Terri DuLong
Terri was born and raised in the Boston area.....Salem, the Witch City, to be exact. An only child, she drew on her imaginary friends for playmates. All these years later, Terri is certain that those playmates and her love for books is what led her to her passion for writing. However, it would be a circuitous route before she finally arrived as a bona fide author.
Married young, with three children, then divorced, Terri realized that education was the key and attended college to graduate as a Legal Secretary. After remarrying, with the children getting older, she decided to pursue a career as a Registered Nurse. During this time Terri continued her love of reading women's fiction. But her writing only consisted of extremely long letters to friends and keeping a journal. After graduating college as an RN and working in Critical Care, the thought of writing "seriously" became stronger and Terri took a creative writing class at college. Encouraged by the Professor, that was when Terri began writing with the possible hope of publication.
When Terri's husband was transferred with the airlines to the Tampa, Florida area she was working part-time as a home health RN and devoting more and more time to writing. That was when she began attending writers conferences to not only improve her craft of writing, but to learn the very complicated publishing industry.
A long thirteen years later, Terri's first women's fiction novel was released by a small press. When the press closed a few years later, it was back to square one. Attending more and more writers conferences, networking, reading, always working on her writing, Terri never gave up. She couldn't. Writing was her passion and filled her soul. Queries went out, rejections came back. But she noticed that the rejections became not form letters, but very nice personal correspondence. Understanding that there had to be an agent, editor or publisher out there that would love her work, she kept writing.
When Terri's husband retired in 2004, they relocated two hours north to Cedar Key, an island off the west coast of Florida. Having visited there for many years, they knew this was where they wanted to be. A small town, surrounded by Mother Nature. And Terri's muse went into high gear......lots of quirky characters, people who actually waved to you and knew your name, a place that touched her soul and she knew she was in her element.
Having completed a women's novel with the setting of Cedar Key, Terri attended the Romance Writers of America Conference, summer 2007. Upon returning home, she sent off a query to Kensington Publishing with the required first three chapters......and she forgot about it and got on with life. Continuing to write, read, enjoy her knitting and her days. Until December 11.......
That was when Terri received an email from her editor's assistant, requesting the full manuscript. And on Feb. 26, 2008 Terri was offered a two-book contract from Kensington Publishing. Finally.....and it was a long time coming......THEE call came! Terri's women's fiction novel will be released Autumn 2009.
Her motto is "Believe in yourself and make great things happen."
