Interesting origins of authors.

- Helen Hooven Santmyer. a librarian, saw her grand work, "And Ladies of the Club" published when she was 80 years old. 

- Agatha Christie's mother did not want her to learn to read and did what she could to keep Christie uneducated until the age of 8. The Queen of Crime wrote her first of  book on a dare (from her sister). A career that might not have been if not for sibling rivalry. She wrote sixty-six detective novels and fourteen short story collections. She also wrote the world's longest-running play, The Mousetrap, as well as six novels under the pseudonym Mary Westmacott.

- Patricia Polacco is dyslexic and has a learning disability and did not learn to read until she was 14. She is a well known children’s author who has published many books.

- Diana Gabaldon - editor of a software journal, and professor in scientific computation, decided to try writing a book "for practice", "to learn how". That book was Outlander, the first in an internationally successful series, and know an equally popular TV series!

- Louis L'Amour was a grade school dropout, worked as a cattle hand, frontiersman, sailed the world while working as a seaman on a tramp steamer, and won 51 professional boxing matches. During World War II, he served in the US Army as a lieutenant with the 362nd Quartermaster Truck Company. He wrote 89 novels, 14 short-story collections, and two full-length works of nonfiction) At the time of his death, all were still in print, and he was "one of the world's most popular writers".

- Erich Segal wrote a movie script and when nobody in Hollywood seemed interested he converted it into a novel, "Love Story". The novel spent more than a year on the New York Times best-seller list before being made into a movie starring Ryan O'Neal and Ali MacGraw.   

- Lee Child was fired from his job at age 40, and thinking "I have to earn a living" took up writing and went on to publish more than 20 best selling crime novels.

- J. K. Rowling was a penniless single mother on welfare who wrote on serviettes in cafes because she could not afford to buy paper, whose first Potter book was rejected by 14 publishers before it was accepted and published and became on of the best selling novels of all time.

- Stephen King wrote Carrie, his first novel, and it was rejected by 30 publishers. He threw it away and his wife retrieved it from the trash and encouraged him to keep working. It was eventually published. He went on to publish more than 63 novels, including seven under the pen name Richard Bachman, and five non-fiction books. He has also written over 200 short stories, most of which have been compiled in book collections.

- Madeleine L'Engle's book "A Wrinkle in Time", was rejected 30 times before being published and becoming a massive best seller.

- Terry Pratchett was a journalist, then a press officer for Central Electricity Generating Board, covering 4 nuclear power stations before becoming one of the UK's best known and best loved authors.

- Kurt Vonnegut dropped out of Cornell University to join the military. He was then deployed to Europe to fight in World War II and was captured by the Germans during the Battle of the Bulge. He survived the allied bombing of Dresden by taking refuge in a meat locker of the slaughterhouse where he was imprisoned. He went on to become a best selling author of many novels including "Slaughterhouse Five".



Do you have any interesting author facts? Please let me know, I'd love to share them!