Why I write Dark Romance

My therapist recently asked me a question that threw me into a loop of more questions and deep thoughts.
She asked: How do you grieve?
At first, my answer came quite easy.
I grieve alone.

I’m not the kind of person who feels better when given a hug, I don’t reach out to friends or family to be consoled, and I don’t share my feeling even with the people closest to me. My husband knows that if I’m going through something, I want to be left alone. I pull away. I cry by myself and go through the motions until I get myself together and rejoin society.

Then my therapist asked: Have you ever tried sharing your pain with someone else?
I was baffled. Because the truth was very simply no. I have never tried, never wanted, or even thought about sharing my pain with anyone.
This is how I grieve. This is how I deal with loss, pain, fear, and everything in between. I don’t know how to do it any other way. I don’t share my feelings, and I don’t think I ever will be that kind of person.

It took me another few days to realize that I was lying to myself. Because I do share my feelings, I do share my pain, my fears, and my grief.
I share it all in every single book I write.

My stories might be fiction, my characters and their problems are made up, but nothing is more real than the emotion I put into my books.
Writing is my outlet, my way of dealing with all the things I normally keep bottled up inside.

Writing is such a crucial part of my life, and now, you are part of it too.

-C. Hallman

Authors Note from
Lock Me Inside