Hey, Readers! I’d like to welcome indie author, Erin Clements, to the blog today. She lives in South Carolina and is an avid reader with tons of great book recommendations for you– and both of those things feed into her writing. Read on to find out more about Erin and her work…
Erin self-published her first novel Restoring Belle in 2020. It is the first in the Crews Anderson series. The third and final book of the series should arrive on the virtual shelf later this month.
Welcome to the blog, Erin! Most good writers are often avid readers, so I like to kick off interviews with questions about books. What’s the last book that had a significant emotional impact on you? It might be a story that made you cry or one that had you delirious with laughter. Why do you think it had that impact?
I recently read The Weight of Mercy by Deb Richardson Moore, and wow! While this is a non-fiction book, which is not normally my forte, I read it in about two sittings, only because I needed to eat. Rev. Moore goes into details about her first few years working at Triune Mercy Center here in Greenville, SC. Triune is a special church that is ready to serve the homeless and poor while being a church for all citizens. Her journey through acceptance of her calling and making sure her ministry was impactful was fascinating and filled with amazing stories.
I also recently re-read Francine Rivers Redeeming Love and it brought me to tears again. The redemption and love of God in Ms. Rivers’ story is so real and deep that it floored me anew.
The Weight of Mercy sounds like an inspiring book, and I just read Redeeming Love over Christmas (I couldn’t believe it hadn’t read it before!!) and was so moved by it. It deserves all the praise it gets. Such an impactful story. What books are on your nightstand (or in a Kindle queue) right now?
I love this question because I always have a stack and then a queue!! My physical stack right now is A Butterfly in Paris by Matt Pelicano (I’m in the middle and so far it’s fantastic!), My Cousin Rachel by Daphne Du Maurier (because Rebecca is one of my favorite books), Outer Banks by Anne Rivers Siddons, and The Weekenders by Mary Kay Andrews (those last two are beach reads and make me excited for summer vacation). In my Kindle Queue I have In Pursuit of Love by Rebecca Bender, The Art of Rivers by Janet Ferguson, and so many more thanks to BookBub.
You’re giving me new book recommendations! And I’m the same way. I have bunches of books piled on my nightstand. Maybe someday, I’ll have a chance to get through all of them. One can hope! Moving on to talking about writing… Where did you grow up, and do you use this setting in your novels?
We moved a few times when I was a kid. The bulk of my childhood was in Maryland in the Chesapeake Bay area. My adolescence, however, was in Columbia, SC. I did decide to set my novels in Columbia because it made sense in my head at the time. It’s a quiet town I longed to leave, but when the hustle and bustle of a bigger city were a lot, sometimes I wondered if returning would be better. Since that was one of the themes in my first book, that is what the character did, just not from the same city. I think it helped to add a richness to the book as I had a feel for the culture and attitude which helped make the city a deeper part of the book.
It can definitely be enjoyable to write about a setting that feels exotic to us, but in the end, we’re probably always going to be able to write more deeply and easily about the places we know personally. What unfinished writing projects do you have gathering dust in a drawer? Do you think you’ll ever try to publish them, or were they just part of the learning process?
When I first decided to try writing as a hobby more than a dream, I was reading a lot of dystopian YA fiction, and so I wrote what I read. So far that book (or series) has just been part of the learning process, though I do hope one day to have the time to work on it more and finish it, even just for me. It’s a story I find myself going back to in my daydreams and I wonder what will ever come of it.
You never know! I’ve heard of so many authors who got established and then revisited a much earlier work later in their career. I enjoy dystopian sci-fi as well (and have my own unfinished manuscript in that genre), so I’d love to read it. What’s the funniest thing you’ve ever had happen to you as a writer?
Oddly, when I published my first book, it was my best friend who pointed out how many of the things in my book had come true in my own life. They were not all good, but I do still hope for a happy ending. There were years between the writing and publishing, and as I have moved through the series, that this has happened again and again. I even had to disclaim to my closest friends that something had been written in one of my books LONG before it happened to me in my real life.
How interesting! I don’t think I’ve had that happen to me with my writing, but now, I want to go back and check previous manuscripts! Do you have a day job other than being a writer? If you do, does that job help or hinder your creativity?
I do! I am an Office Manager by day. When I first started writing (and long before publishing), I was at a job I had done for years and knew backward and forward, so it was easy to fit writing into my schedule. Over the past few years, my life has been a bit topsy turvy with my job and I have struggled to find a good writing routine. I am hopeful to get that straightened out soon as possible. I have another series to get done!
It can definitely be a challenge, to fit writing into our daily lives. I had just gotten a good writing routine down when I unexpectedly had to start homeschooling my two boys. It took the better part of six months before I was able to get some sense of balance back. I know you’ll get there, and I’m excited to read your future work!
Erin, I know readers would love to know where to find you online. Care to share your website address and your social media links?
Website: https://www.erinclementsauthor.com/
Amazon: https://www.amazon.com/Erin-Clements/e/B08CRTMH99/ref=ntt_dp_epwbk_0
Goodreads: https://www.goodreads.com/author/show/20588336.Erin_Clements
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/ErinClementsAuthor
Thanks so much for joining me on the blog today, Erin! It’s been a pleasure to talk with you. Readers, if you’d like to check out the first two books in Erin’s series, just click the Amazon links below:
Belle Anderson left home as a teenager and vowed to never return, no matter how idyllic her world had been. Years and heartbreak later, she finds herself with nowhere else to go. Will she find peace with the heartache of the past? Can she reconcile the relationships of family and friends?
Blythe Anderson longs for a life that always seems just out of reach. When life presses in around her that life slips even further away. When the pain is too great how will she react? Who will she turn to?
Keep reading!
Shaen
*Photo by Sixteen Miles Out on Unsplash.
