For 77-year-old Darlene Quinn, her age hasn’t held her back. In fact, she said, it’s given her a chance to rediscover herself.
The life-long Long Beach resident said in an interview with the Long Beach Post that she lives by the motto, “It’s never too late to reinvent yourself.” And when she retired, Quinn did reinvent herself and applied her skills in retail into a new field—writing.
“The reason I don’t mind disclosing my age is because it has been an advantage,” she said. “Because of my age, the CEO of my PR group invented a topic that is fabulous and has been very successful that focuses on ‘it’s never too late to reinvent yourself.'”
Quinn will host a signing for Conflicting Webs, the fifth installment in her suspenseful “Webs” series, on Sunday at Barnes and Noble at Marina Pacifica.
She said she never expected her first novel, “Webs of Power,” to grow into a series but “the characters had other plans.”
“I never really wrote these books in order,” she said. “They kind of just happened.”
The author, who discovered writing later in life when she decided to take a fiction-writing class at Long Beach City College after retiring, gets assistance for her novels from real-world retail fashion industry experts, which she said helps her scenes and settings ring true.
Prior to retiring and becoming an author, Quinn worked for the management team of the Bullocks Wilshire Specialty department stores.
“As they say, you write about what you know,” she said. “All of my books have a background in the retail industry. What I write is ‘faction’. It’s page-turning suspense based on events in the retail world.”
She’s also gained insight from local community members like Carol Hatch Pazdernik, a trauma nurse at Long Beach Memorial Medical Center; Steve Fritch and Norman Benson, both retired from the Long Beach Police Department; and Jennifer Dominquez, a student at nearby Cypress Community College, to make her books as real as possible.
“My new book focuses on family, loss, love and overlapping commitments, as well as the problems we face in the world today,” she said.
A book synopsis on Quinn’s website reads, “Wedding bells are set to ring. April Toddman, the darling of the Jordon’s retail dynasty, feels blessed. Her handsome, amiable fiancé, Kyle Clark, is passionate and shares her dreams. No couple could ask for a more promising future. And yet, just days before they are to exchange their marriage vows, their perfect world begins to crumble. Fate steps in and puts April and Kyle to the test. Will they successfully thread their way through the conflicting webs to secure their happiness?”
Quinn said her books are intriguing because of its “bite-sized chapters,” which are inspired by James Patterson’s writing style. She said she has often received complaints about the lengths of her chapters, but in a good way.
“We all write what we like to read,” she said. “As an author, it’s my obligation at the end of each chapter to have people thinking what comes next. My readers’ biggest complaint is I keep them up all night, because they want to keep reading since my chapters are so short.”
Quinn will sign copies of all her books, including Conflicting Webs, on Sunday at 3:00PM at Barnes and Noble, located at 6326 East Pacific Coast Highway. Conflicting Webs’ official release date is April 7, but readers will be able to get it early at the signing.