Book 3 in the Hawthorne Series released in February

By Don Rush

Shelby Stewart-Soldan likes to read.

She likes to write.

So, the 27-year-old Oxford Township resident started to write a book in 2020.

“I thought of the name Bennett, which is the first book’s main character. I like the name Bennett,” she said. “And, I thought I’m going to write a story about that name. I started to write it the week of my wedding, you know because I wasn’t busy enough. I finished it a few months later and then sat on it until last year and decided to publish it. I haven’t stopped writing since.”

What started out as one story about Bennett Hawthorne (Quarter Life Crisis, in 2022) has turned into the Hawthorne series, with the third book, Away From Home, being released this past February, The second book in the series, According To Plan, was released later in 2022. Each book has grown progressively in page count. The first book was 201 pages long. The second, 238 and the last book was 277 pages.

The New Adult series centers on the Hawthorne family. Each of the books’ main characters are siblings. Quarter Life Crisis centers on Bennett who is the oldest of the siblings. He “is 25 years old, living on his own, and hasn’t been back home in seven years. So when his father unexpectedly dies and he has to go back home to take care of his little siblings, he finds a family that is drastically different than the one he left.”

According To Plan tells the story of the middle Hawthorne brothers, Oliver and Ryan. According to the Amazon plot description, “Oliver and Ryan Hawthorne have been best friends since they were little. Through the death of both of their parents, a changing family dynamic, and the ups and downs of high school and college, they’ve only gotten closer. . . . But then Ryan and his high school sweetheart, Harrison, call it quits after six years, and Oliver is dangerously close to graduating college with no career or life plan on the table. With the future so uncertain, the stress drives a wedge between the two and they find themselves having to deal with their problems without each other to lean on . . . “

The latest installment, Away From Home, is about the young Faith Hawthorne. Faith “has one last summer before her senior year, and she’s looking forward to getting the hell out of the house. She’s tired of living with her older brother and his kids, and a summer away from home is just what she needs. One month staying with one of her other brothers, one month of staying with her uncle, and one month staying with her grandparents. But maybe being away from home isn’t all it’s cracked up to be, and Faith’s first taste of freedom quickly sours when she realizes that. She hopes it’ll get better, but traveling to other stats feels like traveling to other worlds entirely. Maybe she wasn’t ready for this after all.”

Stewart-Soldan said before finishing each book, she was already starting on the next.

“Writing fiction you start really enjoying the characters and letting them breathe and when you finish, you realize you’re not really done yet. This series is about family,” she said. “They are coming of age stories. In the first book, Bennett is 25. In the next Oliver and Ryan are 20 and 21 and in the third book, Faith is 17. It’s about growing up and figuring out life. Something everyone goes through. At some point you have to figure out what you’re going to do for the rest of your life.”

She said she not only likes the series, but also likes the characters in her books. “They seem very honest to me. People always say, ‘write what you know,’ which is a very vague piece of advice. So, if you write the emotions you know, the situations you know that makes it a lot easier to write. I like the last one in particular because up until then, I always struggled writing female leads. I don’t know why and I’ve tried to figure it out, I’m not really sure. It was a huge hurdle for me and I felt when I finished the book, I not only understood myself better and the women in my family better. I kind of tackled that hurdle that I didn’t think I would.”

She self-published her books on Amazon.com

Stewart-Soldan has been writing “as long as I can remember.” She and her husband Kyle were co-editors of their high school newspaper the Blue Devil’s Advocate in Richmond. She studied journalism, Spanish, womens/gender studies at Oakland University and is a reporter at The Citizen newspaper located in downtown Ortonville, a part of the View Newspaper Group.

She said she enjoys telling people’s stories, which is one reason she went into journalism.

“I actually think being a reporter helps being an author,” she said. “One of the things I wanted to do in journalism is tell peoples’ stories, because everyone has a story to tell. When it came to my own story it was easier to tell it through fiction. In journalism you get to talk to real people in real life situations. I think it goes well together. I think many of the authors I admire were reporters or columnists.”

And, to aspiring writers she has this advice. “Keep writing. You’ll get better with practice. You might not like what you’re writing right now, but eventually you’ll get better at it.”

The Hawthorne books are available at Amazon.com and the South Street Exchange in downtown Ortonville.