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At 15, Joan Thatiah wrote her first complete book by hand and stashed it away ready to pursue a career in law. But writing kept calling. Four published books later and one book still with the publishers to be released in October, she takes us through her journey.

Njeri Maina @njerimainar

“I always wanted to be a lawyer, especially since I loved debating growing up. I did manage to get my law degree though.

This was after becoming a single mother at 19 while in first year and muscling through school while juggling motherhood and holding down a job as a marketing officer for a garage,” Joan Thatiah explains.

Joan learnt early on that the world owes no one anything. So spurred on by the fact that she did not want to be a statistic, just another young mother, she finished school. 

While still working at the garage and doing her usual newspaper perusal, she came across a feature and thought that she could definitely do a better job.

So she went out, interviewed people, wrote her first feature, which was published instantly. 

She would start working as a features writer with a local newspaper in April 2011. She was drawn to stories about women and womanhood.

After five years of strong interviews and write ups on womanhood, she decided to write her first book, Things I will Tell My Daughter. 

She describes it as a collection of all the knowledge she had gotten through her experiences and her interviews; things she wished someone had told her when she was younger and all the things she had also been told.

Shot in the dark

“My first book was a complete shot in the dark. Everyone I spoke to told me Kenyans do not read.

A woman I looked up to asked me why I thought I was qualified to write about womanhood at just 27 years.

But I had information that I needed to offload, so I wrote anyway. Everything that came after was a pleasant surprise,” the mother of three further explains.

Being in the newsroom enabled her to rub shoulders with literary giants who helped shape her into the writer she is today. 

She credits King’wa Kamenchu and Ng’ang’a Mbugua with shaping her literary voice. 

Great influencers

King’wa advised her to just write and ignore all the writing rules while Ng’ang’a helped shape her first manuscript into a book. 

Her family are also great influences in her work. She was raised by a strong mother who imparted a lot of lessons. 

She grew up as the only girl alongside six boys. She credits most of what she knows about manhood to the six brothers and her strong father. 

“My father who passed away last year was quite unconventional. He allowed us to be whoever we wanted to be.

He encouraged me to speak my mind and I do this all the time. This also comes out in my writing,” Joan elaborates.

She describes her way of writing as the big sister, tough love style. She hopes that with her work, she not only entertains, but also helps more women see themselves in a better light, and inspire her readers whichever the gender, to want more from life and live life on their own terms.  

Joan went on to pen Letters to my son, I’m Too Pretty To Be Broke, and Damn Girl Stop That.

She self-published all four books as most publishers were only interested in books they could sell to schools and the only publisher interested in her manuscripts needed her to change her writing style.

But everything has its silver lining. Joan explains how self-publishing has allowed her to be in control of her own brand. She has a team she guides through all the decisions regarding her books.

“It is a truly incredible journey fraught with challenges and highlights. It has been incredible to have so many people read my book and be moved, that is always the highlight for me. 

The main challenge was getting my name out there. I was little known when I started out and it took me a year of marketing to start making steady sales. The other challenge was setting up a distribution channel. 

The big bookshops were apprehensive about working with me at first. But as the readers kept asking for my books, I slowly set up my channels which I have used to sell subsequent books. Also, publishing is a capital intensive affair,” she elaborates.

Master planner

Joan is intentional with everything she does. She expertly juggles being a mother of three, a wife, a journalist and an author by being a master planner.

She explains how she has a time set for everything.  She is most creative in the mornings, so she wakes up early to write her creative works, then switches back on to mummy mode after which she heads off to work. 

She blocks off weekends as her family time and also credits her supportive spouse, Roy, to helping her balance wearing all her hats and competently too.

Joan has her debut creative fiction novel named, Guilty set to be released on October 2, this year. It is published by Quramo Publishers in Lagos, Nigeria. 

To budding writers, Joan urges them to be deaf to the naysayers. “Don’t listen to them.

If there is something that you want to write, do it. There will be someone out there looking to read it,” she concludes.