Author Jadette Paige has a few things to say about challenges...and how they put her on the road to publication. Check out Jadette's website here and her new book, Blue Heaven, here. 


Leave a comment below and Jadette will randomly pick a winner for a free copy of her debut novel,  Blue Heaven.

I love challenges.  You know the ones where you feel dared to complete a goal in a limited amount of time. I guess, you could say I'm very competitive where my writing is concerned. I used to belong to a critique group that loved to issue writing challenges.  My favorite was the one where  Blue Heaven , my debut novel, was conceived. We were instructed to write approximately 1500 words using a song (our choice) and a picture that was assigned to us. I was given a painting of a knight kneeling before a lady. Easy, right, especially since I love writing fantasy and paranormal stories. The piece started with a mercenary entering a holy center to kidnap the land's holiest of men, the Godchild.  It was natural for the characters to be both male. I found their love story—yes, that is exactly what their story is all about—was endearing and enchanting. The more I wrote about them, the more they came to life until I ended up with a finished novel.



With this particular challenge, I learned one important aspect about my writing. I love writing in the male point of view. For some reason it feels natural.  It makes me wonder if in a distant past I wasn't a man. You never know.  All this makes me think about how challenges bring out the truth of one's abilities.  For me, it opened the door to an entirely new genre, one I'd never considered writing in. Several of my old critique partners were surprised at the path I decided to travel on. I normally wrote sweet romances. I still consider my romances sweet only they are gay romances and (grins) they are a bit hotter. So now with each day, I compose pages in my works in progress with an ease that surprises me, and it's all because of a simple challenge issued in the past.

If you take the time to check  Blue Heaven  out, please let me know. I would love to hear if I succeeded with their love story. Stryver and Blue would greatly appreciate it!


 How do challenges affect you and your life? Share some of the moments which led you to a realization about you and/or some part of your life.


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