I was born and raised in Nairobi, Kenya and I’ve never actually stepped one foot out of East Africa. I don’t remember the first book I read; it was possibly some time in Kindergarten. I remember my mother telling a friend that I was reading fluently by the time I went to primary school. As I grew up, I generally almost always had a book in my hand; Famous Five and Nancy Drew, Sweet Valley High. Not to mention making up stories of my own. It was a common occupation in my family…By standard five, I’d graduated to reading Mills and Boon and James Hadley Chase. Then Stephen King, Robert Ludlum and Wilbur Smith. By the time I went to high school, I’d pretty much read every book my classmates were just beginning to discover. The Dark Tower series by Stephen King was my first experience of a story written in more than one book – I loved it…until I hated it. I picked up my first Anne Rice sometime in the middle of high school- Interview with the Vampire – where I first came to know the mystical New Orleans. I fell in love with the place and the people, and this love was enhanced when I saw a movie in which they showed a New Orleans funeral; where the band plays and dances as the coffin is taken to its final resting place. It seemed that New Orleans was a place like no other on the face of the earth. The Africans there are not like others. Although they are children of slavery, somehow, they had not lost the spirit of Africa, but had added to it to produce these beings of mystery and magic; everything seems possible in New Orleans- ghosts, vampires, magic, voodoo…all taken for granted by the human population. They inspire me. I completed high school in 1992 and went to the University of Nairobi to pursue a BSc. Degree in Botany, Zoology and Chemistry. Two years into my course, I was accepted to Makerere University to do BPharm. It was in Uganda that I found my second Anne Rice book; The Vampire Lestat. After that, I just had to read them all. I also got pregnant two years into my four year course and came back home to have my baby. Bringing up a child, going to school at Medical Training College, and then working at various pharmaceutical endeavours meant that I didn’t have much time to read anything not related to my job, or school. I hardly read a novel for seven years. I did manage to get through the entire Harry Potter series though. J.K Rowling is a genius. Then I walked into one of those books-for-exchange establishments that are proliferating in the city centre and picked up Outlander by Diana Gabaldon. I fell in love with the characters, the writing, the story…Its an ongoing affair, seven books in and waiting on book 8. In 2009, I left work as an active Pharmaceutical Technologist and became a full time academic writer. Being a single mom, it seemed the best option in order to be home for my son when he needed me, and still earn a living. As a result of spending so much time online, I discovered the Books and Writers Community on Compuserve where Diana Gabaldon Herself is known to interact with fans, other writers and aspiring writers. She and the community in general really taught me a lot and encouraged me with my efforts to finish writing a book, and maybe get it published. My first effort at a finished manuscript was ‘bringing up boys’ which got good reviews from the editor but one publisher thought that the writing was a bit too unfinished and the rest were possibly scams. Child of Destiny is my second finished manuscript, it has taken five months to write and it has been the most fun I have experienced since…ever.