#WhatsYourStory Featuring Becky Clark

Becky Clark is the seventh of eight kids, which explains both her insatiable need for attention and her atrocious table manners. She likes to read funny books so it felt natural to write them too. She surrounds herself with quirky people and pets who end up as characters in her books.
Readers say her books are “fast and thoroughly entertaining” with “witty humor and tight writing” and “humor laced with engaging characters” so you should “grab a cocktail and enjoy the ride.” They also say “Warning: You will laugh out loud. I’m not kidding,” and “If you like Janet Evanovich, you will like Becky Clark.”

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I'm lucky enough to be a full-time writer, which means I get to do my writing between 9:00am and noon every day, instead of 9:00pm and midnight. Which is good, because it's hard to write when you're fast asleep.
 
I started writing when my kids were very young and I had a childcare business in my home. The naptime rules were that they didn't have to sleep, but they had to stay put and read or otherwise silently occupy themselves.
 
That's when I went upstairs and wrote. At that time I wrote short personal essays about whatever was on my mind. I envisioned myself the next Erma Bombeck. I sold a few of those and it was extremely gratifying. It also gave me the writing bug.
 
Fast forward several years to my son and me at the public library. He wanted to find some historical fiction written for boys, but precocious as he was, he'd already read everything they had. As we left, he threw down the gauntlet. "Why don't you just write one, Mom?"
 
I didn't do everything my children wanted, but I did this. I had a lot of help, though. Several organizations and people came to my rescue: Colorado Independent Publishers Association, Society of Children's Book Writers and Illustrators, and Pikes Peak Writers.
 
Many marvelous people taught me strange and wonderful things I didn't even know I needed to know and I got that book published, and into the hands of kids, one who told me he didn't like to read until he read my book.
 
Again, that writing bug chomped. Hard. And hasn't let go.
 
I wrote six or eight more manuscripts for kids, each one teaching me how much I still needed to learn. And then I made the leap to writing mysteries for adults. I became more involved in Pikes Peak Writers, and other writing organizations, teaching workshops to pay back the help I'd received over the years.
 
Getting involved in writing organizations is the advice I give everyone who asks me how to get started in a writing career. You meet fantastic and generous writers, some further along the path than you are, some further behind. You learn from both types. It's where I met most of my friends and many of my inspirations. Writer's conferences bring in editors, agents, and bestselling authors. And you get to chat with them.
 
As my mysteries found an audience, I was able to kick it up a notch, join Sisters in Crime (and help found my beloved Colorado chapter) and attend mystery fan conventions. Not put on for writers, but for readers. And I was able to hobnob with tons of mystery authors at conventions like Left Coast Crime, Malice Domestic, and Bouchercon.
 
Guess what! Even very famous ones are down-to-earth and generous! In fact, at Bouchercon 2017 I made a plan to stalk a bunch of authors to ask if they'd blurb my upcoming title FICTION CAN BE MURDER. I nervously clutched my ARCs, trying not to get them all sweaty, but I was nervous for absolutely no reason. To a person, they all said they'd be happy to read and blurb. Of course, it didn't work out for all of them in the end due to time constraints and their own writing deadlines. But I was never made to feel 'less than' or 'junior.' When asking, I always made sure to acknowledge that what I was asking of them was a huge imposition and that there really wasn't anything in it for them. They all pooh-poohed that, telling me, "People did this for me, and I want to do it for you."
 
Writers are inherently generous. I don't know why, but they are. I heart them.
 
I like the image of writers ahead of me on the career path stretching one hand back to me to help pull me along, while I have my other hand reaching back to help pull someone else along.
 
Because of all these helping hands, I have the first book — FICTION CAN BE MURDER — in my new Mystery Writer's Mystery series getting ready to launch in April 2018.

Fiction Can Be Murder

​Mystery author Charlemagne Russo thought the twisty plots and peculiar murders in her books were only products of her imagination. That is, until her agent is found dead exactly as described in her unpublished manuscript. Suspicion swirls around her and her critique group. Which of her friends is a murderer?

















​Becky’s website …. https://beckyclarkbooks.com/
 
Follow Becky Clark on Amazon … https://www.amazon.com/-/e/B004NQO14I
 
on Facebook at Becky Clark Author … https://www.facebook.com/BeckyClarkAuthor/
 
and at Goodreads … https://www.goodreads.com/author/show/4730815.Becky_Clark

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