HOW I CAME TO WRITE THIS BOOK: Joelle Charbonneau

SKATING AROUND THE LAW is Joelle Charbonneau's first novel.

How I came to write the book

My first career choice was a stage performer. Yeah – I know how to pick the stable careers, don’t I? Musical theater, opera, operetta, children’s theater – I liked them all. Somebody wrote lines and music, I memorized them and the story came to life on the stage. Then coming home one day from a performance I had an idea for the opening line of a book. I’d always been an avid reader, but had never written anything longer than a term paper. I have no idea why I decided to write that book. But I did and while no one will ever read it (and trust me – no one ever should), I learned I liked to write and decided to try it again.

Several books later I attended a writing conference and ended up seated at the bar– because that is what one does at writing conferences. I was seated with a couple of writer friends and an agent who was attending the conference. For whatever reason, my performing career became the topic of conversation and someone at the table asked if my parents were performers.

My answer was “No, but my mother is a world champion artistic roller skater.”

Everyone looked at me as if I’d just hit them upside the head with a dead fish. The agent was the first to recover. She looked at me with a smile and said “You should write a roller skating book.”

We all laughed and the conversation moved onto other things. There was no way I was going to write a roller skating book.

Ten days later, I wrote the first chapter of Skating Around the Law. It just goes to show you never know where the idea for your next book is going to come from. I certainly don’t.

This is Joelle's first novel. A second book in the series will be published in September, 2011.