Article in the Brookville Democrat:

When Margie Hodapp met with her high school friends for their 40th reunion and the conversation turned to book topics, she couldn’t have anticipated the career it would spark.
    The Connersville High School Class of 1960 holds weekend-long reunions every five years, but one in 2000 was particularly significant to Margie. She and her friends were frustrated because they couldn’t find any books about people their age.
    “So many of the books we picked up, the heroine was 20 and cute and dimpled, and any woman our age was portrayed as a nosy neighbor or a meddlesome mother-in-law or that type of thing,” she said.
    Margie, then 58, decided to give writing a try. Now, at 68, she has four published books and another she’s currently writing. It’s not her first career – she and her husband, Jim, owned a farm near Bath for over 30 years. When they stopped farming, Margie searched for something new to do.
    “I tried retail, and after 35 years of farming and being my own boss, it was so hard for me to punch my time clock,” she said.
    A desire to travel led her to trucking. She drove various types of trucks for five or six years and saw much of the continental United States. Now she’s a writer.
    Margie said she’s never let her age deter her.
    “I just think whatever you want to do you should do it, and age shouldn’t be a factor,” she said. “I don’t like people to say ‘I’m too old to do that.’”
    Margie wanted to write, and so she did. She didn’t expect it to go anywhere, though. She started with poetry and a book, called “Hidden Legacy,” about an 18th-century Irish widow who travels to America to start over.
    “I really just figured I’d send it in and they’d say ‘This is no good’ and that would be the end of that ... So I was very surprised when they accepted it and liked my work,” she said.
    Once PublishAmerica accepted “Hidden Legacy,” they and Margie sent the manuscript back and forth with corrections. Then they negotiated a cover. Finally, the whole package was sent to the printer and on to store shelves. The process has remained the same since Margie began, and her books are usually available for purchase 3-6 months after she finishes writing them.
    Writing them, however, can take much longer than a few months. Earlier in her writing career, Margie attended a convention with other PublishAmerica authors. Margie said a lot of the authors had specific strategies for writing – many used detailed outlines before writing the chapters, and one author wrote his last chapter and molded the rest of the book to fit its outcome.
    Margie’s plan of attack is quite different. She writes what and when she feels motivated to write and often doesn’t know what will happen from chapter to chapter.
    “It just sort of evolves and comes,” she said.
    Margie said Jim is used to her waking up at 2 a.m. to work on a book or a poem, “or by morning, it’s gone.” She said Jim describes her hobby as something to keep her out of mischief.
    “I ask him what trouble an old lady like me could get in,” Margie said.
    With all her books, Margie’s added to the small collection of works geared toward women her age; all her heroines are in their 40s or 50s. Her latest is “Faithful Friends,” the third installment in the “Crystal Lake Friends” series. The series is about a group of women who were close friends in high school. For years, they lived lives apart from one another, but they kept in touch. The books catch up with the characters years later, and the group reunites in a small town in Missouri.
    In the books, each character faces different problems from divorce to spontaneously switching careers. The women rely on each other for support and friendship through their struggles. Margie said it’s a bond many women experience with their friends.
    “Women support each other, and I try to stress that,” she said.
    The characters in “Dearest of Friends,” “Friendship Circle” and “Faithful Friends” are inspired by Margie’s friends, the very people who inspired her writing career.
    “They’re all taken off of friends that I went to school with, and I won’t tell anybody who each one is,” she said.
    Regardless of what friends match which characters, Margie and her own circle of friends had to find a different topic during their 50th class reunion last month. Margie’s books have helped end the discussion they began 10 years ago.
    She plans to continue writing books with leading ladies her age, but she stressed that the content is relatable to any age.
    “They’re about older people but they’re books anybody could read,” she said.
    Margie’s books can be found at many local stores and libraries. Copies can also be purchased at her personal website, margarethodappbooks.com.