me one bit). I found that my traditional coping resources were insufficient to meet the demands of the stress I was under. In short, I was going insane.

Then a dear friend recommended that I try reading romance books. But I don’t read romance books, I said. She politely told me to get over myself and just give it a try. So I started reading historical romances. Finally, I found some relief to the stress, a way to let go of my worry and escape into a romantic adventure with a guaranteed happy ending (at first I didn’t know all romances ended well and I was so worried it would end badly… after a few books I began to catch on!). I don’t know how many books I read while my husband was away (it was a lot – and yes, he did come home safely!), but I do know that in the wee hours of the night when sleep was impossible, these books kept me company, they gave me hope, they made me laugh, and they kept me sane.

Not only did romance books keep me from being locked away somewhere, but as I read them I realized that these books were a lot like the stories I have always had in my head. Reading romance novels for the first time was like coming home, like finding a piece of me that had always been missing. I now had a new perspective on those unacceptable storylines slinking around my brain. Maybe they weren’t just daydreams. Maybe, they had a purpose. Maybe, I was an author!

I had begun my adventure. I took on the challenge of writing my first romance novel. I even went to a writer’s conference, where I met Sourcebooks editor, Deb Werksman, and literary agent Barbara Poelle. They both asked for a full manuscript, so I sent it in, knowing of course that they would say no, as would any logical creature. Little did I know that instead of being reasonable people they were more like Gandalf the wizard and they both said Yes! And thus, I got a big shove out the door and onto the road of this adventure.

My first book, THE HIGHLANDER’S SWORD, will debut March 2, and no one, no one I say, is more surprised than me. It is a wonderful, scary, and most unexpected adventure, and I hope you will share it with me – adventures are so much better with friends – don’t you think? Come find me at www.amandaforester.com

So how about you? How has your life taken a dramatic turn into an unexpected adventure?

Amanda Forester