About The Author:
Sarah-Jane Lehoux has always had a passion for storytelling. From grade school tales of cannibalistic ghosts, to teenaged conversations with God, to her rebellion against adulthood with fantasy kingdoms and fairy magic, she has attempted to share her love of the quirky and unconventional with her readers.
She currently resides in Southern Ontario with her husband and her horde of Machiavellian cats. In addition to her own writing, Sarah-Jane works as an editor and freelance cover artist.
Guest Post:
Imagination is a gift all people
are born with. As children, we use this gift to explore our world, to learn, to
understand, to prepare ourselves for adulthood. Tea parties and
cops&robbers are not just ways to pass the time; they are rituals, instinctual
and pure, that help our minds expand to fit any number of possibilities.
So when people ask me where my
inspiration comes from, I don’t really know what to say. It’s a part of who I
am. As soon as I learned how to write, I was scribbling down stories, however
rudimentary they were (see attached). I was an author before I knew what an
author was. I was very perplexed when my friends started putting down their
dolls and picking up lipstick, because I wasn’t ready to give up my world of
make believe.
I learned to keep it hidden.
Grudgingly, toys were packed away and my day dreams were a dirty little secret
I kept to myself, lest I be laughed at (the most dreadful thing that can happen
to a teenager). I read voraciously, and I took great pleasure in any creative
writing assignment I happened to be assigned. I wrote a lot of angsty poetry
that will never see the light of day. I even tried to write a play for my
school’s drama club.
Writing was still a part of me,
even as I went off to university and immersed myself in textbooks and critical
thinking. And then came the real world and jobs, bills, relationships, and
mindless routine. I struggled with depression and social anxiety, and once
again, I turned to my imagination to relieve the pressure. In the half hour or
so after I went to bed but before I fell asleep, I lived any number of
different lives. I think that was my way of keeping sane.
Finally, after long years of this
numbing drudgery, I once again decided to try writing out the stories that were
swimming around my head. The effect was immediate and overwhelming. I felt a
rush of pleasure that I hadn’t felt in years. I looked forward to the end of my
work day so that I could hurry home and type out the snippets of dialogue that
had been circling my mind. Reinvigorated, even my dreams became more complex
and exciting. I used these dreams to further fuel my writing, and within a
year, I had finished my very first novel.
I sat back, astounded with
myself. I never thought I’d ever write a novel. And it wasn’t half bad. After
reading it over, I realized that I had a talent that I didn’t want to keep
suppressed any longer. I discovered that my general dissatisfaction with life
was that I wasn’t living up to my potential, and I wasn’t doing what I loved. I
decided then and there that no matter how long it took, no matter how difficult
the road, I would devote my life to writing.
It’s been a few years since that
epiphany. And the road has indeed been rough, rougher than I thought it would
be. I still find it difficult to say, “I’m an author,” when people ask me what
I do for a living, because it still seems a far off goal rather than a current
reality. All I know is that I am truly myself when I am writing, so there
really is no other option.
My Sanctuary:
Author:Sarah-Jane Lehoux
Release Date: May, 2012
Rebecca Dolores Kingsley, better known as Dot, is a precocious young girl with a lot to say. Despite the bleak Catholic orphanage where she resides, the indifference of the adults charged to care for her, and her painful past, Dot is determined to find the sense of safety and belonging that has eluded her since birth. Even if this means taking Kenny, a fellow orphan, under her wing and pretending to be a better mother than the one who abandoned her.
Together with a stained glass angel, Dot and Kenny form a make-shift family which shelters them from the cruel realities of life at the orphanage. But their bonds and Dot’s faith are tested by the world outside their sanctuary, and Dot must make a decision that no mother, real or imagined, should ever have to make.
Find My Sanctuary Online:
Happy reading until next time!
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