Conversations with BB Easton

Today we’d like to introduce you to BB Easton.

Hi BB, thanks for sharing your story with us. To start, maybe you can tell our readers some of your backstory.
I was a school psychologist in Gwinnett County when inspiration struck. At home on maternity leave, I began reading books on my phone as a way to stay awake during those dark, quiet, late-night feedings. I found myself oscillating between comedic memoirs and bad-boy romance novels, each one a palate cleanser for the other, and soon realized that I related to both the self-deprecating humor of the memoirs and the wild, toxic, sexy, dangerous experiences the romance novel heroines were going through. I’d had a very extensive bad-boy phase myself, before settling down with an accountant and having two children, one of which I was nursing as I read those stories, and I thought, “I could write these stories and not have to make anything up.” So I began journaling.

My stories were never meant to see the light of day, but as a mother and wife drowning in domesticity, giving myself a little time each day to revisit my carefree, child-free, cage-free life was intoxicating. I wrote dozens of stories in the wee hours of the night, just for myself, until a psychic in Sedona, Arizona told me, baby on my hip, that I was writing a book. “No. Sorry.” I replied, smiling apologetically. “I’m a school psychologist.” Her tone turned more serious, borderline angry. “You’re writing a book. It’s going to come through you in three years, and in five years it will reach new heights.” And it did.

Three years later, I published 44 Chapters About 4 Men, and two years after that, Netflix announced that they were adapting it into a TV series called Sex/Life. That show went on to become the third most-watched Netflix Original Series of all time when it aired in June of 2021, and I’ve been writing my own bad-boy romance novels ever since.

Would you say it’s been a smooth road, and if not what are some of the biggest challenges you’ve faced along the way?
One of the biggest struggles I’ve encountered during this transition from school psychologist to author has simply been what I refer to as “my happiness journey.” I was not happy as a school psychologist. I had worked very hard to become one—it requires seven years of college and three degrees to get certified—but in Gwinnett, school psychologists have two-to-three times more students on their case loads than the national recommendation. After nine years, I was burned out, overwhelmed, deeply discouraged, and the worst part was that my creative/funny/whimsical side, which used to be the biggest part of my personality, had all but died. I felt trapped in a career that was slowly killing the best parts of me, and it wasn’t until I re-discovered my love for writing and re-visited my past self through these stories that I realized I simply couldn’t do it anymore.

It was terrifying to quit the career I’d devoted almost half of my life to, but the moment I decided to choose happiness over obligations and expectations was the moment that doors I’d never dreamed of walking through began to fly open. That is the lesson, and that is the struggle. When I am true to myself and make decisions based on desire rather than duty, magic happens. Always. But I am still plagued with doubt, fear of failure, the need for certainty, and concerns about what others will think. “Leap and the net will appear” is easier said than done. But, I just keep reminding myself that when I am true to myself, when I pursue what lights my soul on fire, success always, always follows. Bliss be my guide.

Appreciate you sharing that. What else should we know about what you do?
In my early work, what set my books apart from others was that I blended a comedic memoir stye of storytelling with the gritty, racy, emotional elements of a bad-boy romance novel. I wrote about real relationships, real people, and my real experiences, but with the high suspense, high steam, page-turning style of fiction. It was like reading your favorite romance novel, but the heroine is real. And you can DM her on social media. And she’ll reply!

While it was fun for the readers to have this access to the main character of a book series, especially one about growing up in the late 90s and early 2000s, which is deeply relatable for so many, it was even cooler for me. I wrote these books as an exercise in selfishness. They were purely for me and my own self re-discovery, so having thousands of readers reach out to me and say, “OMG ME TOO!” made me feel like my work actually meant something. Like I wasn’t alone in my struggle.

Before we go, is there anything else you can share with us?
I get asked a lot how someone should go about becomming an author, and my answer is always the same: You’re asking the wrong question. If I had been trying to write a book when I started writing, it would have been terrible. I would have been striving to make a thing that I thought people wanted, instead of giving birth to the story of my heart which is what people actually want. So please, stop thinking about becomming an author. Erase the word “author” from your vocabulary completely. Just focus on expressing what’s inside of you. Explore what you crave most, and when the time comes, you will find other people who say, “OMG ME TOO.”

Contact Info:

• Website: https://www.artbyeaston.com
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/author.bb.easton
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/bbeaston
• Other: https://vm.tiktok.com/ZMeEKRLyS/

Image Credits
The image of me in front of the Sex/Life backdrop that I uploaded as my personal photo can be credited to Getty images. The last two of me standing at a tall round table signing books can be credited to Jack Hamm.