I have known the lovely and grounded, Rebecca Quarles for better than a decade. When we reconnected last Spring, it was as if no time had passed! When I found out that she was writing, and still very much in love with the craft, I had to know more about her process and future projects. Between her full-time day job, and the release of her fourth book in the Running Away from God series, she sat down with me for an interview.
SG Writing Services: How did you start writing?
Rebecca Quarles: I initially started writing when I was in high school. I was in an African American studies class. The teacher had us do some writing assignments and suggested that I stay after school to join the African American Poetry club. I did that until my sophomore year.
Rebecca Quarles:
I am currently published about 700+ locations including, Amazon.com, Lulu.com and Barnes & Noble.
RQ: Currently I am working on the spin-off of my first series that I just finished. I don’t have the name of it yet, but I am extremely excited about it. It’s completely different that anything I have ever written.
RQ:
No, I do not. I am a sporadic writer. Sometimes I will get ideas and I can jot them down and at other times I can write for 2-4 hours. Consistently writing multiple chapters in one sitting.
RQ:
That this is trurly my hearts desire and there is a lot of relatable messages in the characters that I write about. You can read these chapters and identify certain traits that you may have or someone you know. I wholeheartedly want people to get the messages and learn from them.
RQ: Joys? Coming up with complicated characters and making their stores intertwine.
Challenges? Finding the time to write. I work a 9-5, so I believe if I didn’t have to work, I would have more time to write and could get a lot more done.
RQ:
Enjoy what you do, don’t stop being creative and don’t allow what others think you should write about deter you from what you want your book, poems, spoken word pieces to be. You are the producer of your writing. Allow your heart to help you write. If you come up with an idea, jot it down. Even if you don’t use it in your current project. You can potential use it for another one.
Stay focused!
