Danielle's Cancer Plot Twist

Life Is Sweeter Than Fiction Once More For The Author

- Fleur Guthrie

If there was a handbook for writing a bestseller, Danielle Hawkins could include the tip that it’s best not to pen a new novel when you’re undergoing chemotherapy.

It’s wisdom from her own experience last year, when the popular rural romance author took her laptop to Waikato Hospital each week and tapped out the manuscript for her fourth novel, all while being treated for breast cancer. She submitted the draft to her publisher and received the response, “Ah, it’s quite bleak, isn’t it?”

“And that’s what happens when you try to write a book when you feel like crap!” laughs the 40-year-old, who is chatting to the Weekly from her family’s farm in Otorohanga.

“I was a little bit embarrassed and had to go and cheer it all up. This poor heroine in my story, nothing went right and everybody was against her.

“For me, writing it felt like I’d run a marathon – and then I needed to go back and do it again.

“In hindsight, it probably would’ve been better to stop and not even think about it for six months,” says Danielle, who has since, thankfully, been given the all-clear from doctors.

Nevertheless, her latest book – tentatively titled When It All Went to Custard – is due out soon and life has returned to normal for the mother-of-two, who works part-time as a large-animal vet when not writing.

“Things are much easier and more pleasant now,” Danielle admits. “I didn’t realise just how stressed we actually were, despite thinking we were coping really well throughout the treatment.