I Didn't Plan on Writing a Book. It Just Happened.

On New Year’s Eve, December 31st, 2023, something unexpected happened.

While most people were making resolutions, I found myself thinking about a character. Not a plot or a twist—just a character. Someone inspired by a real friend, living in a world I knew intimately: San Francisco. The Haight and Ashbury neighborhood. The very building I live in. The idea wasn’t fully formed, but it felt electric. I woke up the next day and started writing. I haven’t stopped since.

This novel is the first I’ve ever written, but it’s not the first time I’ve written something that mattered to me. Back in middle school, a friend and I wrote a play that we got to perform in front of the entire school. I guess, in a way, I was always drawn to storytelling.

But it was a friend—an accomplished, published author—who gave me the final push. Watching her chase her dreams made me want to chase mine. So I set a resolution for 2024: one chapter per month. And I stuck with it. I finished the first draft by the end of the year and spent the first quarter of 2025 polishing it, deepening the characters, and refining the prose. Now, I'm preparing to send it off to an editor for a final edit.

The story came to me in pieces. I didn’t plan everything. In fact, I didn’t know who the killer was or what their motive would be until I was halfway through writing. I knew who was going to die and how—but the rest unraveled one chapter at a time. Ideas would come to me randomly—during morning coffee, on flights for work, even in the middle of the day. I'd jot them down and wait for the moment when the whole shape of a chapter would fall into place. That’s when I’d sit down and let it flow.

Having a full-time job in corporate America makes writing after work just unrealistic. And that’s okay. I learned that inspiration doesn’t follow a schedule. For me, early mornings were best—quiet hours with coffee before the world got loud. Weekend afternoons. Plane rides. You find your rhythm.

My novel is a murder mystery, yes—but it’s also deeply personal. It’s filled with real places I’ve lived and walked through. The characters are built from fragments of people I’ve met throughout my life. And while it is a mystery, it also deals with grief, forgiveness, and the long shadows of childhood trauma.

One thing I knew from the start: I wanted to write an LGBTQ+ story. Growing up, I didn’t see myself in the books I read. This novel is, in many ways, for a younger version of me. It’s for the kid who needed to know they weren’t alone.

Now that it’s done, I carry the characters with me every day. They’re real to me. They exist in my life. They’re flawed, messy, beautiful people I hope readers will love—and maybe even hate—a little too.

I hope readers get swept up in the mystery. I hope the twists catch them off guard, that the cliffhangers make them keep turning the pages. But more than anything, I hope my story reminds people that even when life falls apart, you can always start a new chapter.

If you’ve ever had an idea that won’t leave you alone, write it down. If you feel like you have a story to tell, you do. Take it one day at a time. Don’t worry if you don’t know how it ends. Neither did I.