What's the story behind the story? What inspired you to write this book?
WHAT HAPPENS WHEN THE PERSON DESTROYING YOU IS THE ONE EVERYONE ELSE BELIEVES?
For nearly ten years, I lived under the influence of someone whose cruelty slowly chipped away at my confidence, my peace, and my ability to trust my own reality. The story of Nothing Lasts Forever had been bubbling inside me like molten lava for years, waiting for a way out. The story is fiction. But the psychological warfare, the public humiliation, the outrageous behavior, and the twisted sense of righteousness embodied by its cult leader, Norman, were born from a reality that felt all too familiar. Because here’s the terrifying thing about prolonged narcissistic abuse: you don’t always realize you’re losing yourself until you can barely recognize the person you’ve become. You begin questioning your own memory. You apologize for things you didn’t do. You carry the weight of someone else’s anger, desperately trying to keep the peace. And while you’re busy trying to understand what went wrong, the people around you may be helping the abuser maintain an image that couldn’t be further from the truth. Suddenly, you’re the problem. You’re the one who’s crazy. You’re the one who must have misunderstood. And the person causing the damage? They’re admired, believed, even protected. That’s when abuse becomes more than a personal battle. It becomes a cult of control.
When the public verbal attacks began, shame and powerlessness threatened to silence me. But silence is exactly what allows these patterns to continue. I wrote Nothing Lasts Forever for anyone who has ever felt trapped in someone else’s version of reality. Because the person who breaks you down doesn’t have to be a cult leader, it could be your boss, your spouse, your friend—or even your own grown child. And sometimes, the hardest part isn’t escaping the person who hurt you. It’s learning to trust yourself again after years of believing you’re the problem. This book is for those who survived, those who are still trying to understand what happened, and those who need to know they are not alone. We endured. We found our way out. And we have a voice.
I wrote Nothing Lasts Forever because I refuse to let the truth about narcissistic abuse remain buried beneath someone else’s carefully constructed image. If you’ve ever had to fight to trust your own reality, this story is for you. Read it. Share it. Start the conversation. Because the moment we begin talking about the abuse others want hidden is the moment we begin taking our power back.
If you had to pick theme songs for the main characters of your book, what would they be?
"The Sound of Silence," sung by Disturbed
What's your favorite genre to read? Is it the same as your favorite genre to write?
Psychological thrillers, immediately followed by horror.
What scene in your book was your favorite to write?
When Willow and Lizzie were in the woods and took their hair out of their buns, letting it blow in the wind, it was a metaphor that stood for freedom- one of those moments in life when you think things are about to get better, and for a moment, you can forget that your life is controlled by another person.
Do you have a motto, quote or philosophy you live by?
“Justice will not be served until those who are unaffected are as outraged as those who are.”
— Benjamin Franklin
If you could choose one thing for readers to remember after reading your book, what would it be?
Trust your instincts, and never twist your own reality to fit someone else’s version of the truth. The world may not always see a person for who they truly are. You don’t need everyone to understand your truth for it to be valid.
