Meet Romance Author Colleen Donnelly -

Fellow Wild Rose author Colleen Donnelly writes beautiful award-winning historical romances that touch the heart.

Welcome Colleen

Is there an event in your life that affected you as a writer?

I will begin with my two favorite quotes.

“If journalists are sworn to the truth but fabricate, can we novelists who are sworn to fabricate write the truth?”

“Write What You Know…But Keep an Attorney on Retainer If You Do”

Not every event that digs the happily-ever-after out of a writer is pleasant. My first almost put an end to my wannabe days when I journaled my way across another country. A novice at writing and surviving foreign cultures, I daily logged my utter buffoonery alongside the comments a more worldly-wise co-traveler offered regarding my ignorance. Candid and honest about my mistakes and their observations, I wove raw human experience into the colorful backdrop of a beautiful culture. Coming home, I shared my almost comical journal with any who were interested, the whole of it finally catching the eye of an editor who offered to help me turn it into a novel or screenplay. Seeing my travel blunders in print or on the screen didn’t slow my “Yes!” down one little bit. But the idea of publicizing their negative remarks brought the co-traveler to a brash and quick, “No.”

Do your travels influence your writing.

That trip did. It gave birth to the writer in me, a new, though clumsy, experience that brought my soul to life as I logged it on the page. Follow that with the unexpected interest from an editor, and I was ready to write forever…until the firm “No” that forced my “Yes” into the same. My first story, the first fire that lit inside of me, the contrast and conflict of me vs a new place, and me vs the one pointing out my mistakes there came alive. Then the refusal to let me put their part of it into print brought about a death. One that lasted months, even beyond their apology once they regretted shutting my opportunity down. The writer in me did somehow survive. Eventually I picked up pen and paper again, and in time even cranked out an Amazon #1 bestseller…about pain and rejection, of course…what else?

Have you written a book that you love and have not been able to get published?

For a time, that would have been this travel journal. I was told by the editor it needed a love interest and conflict. That trip wasn’t about love, but he was right. My humorous bumbling and the conflict of having that pointed out to me at every turn, left this book rife with possibilities…but no hero or heroine destined toward love. Months after the co-traveler’s apology, I picked it up, repeatedly trying to turn it into what the editor suggested…this time on my own since the “No” forced him to move on. Dabbling with the journal merely proved the only love interest there was between me and my pen. True, conflict brought about a typical black moment when I laid my pen down, but when I finally picked it up again, this trip was no longer a part of that relationship. The happily-ever-after happened only in me.

What has been the toughest criticism given to you as an author?

Reference all of the above. Add a few asides made by the co-traveler that looked something like this— !@#$%+)&*(^! —and you have my first and toughest taste of unconstructive criticism regarding “Write what you know.”

What has been the best compliment?

In light of that particular journal, the best compliment was, “I’m sorry.” This other traveler eventually confessed they wanted to be seen as a hero. Every book needs a hero, but upon looking at their behavior on this trip, heroic wasn’t going to describe them. So today, in light of their owning their mistakes and how I’ve grown as a writer, I can end this long tale with what the editor wanted, and the way the co-traveler wanted to be seen. I no longer have to fictionalize that person heroically—apologizing was the heroic thing to do.

Mine to Tell by Colleen Donnelly

An Amazon #1 Bestseller

Annabelle Crouse is determined to reopen her great-grandmother’s boarded up house—and her shunned life. Many years earlier, after an unexplained absence, Julianne was relegated to a separate home by a rigidly unforgiving husband, and the Crouse women have suffered the disgrace of her assumed guilt ever since.

Despite her family’s strong disapproval, Annabelle is driven to pursue her mission through cobwebs and dust, finding the clues and the coded story left behind by her great-grandmother—Why did she go? And why did she return? Annabelle has to know.

Only one person, a man she grew up with but never noticed, stands with Annabelle as she discovers the parallels between her story and her great-grandmother’s—two women, generations apart, experiencing what love truly is.