We were lucky to catch up with Screaming Mimi recently and have shared our conversation below.

Screaming, looking forward to hearing all of your stories today. It’s always helpful to hear about times when someone’s had to take a risk – how did they think through the decision, why did they take the risk, and what ended up happening. We’d love to hear about a risk you’ve taken.

Picture it, Texas, 2014. Screaming Mimi was just a road name my husband gave me. Little did I know that road name would turn into my pen name and alter ego. At the time I was a stay-at-home mom, reading and reviewing books for a blog. I’d been introduced to several Indie Authors and became friends via social media them. That’s when it happened. I was minding my own business when the song “Drunk on the Plane” by Dierks Bentley came on the radio one day while I was driving. Suddenly this idea formed in my head, one where the guy in the song got a happy ending. When I got home that day I contacted two of my author friends, Dawn Sullivan and Dawn Walters and pitched them idea. Did they take my idea and run with it? Nope, instead they both told me to write it myself. Well I laughed at that idea, the only writing I’d done recently was for the reviews I was doing or for college. The last time I wrote anything remotely creatively was in Junior High in Mrs. Quasdoski’s class. There was no way I was going to be able to write an entire book. I sat on the idea for about a week or two. I talked to my fellow booklovers I’d made as friends and they too pushed me to write my story. So in September of 2014 I sat down at my computer and I started writing my first book “Submitting to Fate”. It took me approximately four weeks to finish writing it. I had zero expectations for publishing said book. So I sent it to my author friend Dawn Sullivan to get her opinion and to kind of to prove I’d done it. She was so excited she asked me if I would mind if she sent it to a friend of hers who had just started a hybrid publishing company called Kingsnake Publishing. I said sure why not, what’s the worst that could happen she says she hates it. A couple of hours later I was being asked to join Kingsnake Publishing as a new author. In February of 2015 my first book was published through Kingsnake Publishing. Shortly after it was published the company disbanded and I took a leap of faith and decided to go out on my own. It’s been 8 years since I started this crazy journey and every year I’ve grown more and more as an author. If I hadn’t taken that first leap of faith, that first jump off the proverbial cliff into the Indie World, I wouldn’t be where I am today publishing my 20th book.

Great, appreciate you sharing that with us. Before we ask you to share more of your insights, can you take a moment to introduce yourself and how you got to where you are today to our readers

I began photography back before the dawn of digital, when life was simpler and I thought my 110 flash camera was the bomb. I took that thing everywhere with me and took photos of all my friends posing on my patio behind my apartment. It would many years before I got my hands on my first digital camera. It was a 3 megapixel, huge square thing, that I’m still not sure how I travel with it like I did. My husband got it for me to take on motorcycle trips with him so we could snap pictures of all the things we did. After that first digital camera I upgraded several times, with smaller easier to travel cameras, eventually leading up to my 2 DSLR cameras I now own. Once I got into photographing other people I decided to invest in Photoshop to learn how to edit them. When I started writing I decided I wanted to do as much as I could on my own to save money so I went about learning how to make book covers using Photoshop. Once my youngest started Kindergarten I went back to school for Graphics Design to learn how to use not just Photoshop but all of the Adobe products that could benefit my business. When I got the opportunity to take a photography class I jumped at it. It wasn’t using digital at all everything was 35mm and in Black & White but I fell in love with the artistry of it. I don’t get to take photos very often anymore, between working full-time, writing, and taking classes for my English Masters there isn’t a lot of time left for my hobby, but I still love taking pictures whenever the chance arises.

Any resources you can share with us that might be helpful to other creatives?

I wish I had given my books longer on all platforms in the beginning. I gave up after only a few months because of lack of sales. I didn’t try pushing them very hard because I was told how big an influence Amazon would be on my sales. Last year after speaking to several other authors about it I decided to go what’s called wide. Meaning making my books available on all the platforms possible. I was blown away by how well my books did those first few months compared to how poorly they were doing just being on Amazon. Sales did dwindle for a few months leading up to Christmas but have since picked right back up.

What’s the most rewarding aspect of being a creative in your experience?

For me the most rewarding moments are during book signings when I ask a fan who they came to see and my name is on the list. Knowing that they enjoyed my work so much they wanted to meet me makes my day and never gets old.

Contact Info:

• Website: authorscreamingmim.wix.com/mysite
• Instagram: @screamingmimi79
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/1screamingmimi
• Other: TIKTOK: @authorscreamingmimi

Image Credits
SCPhoto Cover-Up did the complete Hades Rejects Series book covers. The model on Matt’s cover is Lance Jones, and the model on Holland is MaxOB on the front cover and the back cover is Saibra Sorensen. All other books covers were created by me. The image on Strippin’ Ain’t Easy is a local model Brandy Napolitano. All the other covers are stock images.