For me, it was a startling epiphany - and I ended up writing this book, which I had A) never even thought of writing and B) knew nothing whatsoever about the topic! What got you started? And more importantly...what keeps you going? Best wishes, Katie

I was in Fowey, which is a very inspiring place on an estuary in Cornwall. An idea that had been floating around in my consciousness for a while, started burning a hole in my brain and I had to write it down.

Rosen...lol, you had me at "on an estuary in Cornwall..."

Gods, I wish I could see some success as you've had - just looked at your page where it says "In 2011 Rosen was an aspiring author. Writing was a hobby. The following January sales of her Kindle books took off. Her total download count is now approaching quarter of a million"... I have worked diligently researching and rewriting this book for years, first with an agent, and then on my own. Published July 23, and currently am selling one or two books a day. My husband says, be patient, Katie...it's a good book. But you know the feeling, I am sure....I long for it. I want to be a good, good writer!

So cool that your story idea just floated, and then, suddenly, stopped floating and started insisting. Fascinating! What changed?!

Be patient. Your book looks great - what a professional cover. Publishing is full of highs and lows. When was it out?

Commenting on this forum certainly won't hinder your book's success. You may have noticed that your books appear in the sidebar of threads you've contributed to. The forum is still quite new so traffic is low, but hopefully it will build with time.

P.S. Please can you edit the title of Viking on BookHippo.uk, as we don't allow the genre to be included in the title - the category fields deal with that. Also we don't allow all-caps unless there's a specific reason such as an acronym.

I've just joined BookHippo and - because I'm a Brit - it's quite refreshing to have UK based forums rather than the States - although they are useful also. (I actually live in Japan...)

I had always wanted to write a book from when I was young but I gave up when I had a career. So slow-forward to 6 years ago, I finally decided I'd have a try and that's The Game Master. I wanted to write for 9-13 years olds and upwards to produce a fun-filled book with different perspectives for them to mull upon. It has been a long journey of learning about the industry but it seems to be coming together and appears to be enjoyed - and that's the ultimate objective...

I was actually talked into it. I used to write a bit when I was younger, but stopped. I became an avid reader instead.

Then I came up with a plot, and the names of the characters, but thought I would always leave it there, with an untitled idea.

Then I was talked into trying and book 1 bgean. As I was writing, I came up with book 2 and 3, and then needed titles. As the books are thrillers with a sort of military background, I ended up with names from chess.

Then I found I couldn't stop, so I'm currently working on books 14, 15, and 16. I have slowed a little, as life has interrupted the flow, but I still do a little writing every few days.

Some of the books are based on what if's, and some are based on bits I pick up from news stories (or a possible backdrop behind the news).

I on the other hand never expected to write a book. Some time ago during a family get-together we had a conversation between twelve adults as to whom would be most likely to write a novel. This family group included three teachers. I was selected as the second most unlikely, just above my brother. My wife came first. Some years later I had this odd sci-fi dream, only unlike most dreams you would experience this one stuck and kept going over in my head. So I decided to put pen to paper and had my first novel completed in around three months. I have now finished my second which will be released in March 2017. I have now got the writing bug and foresee a number more. My wife I feel is a little jealous as she still will not read my novels and keeps saying that she will start one soon.

I’ve lived in Brazil for ten years and had been going through a particularly bad time. What happened to me actually sounded like something that might happen in a book, so I started to write the book (as a form of self-therapy, I suppose). It didn’t help, so I abandoned it, but I did discover that I enjoyed writing.

I started writing my first book (a contemporary thriller) which I wrote under my real name, mainly to see if I could actually write a book. (I’m about to re-work it) and publish it under my pen name Greg Krojac). Once satisfied that I did have the stamina to write a novel, I settled on concentrating on my favourite genre - science fiction

Wow, fabulous to find a UK based forum. I travel a lot with my job and found myself making up stories in my head to pass the time when driving. One story became too complex to fit inside my head so I decided to write it down and by the time it got to about 20k words I realised that it could actually become a novel. It took about 5 years from inception to publishing (largely because of my lack of writing experience, I rewrote whole sections as part of the learning curve) but I have almost completed the sequel in 9 months and hope to have it published after Christmas. I never planned to become a writer and hated English at school but have discovered that telling stories is very addictive.

What started me writing my first book? Well, it was an enquiry from a publisher's scout, at least that is what they claimed to be. I'd been writing stories for a website and out of the blue he approached me and asked me to write a story for them to publish. I did so but they didn't like it. But wouldn't say why. I thought it showed promise so I developed it more into a Novella that I called Worth Fighting For, which was the first book I published.

Being an eternal cynic I never really expected anything to come from the publisher but I can't complain, it got me thinking about writing books.