MY STORY

I fell in love the first time I wrote a story. I was 9, and it was five pages of an island-treasure adventure. Then high school happened, with its reading lists and AP Lit exams, and somehow, my secret wish to write fun, entertaining stories morphed into a dream to write—ahem, pen—the Great American Novel. Sadly, practicality and parental pressures prevailed, aaaand … I became a pharmacist.

And then I spent the next 18 years planning on writing a literary masterpiece. Honest, I did. But when life is happening, and the expectations on you are piling up, and the I shoulds are winning, it’s hard to find the energy or to make time for something that isn’t lighting you up on the inside.

Then my father died. And later that year, our son’s nanny made me download the whole Twilight series. (Some things in life are weirdly random. Just go with it.) I devoured those books, and it reminded me of all the stories I made up in my head as a teenager. If I were going to die the next day, would I really want my island-treasure adventure to be my crowning literary achievement?! Obviously not! So I opened a Word doc and started writing a sweepingly romantic, anything-goes novel about a girl who looked like me and a boy who was fated to be hers. (Hi! My name is Shaila, and I’m a hopeless romantic!) That story became my first published book, Soulmated, and the first in a trilogy. (Thanks, Dad, for the push!)

Oh, and there was ZERO expectation of it being a crowning anything! It was just pure fun for me. And yeah, the story happened to reflect some of the immigrant struggles I’d dealt with growing up, but there was also a spark of something else too. Eventually, I realized that all of my work seemed to explore themes of defying expectations. (Notice my tagline?)

Some part of each main character’s struggle mirrored my own journey through life–obviously not in the specifics, but in enough ways for me to see a pattern. Like how I’d inadvertently accepted that to be a “real author” I should be writing literary fiction—which is just plain not true! And that pursuing my dreams had to come at the expense of being practical or sensible—which aren’t things that are mutually exclusive. And that being a woman who doesn’t fit some cultural mold isn’t a hindrance to a beautifully meaningful and fulfilling life.

What You’ll Find in My Books

With each new story I dream up, you’ll always find a thread of this defiance, this desire to break out of the cage a community, a culture, or a tradition placed my heroine in, this drive to subvert the script written for her so that she can write her own. To basically break free from expectations–whether someone or something placed them on her, or she did herself.

I’d never given much thought to being labeled a feminist. I would’ve called myself feminist-adjacent, if anything, but I’ve begun to realize just how much space–or rather a lack of space–my ingrained societal and cultural views were leaving for the woman I saw myself as. And I wasn’t okay with that, for me, for the heroines I was writing, or for my readers. No more trying to be small!

So how does writing romance fit in with that, you ask? Well, there’s a flip side to this tug-of-war between all the expectations placed on you, which is the need to have someone see the real you—the version you’re fighting to be—to have someone accept and value her, and to have someone not underestimate her. That someone doesn’t only have to be a love interest. Other characters will, of course, play an important role in the heroine’s journey, but at the heart of my stories, there will always be a romance because that’s what I enjoy writing.

And I’m not going to apologize for that.

Love is meant to be unconditional. And love that’s worth fighting for? Worth writing novels about? That’s a love that should set an example—be validating, supportive, and giving. It should be celebrated and sighed over. It should be honored and expected. And if I can remind one girl, one young lady, one woman of that, my stories have served their purpose.

I'd love for you to join me on my journey! I’m on Facebook, Goodreads, Instagram, and Pinterest, but I’m the most active on Instagram. You can even sign up for my newsletter below! (I promise not to fill up your inbox or sell you personal information!)

For more information about the books I’ve written, please visit my Books page.