Breach Of TrustAspiring writers are told to write what you know. Kimber Chin took this advice to heart and writes novels based on two things she knows best: business and romance. ‘œI love business,’ she says. And there happens to be a lot of lovin’ going on when her characters get down to business. These are her words’¦

The character in Breach Of Trust, I get the most feedback on is Stanley. Readers tell me that Stanley is such an over the top stereotype, he can’t be real. The irony is’¦ he is. Very real. The real Stanley may be a logistics genius rather than the more exciting make up artist and he may be, ummm, a tad bit (i.e. decades) older, but their core quirks and mannerisms (and obsession with eyeliner) are the same.

The reason Stanley is in my first published novel is because he is one of the reasons FOR my first published novel. Stanley and his alternative lifestyle thinking. No, not because he’s gay. He is, happily living with the publicity shy R in a multi-decade long relationship, but by alternative, I mean financially.

You see, I’ve always been torn. Business or writing? Business or writing? I loved both but felt forced to choose one. The plan was to go to school, pick a major, get a job in that major, work for 45 years, retire and die because that’s the way it works, right?

Wrong, Kimmychunga, as Stanley told me during one extremely harsh round of corporate downsizing. Was he worried about the layoffs? No. Bring it on, he taunted management. Stanley and R had plans. They were simply waiting for the right time to move to the next stage.

The two of them had another mortgage-free home in a rural setting, far out of town. They could sell the city home’¦ or not. They had enough passive income from investments (some rent paying real estate, some dividend paying stocks) to easily pay for their lifestyles forever.

Now, some of you, as were some of his coworkers, are thinking ‘œIt is because they don’t have kids.’ Sadly they don’t (they would have made great parents) but speaking as another half of a childless couple, it is as easy for us to fritter away our funds as anyone else (travel is my drug of choice).

Unless we have goals and plans to reach those goals. In Stanley and R’s case, it is a quiet and early retirement in the country. In my case, it is summers off to write and contract business gigs the rest of the year.

It is challenging, I won’t sugar coat it. It means thinking for ourselves and designing financial plans as individuals or couples (no plugging numbers into a master template and investing robotically). People laugh at me. They even call me ungrateful for walking away from full time jobs others would kill for. They don’t understand.

That’s okay because I’m happy, very happy. Last I heard, Stanley and R are as, or even more, happy. We did what was right for us.

If you want what everyone else has, fine, follow the nicely paved and crowded road. Want something different? Then think’¦ Alternative.

More about Kimber Chin
Kimber Chin writes romance novels based in the business world. She also blogs at NoLimitsLadies.com. She does not answer to Kimmychunga unless your name is Stanley or you’re offering her free chocolate.