A Blog for Writers: Women and Adversity, Karina Cooper, Part 1

Karina Cooper, Author, Paranormal Romance, Steampunk, Historical Urban Fantasy

Karina Cooper gave a presentation to Heart of Carolina Romance Writers in Raleigh, N.C. recently and made a hit with the audience. She specializes in writing about the dark side, paranormal romance, steampunk, and as she described it, the historical urban fantasy genre.  She said you are not bound by historical facts, and you can create a world of your own: her specialty. Her award-winning The St. Croix Chronicles is classic steampunk.

She agreed to participate in my Women and Adversity blog and included so many fascinating observations that I decided to divide her comments into FOUR posts. This is the first.

Question: What was the biggest obstacle you faced when you decided to become a writer?

Karina:  In all honestly, the only real difficulty I had to face was the same difficult everyone across the board faces—”how”? How do I actually become a writer, how do I make that first book while balancing a job or kids or married life or whatever else? I was fortunate in that I wanted to write a romance first, and as the romance genre is full of support for women in writing, I really clicked with the community in a lot of ways. The hardest part for me was in gaining the confidence to believe not only that my work was worth reading, but that I had it in me to do it over and over—each new book often feels like an uphill battle.

What obstacles did Karina have to overcome when she decided to write “on the dark side”? Sign up for this blog to get it in your email. It will appear May 22.