iUniverse Author Profile: Vicky DeCoster

Hi. I’m Vicky DeCoster. I am from Omaha, Neb.  I’m the author of The Wacky World of Womanhood and Husbands, Hot Flashes and All That Hullabaloo. We women, we like to do everything together. We go to the restroom together, and we like to experience middle age together, and I like to teach women that they need to laugh at themselves a little bit more and take this journey with a grain of salt. My thing to write with a humorous slant, I think it is in my nature. I was voted ‘Most Funny’ in high school, and so I have taken it just a little step further, and narrowed my focus to women’s issues, just based on the funny stories that my girlfriends and I have exchanged with each other over the years. I suppose every writer has maybe a gift of storytelling, and I’m just basically telling funny stories that have happened to me. From Husbands, Hot Flashes and All That Hullabaloo, my favorite essay is when my husband and I went on a diet together, and he was notorious for cheating on his diet but trying to cover it up, so one night he said “I’m going to go get some gas for your car.” And I said ‘Okay’ and I was a little suspicious, and he was gone for a while, and he came back and I said let me smell your breath.  He said no. Then he smiled and he had Oreo cookie crumbs in his teeth, and so I knew he had not really gone to put gas in my car, but instead had gone to get Oreos at the gas station. When I wrote The Wacky World of Womanhood, I actually wanted to traditionally publish it.  I sent it to a couple of agents, had some interest, it just seemed like it was taking forever for the process, and I’m a little impatient, and a little bit of a control freak. I basically wanted to self-publish, but I wanted assistance from professionals. So, I wanted ‘assisted self-publishing’ this time, so that is why I chose iUniverse. I expected to sell to family and friends, maybe a few extras. What I got out of it was much, much more. Life has just completely gone in a different direction as a result of publishing my book through iUniverse. It has gone beyond what I ever could have dreamed for myself. It’s been a lot of hard work on my part. It doesn’t come easy, but the journey has been exceptional. I’ve had a lot of fun. We did have two pet rats. I wrote a story about giving the rat a bath, which was an experience.  Which, believe it or not, you have to do with a rat. I never knew that. My husband is usually on the couch watching football, and the kids are running around and I’m trying to cool off.