KENYON, SHERRILYN
About Sherrilyn Kenyon:
About Sherrilyn
#1 New York Times bestselling author, Sherrilyn Kenyon lives a life of extraordinary danger... as does any woman with three sons, a husband, a menagerie of pets and a collection of swords that all of the above have a major fixation with. But when not running interference (or dashing off to the emergency room), she’s found chained to her computer where she likes to play with all her imaginary friends. With more than sixteen million copies of her books in print, in over thirty countries, she certainly has a lot of friends to play with too.
Writing as Kinley MacGregor and Sherrilyn Kenyon, she is an international phenomenon and one of the founding authors of the current paranormal craze (her first paranormal novel was published in 1994). She's the author of several series including: The Dark-Hunters, The League, Brotherhood of the Sword, Lords of Avalon and the forthcoming Nevermore and Chronicles of Nick. Her Lords of Avalon novels have been adapted by Marvel and her Dark-Hunter novels are now manga published by St. Martins and packaged by the talented Dabel Brothers.
Her books always appear at the top of the New York Times, Publisher’s Weekly and USA Today lists.
The Kenyon Minions are a million strong and growing every day, all over the world. Join in the fun!
And here's the story on how I got to where I am.
One of the questions that I'm asked over and over again is why I decided to be a writer. The only answer is, I didn't. I was born to be a writer. If you look in my kindergarten Brownie manual it has "When I Grow Up I Want to Be..." and scribbled in my awful handwriting is A writer and a mother. Ironically, neither one of those ever came easily for me.
I finished my first novel when I was 7 and I published it myself ;) Yes, I still have it. It was a horror novel about a little girl who killed off her brothers and it was even illustrated. I published my first essay in third grade in a local paper and made my first official sale at age 14. I wrote all through school (hey, it was the best way to daydream and be left alone--all the teachers thought I was taking diligent notes).
I stayed steady to my course, writing for the school newspapers, yearbooks and even local papers and magazines. In college, I hooked up with a buddy who had his own SF/F magazine he was publishing (his father owned a printing company) and I was well on my way to being a book author.
But sometimes God has other plans for us. At 20, I decided I was going to go for it. I'd been selling to magazines for years and had quite a resume built up. It was time to go for the book market. For months, I typed in my handwritten words and just as I finished the manuscript and it was ready for New York, my older brother died.
I was devastated. You see, Buddy wasn't just my brother. He was my best friend. My protector. And with him gone, I didn't want to write anymore. I honestly didn't want to do anything. It was the only time in my life that I was truly lost.
Three years later I married my husband. More than anything else, he helped me heal. As I was moving into his apartment, he found some of my old novels and said, "You know I remember how you used to write all the time. Why don't you do that anymore?"
I told him I just didn't and I tucked them away. But destiny wasn't through with me. I had moved to Richmond to be with my hubby and I couldn't find a job. Not even at McDonald's. It was horrible. We were dirt poor with a beat up Escort and Mustang between us. We had no table or chairs and only a bed, a stereo and a small TV in a tiny two room apartment.
I wanted to help support us and felt lower than low. I was talking to another childhood friend who was then editing for a magazine. She told me that they needed a couple of articles written. They didn't pay much and she knew I hadn't written for awhile, but if I wanted those they were mine. I jumped at it.
So I pulled my hubby's typewriter out of the closet (I had sold mine) and sat down on the floor with a cheap pack of typing paper and set to work on my article. No sooner had I started than I heard those voices that I had silenced. Once more my people were talking to me. I remember looking up at the ceiling and bursting into tears. For the first time since my brother died, I remembered why God had put me on this earth.
I was supposed to be a writer. By the time my hubby came home, I was surrounded by paper and I was still crying. He looked at the mess and with a confused expression asked, "What happened?"
I told him, "I'm writing!" After I explained everything, my wonderful hubby took me out immediately and bought a Brother Wordprocessor for me. Yes, he who hated to charge anything, broke out that almost unused card and charged me my very own wordprocessor (and a card table and $10 steno chair). It was there my first eight novels were written and there the first of the Dark-Hunter novels were started.
Almost two years later, I sold my first book. Not for a lot of money, but it was enough so that I could buy a real desk and after the sale of the third book I traded in my Brother for a real computer. you can see my workstation here complete with the hubby's typewriter on the white desk and my Brother on the black one. The boxes underneath are unsold manuscripts. The red chair was the good one I'd bought after the sell of my second book.
This was all the furniture in our living room, btw
Now here's where I remind you that my career wasn't easy. After six sales, it went south. I had won awards, I had had high sell-throughs. But none of that mattered. I found myself without a contract and with no prospects. As my career plummeted, so did my personal life. As my hubby finished up school, I became pregnant. We had planned everything carefully. I was going to work until the week before the baby was due (which would have been a month after his graduation). But life often throws big wrenches at our best laid plans.
