Abby Jimenez is a Food Network champion, motivational speaker, and contemporary romance novelist living in Minnesota. Abby founded Nadia Cakes out of her home kitchen in 2007. The bakery has since gone on to open multiple locations in two states, won numerous Food Network competitions and amassed an international cult following. Abby has since turned her talents to penning novels. She loves a good book, coffee, and doglets, especially Stuntman Mike. For more on Abby and her books, visit www.authorabbyjimenez.com.

Check out her book The Friend Zone that Publishers Weekly called “as hysterical as it is tear-jerking.”

How did you make the jump from Food Network champion to author?

I’ve always liked baking and writing and when I like something, I tend to get very into it. Once my kids got older and it got easier to focus on something like penning a novel, I sorta just slid into it as a new hobby.

Your book has been described as “laugh-out-loud” funny, any advice for infusing humor into your writing?

Man, that’s such a hard thing to coach someone on. It was easy for me because I tend to view life through a sarcastic lens. I’d say if it’s something you struggle with as a writer, start paying attention to things in your life that make you laugh. Then write those things into the book. A lot of the conversations that Kristen has with Josh are actual conversations I’ve had with my husband!

In a Scary Mommy interview, you said you landed your agent with a query “that had a dick joke in it”… we have to know more!

The query was for The Happy Ever After Playlist, which is the book that comes after The Friend Zone. I actually wrote this book first. In HEA, the main character meets a musician. The now famous dick joke line in my query was, “My best friend thinks I should touch his guitar—guitar is in quotes.” When I showed my query to my crit buddies, they told me not to send it. But I figured if my literary agent couldn’t take me at my dick joke, she couldn’t take me at my full novel.

Do you feel like there is an overlap between your career as a baker and your work as an author?

Do you mean does being one help with the other? For sure. Both fields require me to produce things people like. I think you need to have your ear to the ground and know what the market needs and wants—both when you’re baking and when you’re writing something.

Describe your writing routine. 

It’s very casual. I wrote most of my books on my cell phone with my thumbs using Google Docs. I only open up my laptop to do big edits. I have a rule that I don’t write until after noon because my brain isn’t awake enough yet. Other than that, it’s pretty fly by the seat of my pants.

When was the moment you started to feel like a writer?

I think it was when my editor sent over my first round of edits. I was like, “Hey, we’re really doing this, huh?”

What is the number one piece of advice you’d give to aspiring authors?

I’d say it’s to get on a critique site. I used Critique Circle and honestly, that site made my writing what it is today. There are countless tools on there and the people you’ll meet will help you in ways friends and family cannot.

Who inspires you?

My husband. That guy has a crazy wife and he just goes with it.