Evelyn Lemar is single mother of one daughter. She discovered her writing talents in middle school when she was contracted by several of her classmates to write love letters for them to give to their sweethearts. After graduating from high school in 1990, she enlisted in the United States Army and spent a combined nine years as an active duty soldier stationed at the now closed Fort Ord, California and then as a weekend warrior in the North Carolina National Guard. In addition to her serving as an army medic, Evelyn held several other positions in the medical field as a civilian to include a medical classification technician, where she coded death certificates for the Center for Disease Control.

It was in that particular job that she began penning her first novel out of boredom, as well as preoccupation with an ongoing issue that she had dealing with a long time boyfriend. Not really sure what to do with the story, she decided to share it with a couple of friends who insisted that she finish it, since at the time it stopped short around chapter five with no end in sight. Evelyn was still not fully convinced, but continued to work on the story periodically in her spare time. The more she wrote, the more she came to love the characters in the story and soon she became just as anxious as her girlfriends to find out how the story would end. As fate would have it, her job was cut due to downsizing in November of 2005, giving her the opportunity to work on her novel uninterrupted for the first time in four years. Thus, “…and then I woke up.” was born along with the creation of Drama Queen Publications shortly thereafter.

Evelyn’s writing is featured in the latest edition of Chicken Soup for the African-American Woman’s Soul. In addition, she has also written several short stories and writes and performs poetry in the Raleigh, North Carolina area under the performance name ‘q.u.i.e.t.s.t.o.r.m.’ Her stage moniker is an acronym that stands for “Quite Unique In Every Thing, So Talking Openly Remains Mandatory.” Her overall uniqueness along with her willingness to speak freely on all topics is what makes her work so compelling.

Evelyn firmly believes that writers create their best work when they write about what they know. So she therefore welcomes each of her life experiences, good and bad, and uses them as an opportunity to tell a good story. “Most folks swear up and down that they can’t stand a whole lot of drama, yet soap operas, gossip magazines, and talk shows still remain big business. I embrace my drama so those people can live vicariously through it without having to admit that they have any of their own,” says Evelyn.