Absolutely. Although my work is fiction, I still pull from real life experiences. In Under the Grapevine, book 2 of the Women of Campbell County family Saga series, I wrote a fictional iteration of the Johnstown (PA) floods that occurred in 1889, 1936, and 1977. I lived through the 1977 flood, while my parents witnessed the 1936 flood.
Marketing, spreading my work to viable readers and potential fans is my most difficult task. The creative, artistic process is much easier. I have interesting stories to tell, and I tell them, however, the stories are lost if no one reads them.