Christine Hannah is an American novelist. She is the author of best-selling novels and winner of numerous awards, including the Heart of Gold, Maggie and the 1996 National Reading Choice.
About me:
1960 was my year. September. Yes, I am Libra, and classic. For me, the whole world is made up of shades of gray. I look at the problem from all sides and it takes me a long time to make a decision. The first time I took up my biography, I couldn’t decide (a) if it was a good idea and (b) what to say.
Still, here I am sitting with a pen in my hand, ready to tell you a little bit about myself. I was born in Northern California and grew up on the beach building sand castles and riding the waves on a board.
When I was 8 years old, my wild, wonderful, adventurous father ripped the family off the ground, put us all in a minibus, and we headed forward into the unknown. Mom, Dad, three kids (I was the oldest), and a dog. We were told to choose the most beautiful place on Earth.
Six weeks and ten states later, we finally got to where we live. West Washington. Incredibly green edge with huge trees, sparkling blue lakes, and rain that almost never stopped pouring.
I grew up and learned to dance in the disco era. Then, to everyone’s surprise, she quietly graduated from law school, got married and gladly plunged into law.
But it turned out that there was something else I wanted a lot more...
During my pregnancy, when I had to spend five months in a hospital bed, I read all the books I had in the house, and from boredom I slowly began to go crazy. Then my husband reminded me of a book I started writing with my mother (she died quite early).
That's how it started. I took out boxes of records, dusted them off, and I thought. I can do that. Then I bought a computer, spent a week studying how to use it, and started writing. So, very simply, I fell in love with writing. By the time my son was born, I had finished the first one and could not stop. I wrote in every spare moment (and there were not many of them with a baby in their arms).
At first, of course, there were rejections of publishers, but this only made me work even harder. In 1990, I finally got the go-ahead and went from being a young mother to being a professional writer. Since then, I’ve been telling love stories to readers. God has blessed me to be a wife, mother and writer.