This as-told-to essay is based on a conversation with Brigid Kemmerer, a New York Times bestselling author of young-adult and romantasy novels . Kemmerer, based in Baltimore and now 48 years old, has worked as a full-time author for the past 10 years and has published at least two dozen books. The essay has been edited for length and clarity.
I’ve wanted to be a writer since I was 12, when a librarian I knew published her first young-adult novel.
Until then, authors might as well have been movie stars. Seeing a real person become one made writing feel like a possible career.
I started working in finance at 19 and eventually became a licensed…