I learned that I'm allergic to pregnancy (seriously) and even though all I have ever wanted was a baby, I had to fight tooth and nail to get him. He came almost seven weeks early and I barely survived it. He spent six weeks in NICU.
Because of medical bills and the fact that I couldn't work for much of my complicated pregnancy, we lost everything we had--which wasn't much. It was one of the worst times in my life. By the time my second son was born, again after serious complications (I told you I'm allergic to pregnancy), I was afraid we would never own anything again. But still I am ever an optimist. For my children, I was willing to fight. Driving a broken down beat-up Baretta we bought on installments from my younger brother for $800, I got a minimum wage job as a web designer (the internet was just starting to go big time commercial) and worked as hard as I could to feed my babies and to get us out of our tiny, rundown apartment.
All the while, I never gave up my dream or forgot the people who lived in my heart. I had $3.00 a day in my budget that I could spend on lunch for myself. More times than not, I spent that money on postage to mail out my partials to publishers--hey, I was really skinny in those days.
In 1997as my web work started to pay nicely, I had a brand new story, a pirate novel that I had started. I felt really, really good about this one. I sent it to my agent and my critique partner (a bestselling author). My friend called up and told me it would never sell--it was the wrong time period, wrong setting, etc. "Sherri!" she castigated, "No one will ever buy a pirate set in 1791! Have you lost your mind?" She asked if I ever wanted to publish again. Worse, my agent called and not only parroted that sentiment, she told me that though she had tried to sell me for the last three years, she couldn't and that she thought it best we go our own ways. To this day, I don't blame her. She stood by me when most people wouldn't have. It just wasn't meant to be yet.
Again I was devastated. But I was not defeated. After I scraped myself up off the floor for the umpteenth time. I decided to submit the book on my own. Just one problem. I didn't have enough money. So I wrote a single query letter to an editor. I pitched her the idea for my two favorite stories...Fantasy Lover and A Pirate of Her Own. She wasn't interested in anything paranormal, but said she would like to see the pirate book.
Saying a big prayer, I sent it off and within a week, I had a 3 book contract and Kinley MacGregor was born. Since then, I have been very blessed and to that I owe my readers so much gratitude that I really, truly can't express how thankful I am to you. (And as a side note to those of you who are writing an unpopular time period or subject--that book that my agent and friend said would never sell is still in print eight years later and is in its eleventh printing).
It was two years after I sold APOHO to Harper that St Martins bought Fantasy Lover and my Dark-Hunters. And yes, I am so glad that I didn't give up.
I think one of the greatest moments of my life (aside from holding my sons in my arms for the first time) was hearing the sound of my editor and agent on the phone the first time I hit the extended NYT and the official NYT best seller lists. But even those were marked by sadness. The first call came while I was on my way home after seeing my mother in ICU, and the other came just three days after she died. Every time I look up on my wall and I see that list with my name and title circled, it is bittersweet. But for three days, my mother would have been here to share the achievement I had spent an entire lifetime dreaming of. How many times did I tell her that I wanted to be on that list? She always believed that I could do it and when that call finally came, it hurt so much that I couldn't tell the one person who had always been there for me. The one person who never doubted me and who said, "I won't buy another book until you make that list." So I would buy the books and authors she loved and send them to her. I had a box of them that I was going to take to her when my brother called with the news that she would never get to read any of them. It's a box that still sits in my office.
My mother was the one I always looked to for courage. She never gave up fighting in a life that was never fair. She was and is my inspiration to carry on no matter what life throws at me. As she would often say, "the more lemons you have, the stronger the lemonade." Of course I would often challenge her with, "Yeah but too many makes it bitter." And my mother would come back with, "Only if you let it. The heart is the sugar. Yours is big enough to sweeten the orchard." She was a great lady whose absence is felt every day of my life.
And I have to say, that she was right. My lemonade is sweet and it is strong. Right now, things are looking good (I'm knocking wood like a maniac) and during those four years while I searched for a publisher, I did learn one lesson. Whether published or unpublished I am and will always be a writer. So for all of you out there who want to write, never listen to anyone who says you can't be what you want. Never give up your dreams. Believe me, I know it's hard. But in the end, those dreams are what see us through the hard times. That and the laughter of friends and family. Hold your friends, family and dreams close to your heart and fight for them all.
I hope you enjoy your visit! Please stop by and watch for my updates. If you would like to learn more about me, please visit my interview page.
Interviews with Sherrilyn:
This Week News 10/2/05
Crescent Blues 8/6/03
Publisher's Weekly 11/11/02
Publisher's Weekly 11/04/02
Publisher's Weekly 8/12/02
Sherrilyn Kenyon's Work:
Please go to the Dark Hunter page. |
