It's Black History Month, and all month long, we have been highlighting African American men and women in Central Virginia and their amazing accomplishments.
Iris Bolling is from Richmond, and she is a former Commonwealth of Virginia employee and now a published author and production company owner. In 10 years, she wrote 22 books and even turned some of them into shows.
“I love it,” Bolling said. “I could not imagine doing anything else.”
Currently, Bolling is working on her 23rd book and third production.
“The plan was I'll write after I retire,” Bolling said. “I started writing at 50, and I retired at 55 because it got to the point where between the TV series and the book, it was a whole other job.”
It all started off with the "Heart" series.
“The very first book was once you touch the heart,” Bolling said. “The story behind that is we were in a time when Bush was president. I didn’t like him very much. Not him, the man, but I didn’t like some of the things he was doing, and I wanted to have my own president. So I decided to write my own president. I took the character from the beginning, what prompted him to get into politics, and I told the story about him and his friends and how he progressed from being a district attorney here in Richmond to President of the United States.”
It was a political, romance series that includes six books. There are now also, several spinoffs.
“Now we have the 'Gem and Gents' series, which is my CIA novels, which spun off from the Heart series, and we have the Brooks, which is my family saga series,” Bolling said.
Bolling also wrote two other book series. She then created a production company called Siri Austin Entertainment and brought some of her books to life, filming in Richmond with Richmonders themselves behind and in front of the camera.
“And now we're doing books to film for other authors,” Bolling said. “We have a project coming up and we're going to start filming April 1.”
Bolling's next book is also coming out in a month. It's the seventh book in her Heart series.
Bolling's books can be found on Amazon, iTunes, and at Barnes and Noble. Her production work can be found on YouTube and Amazon Prime.http://www.nbc12.com/story/37557812/richmond-woman-publishes-22-books-starts-production-company
