“Don’t ever let obstacles keep you from achieving your dreams,” said Imani Josey, author of The Blazing Star. This year Josey, wife of STEM teacher and football coach, Mr. Colin McCullough, released her book “The Blazing Star”, achieving her dream and allowing Bishop Noll students to be among the first to read and review the novel.

  “I’ve always wanted to write a book. I come from a long line of journalists and writers, so I knew at some point in my life that I’d want to be published. I just didn’t know when or how. Sometimes life makes that decision for you,” said Josey. “I wanted to get the advanced copies into the hands of family, and the students of Bishop Noll are just that.”

  The Blazing Star revolves around sixteen year old Portia White and her twin sister Alex, who accidentally find themselves in ancient Egypt and go on an adventure to find their way home.       

  “The Blazing Star has been in my head in one way or another since I was a kid,” said Josey. “Right after I finished grad school, I was getting into YA and writing again. I decided that the bones of the faerie princess story were actually decent, and would fit well with a YA adventure swirling in my head. Add a dash of historical fiction and ancient Egyptian mythology, and five years later, here we are.”

  Despite facing a few obstacles in the publishing process, Josey remained optimistic and determined to get to print.

  “I’ve been working on The Blazing Star project-wise for five years. Thus, Mr. Cullough and I have seen our fair share of ups and downs with the publishing process. When I first started, I wanted to go the traditional publishing route. This means that I’d seek an agent, who’d then find a house (Penguin, HarperCollins, Random House, etc) to back my work,” she said. “You find an agent by querying, which is sending a letter to an agent about your project, hoping they’ll take you on as a client. I queried for a year. This was after a year of writing and a year of editing independently. Then I decided to go a different route, being more hybrid/indie, with my publisher Wise Ink.  We’ve been polishing the book for the remainder of those five years, and now here we are. Often times what it challenging is sharpening the sword, preparing you for the real opportunity that lies behind it.”

  Freshman Hayden Kammer encourages those who haven’t read the book to do so soon.

  “The book was interesting to me because it’s about a high school student who feels worthless, but then realizes what is good about their life,” Kammer said. “It is a good message to people who feel dejected because this book let’s them know their is something good about them.”

  Although there were a few obstacles with Josey’s first book, she isn’t shying away from writing another in the future, with the help of her support system.

  “My husband is the most supportive man in the world. One of his favorite sayings goes like this: “If you want something you’ve never had, you have to do something you’ve never done.” This means you need to push past your comfort zone when the going gets rough,” she said. “My friends and family pushed me to keep going, even when I wanted to give up. When you have great people behind you, you can accomplish anything.”