Hi. I am Eva Ridenhour, and I’ve been writing books for a third of my life. I am nine years old now, and I have just released my third book, The Kinzy Chronicles. I love writing and I want to share my passion with the world by reminding you that you can do this too. Not just writing, but whatever you want to do. I am very glad I have found my talent so early in life. It’s never too early or too late to find your passion.

I am going to tell you a bit about myself… well actually I am going to tell you about the third of my life that was writing books.

When I was six years old, my dad and my brother decided that they would write a first draft of a book. My mom, (my teacher) said that I should do this as well. My brother and I are homeschooled so that was actually a school assignment. We used a program called National Novel Writing Month, Or NaNoWriMo for short.

NaNoWriMo is a program on the internet that challenges kids and adults to write a first draft of a book in the thirty days of November. For adults, you have to write 50,000 words. For kids, you pick a word count goal and ready, set, go! It’s non-stop writing through November and at the end, if you reached your goal, you get an online banner, a winning certificate, etc.

After NaNoWriMo, I decided that I would take it another step forward. I edited my book. And then I edited it again. And again. Next, I illustrated. For my first book, I drew with colored markers. I watched my mom scan my pictures on to the computer and even learned a bit about it myself. And then, the very last thing that we did was upload the PDF file onto a self-publishing company called lulu.com.

I did NaNoWriMo and the writing process two more times. And that is where I am now. My first book is called Birds on the Run! My second, Attack of the Reptiles! And last but not least, The Kinzy Chronicles, which is a book of short stories about my stuffed koala named Kinzy and his friends.

But I didn’t stop there. I marketed. I now have a website and a Facebook page. Teachers across North Dakota have invited me into their classrooms to tell their students about writing. In Devils Lake, a classroom invited me to Skype them there. It was a lot of fun. In 2011, I did a variety of things to help me get started, including a book tour, and having a booth at a teacher’s conference called the North Dakota Educators Association.

On the book tour, I met some teachers in Georgia who said that it would be really cool if I could tell other kids across the country about my writing. I thought about that a lot on the way home. Finally I came up with a plan. In August 2011, my mom and I made five two-minute writing lecture videos. They teach other kids across the country how to write. They have been a huge success. Bigger than I had expected anyway. They have been used in classrooms all across the US and even in other countries. I am very proud of what I have done.

That is what I have done so far. What I plan to do next is to write another book, and do more presentations. As I said in the beginning, you can do this too. Just do what you want, be what you want, and do it no matter what age you are. I have really enjoyed writing, and I hope you enjoy what you do too. Please show this to others you care about – your kids, your friends. I hope you enjoyed this article and good luck finding your passion.

Visit Eva’s website to watch her videos on writing, to purchase her books, or to invite her as a guest speaker into your classroom. evaridenhour.com