Emma Lai Guest Post

Today I'm welcoming author Emma Lai to the Authorial Moms blog! Emma is a super Twitter friend--I highly recommend following her. Take it away, Emma!

I’m one of those women who thought she’d never had a child. Then at thirty, we decided if we were going to be parents, we had to give it the old college try. A couple of years went by, jobs changed and the end of grad school was in sight, but still no baby.

 I took a year off to study for comprehensives, got bored and decided to write a story. After much encouragement and pressure from my wonderful family, I submitted, and lo and behold, I received an offer for His Ship, Her Fantasy: Mates of the Guardians Book 1, a short launched by the image of a woman talking to a space ship. Oh, the possibilities.

Wonderful news quickly eclipsed by finding out I was pregnant. (Of course this occurred the week after I accepted I wasn’t going to be a mother and instead would concentrate on growing my fledgling writing career.)

There was no morning sickness, no fatigue or cravings (except for beans, which is no hard thing to satisfy), but there was a horrible fog that seemed to keep my bottom firmly ensconced on the couch while an endless stream of movies played out on the television.

Somehow I managed to write another short, His Hope, Her Salvation: Mates of the Guardians Book 2 (inspired by the image of a desperate woman walking in on a couple in the throes of passion), but then baby was here, and the fog became impenetrable. I have only the vaguest of recollections of the first five or so months of my little one’s life. During a lucid moment, I managed to crank the following out.

Superwoman, I am not.

Baby needs

Changing, feeding, play.

Rinse and repeat.

Breakfast? Lunch? Dinner?

Oh yeah, a mom must eat, too.

Dishes pile up.

Laundry never stops.

What is dusting?

What is sweeping?

What is vacuuming?

Do the chores never end?

Time.

Where does it go?

Oh, that’s right.

Baby needs

Changing, feeding, play.

Rinse and repeat.

Then after the fifth month, the lights came back on, the “nobody’s home” sign was put aside, and I started writing again.

The funny thing is that though baby is now toddler the above poem still applies. So, when do I find to write? Sometimes it’s only thirty minutes here or there. Other times, dear hubby takes charge and I get hours. There’s no happy formula for me. No actual “rinse and repeat” for my daily schedule. But I have somehow managed to make it through the first couple of years with only a few additional gray hairs, a healthy and happy son and multiple published shorts and novellas under my belt.

Coming in April, His Capture, Her Rescue: Mates of the Guardians Book 3.

Masquerading as an American, Eallair, a Guardian Steward from another world, is searching Victorian England for the kidnapped mate of a fellow Guardian. When he meets Miss Harriet Cartwright, he knows her for the spirited, intelligent mate he has longed to find.

Since the death of their parents, Harriet has used her intelligence and sharp tongue to guard her sister from fortune hunters, but now that Prudence is close to choosing a husband, Harriet can consider her own future—one hopefully filled with adventure. When she meets Eallair, an American rancher who likes to travel and isn’t put off by her outspokenness, she is intrigued.

But before Harriet and Eallair can explore their attraction, she and her sister are kidnapped. While Eallair scours the countryside for them, Harriet discovers Eallair’s off-world origins. Now she must decide: just how much adventure does she want in her future? 

Website: http://www.emmalaiwrites.com

Blog: http://emmalaiwrites.blogspot.com

Twitter: @emmalaiwrites