I can hardly remember a time I didn’t write. When I was eight I wrote poetry—thankfully there are no surviving examples! At ten, I started a novel about a boy who is kidnapped and such a trial to his kidnappers that they try to give him back. Ten pages in, I came across The Ransom of Red Chief by O. Henry. Being ten, I didn’t realize the same plots are used over and over in writing and I could still write my version of this plot, so I set it aside.
I wrote and bound stories to put on my classroom bookshelf. As an assignment, I wrote The Night the Sea Turtle Went Down, ending with the narrator putting the story in a bottle and casting it on the waves. I turned in the assignment in a bottle. I wrote plays and short stories in college and finished my first novel at 23, staying up late after my young children had fallen asleep.
At 24, I stopped writing ‘for the sake of my marriage.’ It didn’t help because, as I later understood, my writing never was the issue. After years of gaslighting, lies, and other issues, I needed a reason to get up in the morning. I needed to remember who I had been. Not writing had not helped my marriage. I was pregnant with my ninth child. I knew I had to find better ways to handle the chaos in my life, for the sake of my children.
With NaNoWriMo just starting, I decided to write again. I went with an idea that had been kicking around in my brain—a tale of time travel, no doubt influenced by my favorite childhood novel, In the Keep of Time about four children in the mysterious time-altering Scottish keep, Smailholm Tower. I wanted it to be a story based on the lyrics of a trombone piece I had played, a theme and variations on the folk tune Blue Bells of Scotland, whose lyrics speak of waving banners and noble deeds. It was a story I wanted to read—that had not yet been written. I set out to write it.
I started NaNoWriMo on November 3rd, 2005. I needn’t have worried about starting two days late. The story flowed! Shawn, Niall, Amy, and Allene acted and spoke and I merely transcribing their lives, rather than creating them. I wrote 103,000 words in 28 days!
In September 2006, I joined Night Writers, a phenomenal group of talented authors. I give them all credit for helping me polish the first draft of Blue Bells of Scotland…and eventually the entire series.
I wrote by an open window listening for my kids playing in the fenced back yard. I wrote as boys fought Nerf gun battles around me. I wrote early in the morning, late at night and when students didn’t show up for lessons.
Everyone is born to do something. The doctor who delivered my second son was born to deliver babies! He was so joyful about his work! I feel the same ‘rightness’ in writing. Writing brought me back to who I was. I joked that I was happier in my medieval dungeon than in my real life—yet writing brought me back to joy in my real life. I regained confidence I’d lost; found I had worth in the world, that the Night Writers saw good in me.
I met wonderful people—in my critique group, among writers I friended online and eventually in readers around the world. I corresponded with a man in South Africa who loved my books. His daughter contacted me after he’d died. I met my friend Elaine in Scotland because she read my books, and was blessed to have two visits with her before she died.
Writing led to hosting a podcast, meeting many wonderful writers and having experiences I never would have had. As a result of my books, I visited Smailholm Keep, from In the Keep of Time, and even met in person the author of that book!
In writing about medieval Scotland, I sought authenticity—what is it to climb hills in leather boots or swing a claymore? This led to finding my Irish Wolfhound, Liadan, a descendant of ‘the Laird’s great hunting hounds.’ She is one of the great joys in my life.
Writing helped me greatly after my divorce. Income from my books was vital when I was a single mother to seven of my nine children still at home. (Don’t confuse that with Seven of Nine! She wasn’t there!) I teased my kids, when I bought things they needed—Thank Shawn and Niall! They paid for it. They said people might get the wrong impression about Shawn and Niall!
I’ve since remarried. My husband says he loved the books so much he married the author. Although he met me before he knew about my books, there’s some truth in his words and he’s the greatest blessing in my life.
I once read a quote: Be the author of your own story. In my darkest years, someone to whom I had offered that advice offered it back to me. It set me on my own journey, which has brought me through difficult times, to wonderful things and great joy.
This is just the beginning of the journey. I look forward to books to come!
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Laura Vosika is the author of the beloved Blue Bells Chronicles, in addition to other works of fiction, non-fiction, poetry, and a collection of music. She is currently working on several other novels, a non-fiction book on raising a large family, and Theology of Music with her husband Dr. Chris R. Powell.
Laura grew up in the military, visiting castles in England, pig fests in Germany, and the historic sites of America’s east coast. She earned a bachelor’s degree in music, and worked for many years as a freelance musician, playing trombone for pit orchestras, ballets, and symphonies, and flute and harp for other venues. She spent three years as a member of the Buz Whiteley Big Band and Farragut Brass Band in Bremerton, WA.
After earning a master’s degree in education, she took a job as a music teacher and band director. She has also taught private lessons on wind instruments, piano, and harp, for more than thirty years.
In her spare time, Laura likes to play piano, harp, and flute, do sudokus, and learn Gaelic.
Laura co-hosts Books & Brews with Michael Agnew, Minnesota’s first beer cicerone, interviewing a new author every month; and Wordsmiths & a Wolfhound: happiness through the arts and self-sufficiency with her husband.
She lives in Tennessee with Chris and Liadan, their Irish Wolfhound much like the great hunting hounds that once roamed the Laird’s halls. Together, Laura and Chris have 10 children.
Find out more about Laura on her website https://www.bluebellschronicles.com/
BLUE BELLS OF SCOTLAND
Shawn Kleiner has it all: money, fame, a skyrocketing career as an international musical phenomenon, his beautiful girlfriend Amy, and all the women he wants– until the night Amy has enough and abandons him in a Scottish castle.He wakes to find himself mistaken for Niall Campbell, medieval Highland warrior. Soon after, he is sent shimmying down a wind-torn castle wall into a dangerous cross country trek with Niall’s tempting, but knife-wielding fiancee, pursued by English soldiers and a Scottish traitor who want Niall dead.
Thrown forward in time, Niall learns history’s horrifying account of his own death, and of the Scots’ slaughter at Bannockburn. Undaunted, he navigates the roiled waters of Shawn’s life– pregnant girlfriend, amorous fans, enemies, gambling debts— seeking a way to leap back across time to save his people, especially his beloved Allene. But he finds himself liking Shawn’s life…
