Today we’d like to introduce you to Eva Haining.
Hi Eva, so excited to have you on the platform. So before we get into questions about your work-life, maybe you can bring our readers up to speed on your story and how you got to where you are today?
I have been a notebook hoarder since I was a kid back in Scotland. I would write the first line of a story idea, and salt it away on a shelf. I didn’t think anything of it until I went to University. Somehow, even though I went to study business, I found myself drawn to English Literature. I became enthralled by the perfect paragraph, and the very nature of how linguistics form our means of communicating ideas. By the end of four years, I did my honors in Linguistics. A love for reading became a lifelong passion in those lecture theaters. As most people do, I left University and found a job that would pay the bills, and it had nothing to do with literature. It wasn’t until I got married and had my first child, that my love for books came back into my life and honestly saved me from myself.
After a very traumatic birth, and almost losing my life two weeks later, I started an ongoing health battle. In and out of hospital, I endured many operations, and with each new assault on my body, autoimmune issues were triggered. I felt lost in my own life, and reading gave me somewhere to escape the confines of my body.
As time went on and I gave birth to my second child, my desire to write became a driving force. Through another barrage of surgeries and diagnoses, I wrote my first book. I intended it to be a short story, but the characters had other plans. That book became a series. That series became one of many.
I’ve taken a few different paths to get where I am now, which included going down the traditional publishing route for a few years, but in my heart of hearts, I knew I wanted to be the master of my own destiny, and so I got the rights back to my work, and threw myself fully into indie publishing. A few months after making that decisions, the pandemic hit, and reading became a luxury people couldn’t afford due to such loss of jobs, security, and lives of loved ones. It truly humbled me to release my work during such a difficult time for humanity, and to have so many readers support and fall in love with my characters.
Not many people get to pursue what makes their heart sing in this life, and I wake up grateful every day that I’m able to write and share my work with such an amazing community of readers.
We all face challenges, but looking back would you describe it as a relatively smooth road?
Smooth sailing isn’t something I’m accustomed to. Everyone who knows me would agree. Just walking in a straight line without literally stumbling and falling over my own feet is a struggle. I suffer from a number of health issues which have made life challenging at times, but it makes the victories all the more important when they come.
When we started our family, it kickstarted a lot of health issues for me, and although I have a wonderfully supportive husband, who held my hand through countless surgeries, reading became my fortress of solitude. Through reading, I found my way to writing, and he championed me every step of the way. People have preconceived ideas about romance authors, and romance novels in general that are so outdated, and even offensive at times.
I know better than most—I grew up in a very religious family, and when I wrote my first romance novel, it strained those relationships to breaking point.
What no one else could see, was that writing gave me a way to shed my insecurities and find my way back to feeling desirable. It paved the way for me to connect with my husband in ways I’d found difficult even before all the surgeries. I grew up being told that sex was bad. Don’t do it. Don’t shame the family and arrive on your wedding day unable to wear the white dress.
Those ideas that are drilled into your mind as a young woman are hard to shed when you become a wife. There isn’t a switch that you can flip and suddenly change everything you’ve been told your whole life.
When I started writing, it gave me a safe space to explore what it is to be a woman, and a wife, and to find a way to be a mother without letting go of pieces of myself. People that judge the romance genre as somehow less than others, are so ill informed.
I never get messages from readers who want to discuss a raunchy scene I wrote. Never. I get messages from women all over the world who have faced similar struggles, and had expectations forced on them. Women who were able to find themselves again in the worlds I create. Stories of marriages saved because they started opening up and discussing their relationships. Women who finally spoke up for themselves to their families because reading gave them confidence.
In today’s society, we are taught as women to be everything to everyone, twenty-four-seven. When I write, it is to connect with those women who are out there, showing up for their families every day and asking nothing in return. To let them remember what those first magical moments felt like, when love sparks to life. We are told that it’s all lovely in the beginning, but to expect romance to dwindle over time. I don’t agree. Romance isn’t flowers and chocolates. For me, it’s my husband sitting at my hospital bedside, making jokes to lift my spirits. It’s him telling me he loves me every day. And it’s both of us making an effort to foster not only our friendship and respect for each other, but to show up and continue to desire one another. It’s a choice we make every day, and the fact that I have readers who reach out to tell me that my books helped them start showing up again for their spouse, is a level of success I can’t put a price on.
Alright, so let’s switch gears a bit and talk business. What should we know about your work?
I am a romance writer. I write contemporary romance novels that will make you cry, and probably want to throw the book across the room at some point. I also write lighthearted romantic comedies with flawed characters who make a mess of romance and find a way to love the flaws. I released my first rom-com in 2020 at the height of the pandemic, and that series took on a life of its own, and continues to do so two years later. I think we all needed to find levity during such a scary time, and my characters managed to tap into that. I would hate to admit how many of the bumbling, laugh-out-loud moments in that first rom-com came from a late-night conversation with my husband about how accident prone I was when we started dating! If it seemed too far-fetched, it was probably one of the true-to-life moments I drew from. I also write paranormal romance, which is a series heavily based in the theology I grew up immersed in, but with a dark twist on how we view the good and evil in this world. It’s based on the premise that the seven deadly sins aren’t a concept, but rather physical beings who walk the earth as the marionettes to our destruction. It’s a passion project of mine as there are no limitations to what I can create, and I’m thrilled to say that there are some exciting things going on behind the scenes with this series, and I hope to be able to share more on that next year.
If you were to ask what sets me apart from others, I would say I write what is in my heart. I never write to market, and I won’t write characters I don’t fall head over heels in love with. I’m not afraid to be different, or seen as a bit of an oddball in real life! I write about love because I am so grateful I get to live my happily ever after each and every day. I found the love of my life, my best friend, and my ride-or-die person. I get to wake up each morning and know that I am loved and safe, and protected by a man I respect, and who still gives me butterflies 22 years after the day we met. How lucky am I? And so I write about the excitement, joy, heartbreak, and passion that comes with finding ‘the one.’ Life and love aren’t always an easy journey, but the struggles are completely worth it.
Do you have any advice for those looking to network or find a mentor?
As a writer, I think many of us are quite solitary by nature, so networking can be difficult at times. For most of the author community now, social media is a place to connect with other authors, readers and bloggers. There are conferences you can attend for writers, and meet some amazing people face to face. For me, finding the right team of editors and beta readers has been the biggest thing. If you want to be a writer, you have to learn your craft, constantly push yourself to keep improving, and step outside your comfort zone. I found people who will always strive to help me put out the best book I can. They let me know what they love and how my characters make them feel, but they’re not afraid to call me out when something isn’t working, or they straight-up hate a chapter or scene. All writers need to find those people who won’t just be ‘yes’ men.
The biggest lesson to learn as a new writer, is to take constructive criticism. Take your time. One of the major issues with emerging writers at the moment, is lack of editing. It hurts everyone in the industry when this happens. Don’t put your work out there until it is of a standard you would be happy to pay your hard-earned money for when you walk into a bookstore. Readers deserve your very best, and you should never take it for granted that they choose to spend their money buying your work. It’s a privilege to have readers buy and read your novels—not a right.
Contact Info:
- Email: eva@evahaining.com
- Website: www.evahaining.com
- Instagram: www.instagram.com/evahainingauthor
- Facebook: www.facebook.com/evahainingauthor
Image Credits
Melissa Bennet Photography
