Interview With Rachel Hauck

Today at The Borrowed Book we're delighted to interview author Rachel Hauck.

1) Have you always wanted to be an author? If not, what made you decide to write, and how long have you been at it?

RH: I’ve always wanted to write. I started writing when I was six in a small red diary. I loved reading and stories, and escaping into other people and places.

I liked to make up scenarios in my head. Like, I wanted to meet Donny Osmond when I was a teen so I’d create a story line where I met him and he thought I was the most wonderful girl in the world.  Of course, we got our picture in Teen Beat or Tiger magazine. 

That's hysterical! I wonder how many of our readers can relate to this... 

But writing is a tough profession, especially novel writing and publication, and I wasn’t sure I’d ever be a published novelist, but a year after I was married, I quit my job and in that down time, I started writing my first book.

I love my job. Love it. Love telling people “I’m a writer.” It’s a fun conversation piece. But it is a solitary life. When I worked in the corporate world, I loved the camaraderie of a team atmosphere. Or at the end of the day, going home and knowing work was over for now. I could pick it back up in the morning. Or, that I’d solved a nagging customer support problem. I felt productive.

As a writer, I can spend ten hours at my desk, write 2K – 4K words between email, Facebook, a lunch break, three snack breaks and a visit to Pinterest, and not know if any of them are worth keeping. Tis the writing life. And it’s feast or famine. Either I’m on deadline, writing hard for four months or I’m waiting for a revision letter or a release and I have lots of free time.

But the core of me is a writer. So, I take in the entire life.

It’s fun too, you know, cause I have an excuse to be nosey. One time I was at a dinner with my husband’s co-workers, and they were new to us, and one young husband was not eating. The rest of us, including his wife, were eating, but he was not.

When I asked why, his wife grinned, waiting for his response. “I don’t eat food at other people’s houses.”

Seems he had a phobia about it and I drilled him for the next five minutes or so. I think I caused him to doubt his own fear.

It was pretty fascinating. He’d eat frozen food. At a restaurant. But not at someone’s house “because he didn’t know how the food was prepared.”

Oh boy! Fiction fodder.

Real life stories like that remind me people and life are fascinating. I don’t have writers block typically but when I get stuck, I just Google ideas or keywords to see what pops.

If that doesn’t work, I take a shower. There’s something about water and the creative process that go together.

I also get a lot of good ideas at the gym. There must be some kind of connection between being physical and letting the brain rest so you can think.

I love to go to spinning classes (bicycles not yarn) and there have been dozens of times I’d get a break through idea in the middle of class.

I’ve been writing full time for almost nine years. It’s not always easy. I’ve yet to match my corporate salary but I’d not want to do anything else with my days. My friend Debbie Macomber says she was a 25 year over night success. So I got inspiration and plenty of years to grow.

In my non writing life, I’m taken on walks daily by my mini schnauzer. I’m a worship leader at my church and on occasion, preach. Our senior pastor is a brave man.

I love college football and spring days in Florida.

I love my husband. And that is one of the reasons I write romance.

And I love your answers! Thank you, Rachel, for taking the time to be interviewed.

Readers, don't forget to stop by tomorrow to enter to win a free copy of Rachel's latest

release, Once Upon a Prince.

Rachel Hauck is the bestselling author of ACFW Book of the Year winner Sweet Caroline, RITA Finalist Love Starts With Elle, bestselling and RITA Finalist The Wedding Dress, and of the critically acclaimed fiction collaboration with multi-platinum country artist Sara Evans, The Songbird Novels. Hauck’s latest release, Once Upon A Prince, is already receiving rave reviews, including a Starred Review from Publishers Weekly.

Hauck earned a degree in Journalism from Ohio State University and is a huge Buckeyes fan. She worked in the corporate software world until 2004 when she began to write fulltime. Although she admits to being Yankee-born, Hauck has lived in the south most of her life and works her southern experience into her stories. She now lives in sunny, though sometimes hurricane-plagued, central Florida with her husband and writes from her own two-story tower.

She is the past president of American Christian Fiction Writers and now serves on the Executive Board. Hauck is also one of five author contributors to Southern Belle View Daily.

Visit her website at www.rachelhauck.com to sign up for her newsletter, read her blog and follow her on Facebook (Rachel Hayes Hauck) and Twitter (@RachelHauck).