Cole Poindexter interview

AUTHOR INTERVIEW

A little introduction:

Hi, I’m Cole Poindexter. I’m 28 years-old, from the small town of Iowa, Louisiana. I’m a full-time nurse, but writing is what I do for fun. I’m also married and I have three dogs that demand attention every day.

When did your love of books begin?

I’ve loved to read ever since I could pick out my own books, which was around the second or third grade. There were two huge books published in 2003 at that time, and they forever changed my life. Eragon, by Christopher Paolini, and Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix, by J.K. Rowling.

When did you start to have the wish to become an author?

It’s something I seriously started considering in about the fifth grade. However, as we grow up, we’re told to chase after realistic jobs and have very concrete plans before we graduate high school, right? So I dropped the dream of becoming the next Christopher Paolini (because it’s such a rare occasion), and I went off to college and had a wide range of different jobs. I finally went back to school in 2017, got serious, and got my nursing license in 2018. Now that I’m a few years into being a nurse, I feel like things have stabilized quite a bit and I can focus more time on writing stuff. I’d never dream of it being a full-time job, but writing is just what makes my heart happy.

How have you found the process for becoming an author?

It’s been really interesting. We’re living in a completely different age from what I grew up in. I grew up reading books from the early 2000s, you know? Traditional publishing was still huge back then. It was basically the only way to get yourself in front of an audience. Not much has changed since then, but it’s still changing a little bit, every year. I think self-publishing, e-books, Kindle Direct…all of those things are really experiencing huge growth right now, and it opens up a big opportunity for people who want to go after it and really work hard. It’s also been very nice building a small community on Twitter and connecting with total strangers. That’s not something that was around twenty years ago.

What would you say to those wanting to become an author?

I’d say definitely go for it. Chase your dreams! You never know when a risk is going to pay off. Someone somewhere could read your book and everything could change. You shouldn’t write just for the chance of striking it big on the New York Times, or for the money, because there’s definitely less money in writing than people realize. A lot less! Write because you want to, and write what you want to. Bring something unique and crazy to the table. People are doing all kinds of great stuff these days. I think a lot of boundaries are being knocked down and the lines are blurring between genres. It’s great.

Tell us about your book/books:

Inherit is my debut novel. The protagonist is Parker Derrick, a 31 year-old struggling artist who receives a mysterious letter from her great aunt on the same day that she’s burying her mother, who has recently passed from cancer. The aunt leaves Parker her giant estate in the small town of Jasper, Arkansas. Parker soon comes face-to-face with some very villainous family members that want to take the estate away from her. It forces her to completely change how she’s been operating her entire life.

What do you love about the writing/reading community?

I love that we all sort of ‘get’ each other, do you know what I mean? We all have a love of reading stories. We all love to escape into that imaginary world for just a little while, to get away. We all love to create. Everyone brings something different to the table, and that’s something to celebrate. There are a million potential stories and characters between all of us, and it’s just really cool to see where someone can take you with a story. It’s an amazing human quality to have, the ability to create.

If you could say anything to your readers what would it be?

I would just say thank you! When you put something out there, whether it’s a book, a piece of artwork, music, anything that you’ve created in your spare time – you never know how people are going to react to it. You hope that you have positive reactions, but that’s never a given. I would just say thank you to the readers for finding a story that I created one day in my head. Hopefully I get to do more of  it in the future.

Where can people connect with you?

You can find me on Twitter, @ColePoindexter1. I also have a website, colepoindexter.info. I’m working on building my profiles on Goodreads and Amazon authors, as well.