When the Heart Brings You Home by Robin Maderich Book Tour. Guest Post ! {Ends 12/2/22}

Robin Maderich – The Footsteps I Follow: Authors I Admire

Following in an author’s footsteps is not quite the same as admiration for an author. I mean, I greatly admire J.K. Rowling and her storytelling ability, from her writings as
Robert Galbraith (Cormoran Strike series) to the Casual Vacancy, to the works for
which she is most well known: the Harry Potter books. I can’t help but be overwhelmed by the success of the latter. I’ve enjoyed every single book in the series, multiple times.

But is that to say I aspire to follow in her footsteps, to be as successful, to emulate her worlds, to be as fabulously wealthy? I can’t say that I do. (Well, the wealthy part would be nice…) Although I admire her, I can’t even imagine myself tiptoeing along in the footprints left by her shoes, because it is not who I am. It would be disingenuous to try to fashion myself into someone I’m not, in the hopes of garnering even some successes that have been hers. I am who I am as a writer, fashioned and formed from my own experiences, my own voice, my own struggles. However, if there is anyone I had ever hoped to be like, it is an author whose name might not be familiar to readers of a certain age.

Mary Stewart (Lady Mary Stewart, I recently learned) was an author whose popularity existed at its height in the 1950s and 1960s. She wrote the most wonderful, critically- acclaimed romantic suspense. Her prose was elegant, her stories rich in detail without ever being encyclopedic. Her most popular books were likely her Merlin series, though, the first of which was published in 1970.

At thirteen years old, after being gifted with The Crystal Cave by my mother, I devoured the book from cover to cover and then
immediately delved into it again and again.
Mary Stewart’s writing was like a magic elixir to me. It supercharged my goal to
become an author, a goal I had set for myself in the third grade. I consumed the rest of the series as the books became available, but also sought out all others I could find—a great many of which were in my mother’s library. Who would have thought?

My respect for this writer became deep-seated, my admiration of her lovely, evocative language, her ability to hold my attention, to wrap me in her tales, inspired me.

So, I would have to say footsteps and admiration met in this amazing author. I will never be her, of course, but she will always be a huge part of who I am as a writer and a person.