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Local author debuts mystery and romance series
Inspirational author Katrina Manning debuts her family-friendly mystery and romance novellas Marmalade’s Exciting Tail and Lupus Obscurus as the honorary storyteller at the Joeten Kiyu Public Library. (Daisy Demapan)
Manning talked about her passion for writing, storytelling, and reading in front of a crowd of over 15 young adults.
Writing a book, she said, is a lot harder than she first thought, with editing her work and deciding on the cover art as the most difficult parts of all.
“I outlined my ideas for a year but the first book was written within nine months,” she said. Her goal has always been to finish each book within a year.
Manning, a technical writer by trade, has been working on her novellas for over a year while working full-time.
Manning’s first book, Marmalade’s Exciting Tail, is set in Menomonee Falls, Wisconsin. It is a modern story of Claire Young, a Web developer who recently broke up with her fiancé. Planning for a fresh start, she starts packing to move to another city for an intriguing job offer when her cat escapes and runs away. Claire cannot imagine losing her furry best friend, so she does the first thing that comes to mind—she asks her ex-fiancé, Kirk, to assist her in the search.
The second book, Lupus Obscurus, whose title is inspired by her love of the Latin language, puts a cat in a werewolf story.
Manning encouraged the students to start writing their own books and that it’s never too late, stating that she got her first break through Amazon’s scout program.
She is currently working on her third book and, although she was raised on Saipan, she now resides in Nevada.
“The last time I was on Saipan was in 2003,” she said, telling the young students to dream big but to also enjoy Saipan. “There’s no place like it. It’s magical. I can still feel the warm welcome from when I was last here.”
Katrina Manning is the daughter of Edward and Frances Kilili Arriola of Saipan and Keith and Yolanda Manning of Texas. She has written thousands of online technical and business articles under her name and as a ghostwriter. She also ghostwrites for a well-known global software company. Yet, it is her love of animals, especially her cat Marmalade, that inspired her to write her first fiction novella.
