Preslaysa Williams: On Finding Hope in Romance

Preslaysa Williams is an award-winning author who writes heartwarming romance and women’s fiction with an Afro-Filipina twist. Proud of her heritage, she loves sharing her culture with her readers. A graduate of Columbia University, Preslaysa is a professional actress, a planner nerd, an avid bookworm, and a busy mom who wears mismatched socks.

Learn more about Preslaysa at preslaysa.com, Instagram, Twitter, and Facebook.

In this post, Preslaysa discusses the process of writing her new romance novel, A Sweet Lowcountry Proposal, her advice for writers, and more!

Name: Preslaysa Williams
Book title: A Sweet Lowcountry Proposal
Publisher: Avon/HarperCollins
Release date: November 8, 2022
Genre/category: Contemporary Sweet Romance
Previous titles: A Lowcountry Bride and Healing Hannah’s Heart
Elevator pitch for the book: A wedding planner and a museum archivist reunite to keep Charleston’s Black history museum from closing down. As they do, the two reignite a love that they’d thought was long gone.

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I originally intended to write this book because it was the next natural step in writing a series of romances set in the Lowcountry. Also, an image of a wooden bench and a church steeple had filled my imagination. From there, I played around with story ideas based on those two images.

I started writing this book in 2014, and so it took eight years for it to go from idea to publication. The original idea definitely changed during that eight-year period. I had undergone a lot of personal transformation between 2014 and 2022, and my writing naturally reflected that shift.

One major change involved the hero’s occupation. In early drafts, he was a youth pastor. In the published version, he’s a museum archivist for the Lowcountry Museum of African American history. Another change involved the weaving of a historical story thread to serve as a reflection to the main storyline. I didn’t include that historical thread in earlier drafts.

When I considered the possibility of this story being published, I was hesitant to include the overtly religious aspects of the story because I wasn’t sure how my publisher would react. However, the publisher was supportive of this creative direction. They provided a platform for me to discuss how I weave faith and romance in my stories.

Oh yes! I experienced a lot of surprises while writing this story. In later drafts, I included snippets of the Black divine feminine, and this was symbolized by having the Virgin Mary briefly appear in the story as a young Black mother. I wrote this into the story because of my personal desire to see myself reflected in the religious spaces of my real life.

I want readers to discover a story of hope, and I want them to know that hope transcends the disappointments of the past—of our ancestral past and of our personal past. We can heal our past and our present by choosing to love.

Writing professionally is very hard. Figure out why you’re writing and make that “why” personal to you. That will help you weather the ups and downs of publishing. If you keep your love for writing at the forefront of your mind, you’ll never be deterred.

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