EXTRA! EXTRA! READ ALL ABOUT IT!
Fran Reitz, a reporter with the Courier Tribune Newspaper in my hometown of Seneca, KS is writing up an article to discuss a hometown boy turned fantasy author and the signing event coming up with the local Coffee House on Saturday, June 24th, 2017. The article should go to print Wednesday, June 21, 2017. I've liked Fran since the first time I met her. She's super nice, down to earth, and easy to talk to. When she agreed to do the interview and write up an article, I was extremely excited to work with her because I knew she'd do a fantastic job. What I didn't realize is the woman is a secret genius. She emailed me the questions she wanted to ask ahead of time so that she could get a good baseline for her story. She even took the time to read Ash to Ashes so that she'd have a better idea what she was reporting about, which is just mind-blowing for a reviewer to do. Most interviewers skim the cover description and try to wing it (badly), so the added effort is greatly appreciated.
That poor woman didn't know what she was getting herself into. Fortunately the WALL OF TEXT I emailed back to her apparently wasn't a complete rambling mess, and she seemed excited to work with the information I gave her. *sigh of relief* Bless you, Fran. If it's any hint of what I sent her, it read a great deal like one of my blog posts, and we all know how that can go.
Fran's questions were interesting and brought up some things I hadn't really given a lot of thought to. I mean, I thought about the topics in as far as "What would I say if someone asked me ____?" I recognized certain aspects as being noteworthy as they happened or as I acknowledged them in passing, but I never really thought about them. (What? I live inside my own head 90% of the time. It gets really crowded in there, and sometimes things get shoved to the side. OK, most things get shoved to the side...or buried. Let's just assume I have a lot of unhealthy coping habits and move forward from there, shall we?)
One of the major questions that she asked that blew a hole in my mental flood gates like a loaded charge of C4 was "What made you want to write a book?"
I could have been simple and coy and said, "Oh, well, you know, it's just something I've always wanted to do. *Cheerful Giggle* It seems like everybody has that dream, don't they?"
If you're reading this, by now you know I rarely if ever take the easy road, and Fran got to take that journey with me for this one. Surf's up readers... *dam breaks*
(In the voice of Sophia Petrillo) "So there we were, Seneca, 1992, I was a 7th grader in Mrs. Beck's grammar class. She said to me, 'When you publish your first book, you be sure to bring me a signed copy.' And that stuck." *record scratch* But wait, there's already a really great blog entry for that HERE.
Let's jump ahead a bit. In Junior High and High School I discovered I had a knack for written storytelling. In college I discovered I had a fairly descent writing style in general that people seemed to appreciate. Not one I could apply effectively to journalism (behold my overblown descriptive writing and love of $.25 words), but a writing style that captured attention and told an interesting story, even about plans for Homecoming Events or my organization's itineraries. I entered a short story into my dormitory's Halloween contest as a junior and won (after heavily disturbing most of the people witnessing the reading). I disturbed another group of people in my "Storytelling and Basket Weaving" interterm class with my tale of a teddy bear saving his boy from an incestuous uncle. (I know what you're thinking. It's hard to comprehend, but yes, I really did get to take a basket weaving class in college, and it was AWESOME!)
I didn't realize it at the time, but writing--or at least storytelling--was becoming an integral part of my person. Without even realizing it, the major I switched to, psychology, was a direct link to that goal.
But C. Robert, you told us back in the day that you went into psychology and mental health because you wanted to help people!
I did? Oh, right, crap, I did. That much was true, actually. I switched to the mental health/counseling track because I wanted to help people. I thought if I could show them I cared enough, and really listen, I could help them sort through the problems weighing them down.
As it turns out, that's a really terrible job description for someone like me. I take on responsibility for others, I take on the feelings of people around me, I don't disconnect from my work (ever), and no matter how hard I try to convince myself it's not about me, people getting worse or actively trying to hurt my feelings in order to push me away does severe damage to my psyche. The things that made me great at those jobs, were also the things that were slowly killing me in those jobs. Go figure.
BUT... What I see now is that as much as I wanted to help people, what I was really more interested in was hearing their story (which in itself is incredibly therapeutic. Most people just want to feel heard; to know that they still matter.). So even when I wasn't working jobs using my Psychology degree, I was still listening to people, taking in their stories, observing people in the streets or stores or restaurants and imagining what their life was like or what they were about as a person. Everybody has a story. All you have to do is listen (or observe, preferably in a legal manner).
I worked a number of jobs after college (see reference to cubicle hell), but every now and then I would manage to sit down and write a bit here and there on a story that started taking form back in 2001. It came from a simple observation and an unspoken series of questions as I watched a group of my college friends escort a toddler through the music wing to deliver the child to her mother (one of the instrumental instructors giving lessons that day). Why were there so many young adults with this child? Where were they going? What if there were more to the story than meets the eye? (The result of that line of thought will appear in Book 5 *Cliffhanger Post!*)
The bad thing was, I always kept that story (and all of the other ones that started developing in its wake) on the back burner. There was always tomorrow, or I told myself I'd get to it later, or there was the soul-sucking reality of working full time that made it hard to go home and devote time and energy to something like writing (I mean seriously, there's video games to play, social interactions to have, movies and tv shows to watch--why get home from work just to work harder?).
Time passed. I'd start and stop projects. I'd create characters for D&D games that never took off. I'd look at the art print hanging on my wall of the cabin next the lake where I imagined myself feeling inspired and writing full time and say, "Someday." All the while I convinced myself that, "If I were that dedicated to being a writer, I'd be writing." and "Real writers write everyday regardless of what it is or how they feel. It's better to write crap than nothing at all." Therefore I knew I wasn't a "real" writer because that's what I'd been told. So I blew it off and let it fester, occasionally commenting about how I wanted to write "But...". I struggled for years with the idea of "Where is my life going? What do I really want to do? What should I be doing with my life, because all of this feels so pointless? What am I really accomplishing?" Little did I know, the answer was staring me in the face the whole time.
Two major events (and one "minor" event) pushed me over the edge to finding myself (more or less). 1.) I'll come back to this one in a follow-up post, but In 2013 my father died of Stage 4 lung cancer. (This was three months after my uncle died of... hell by that point let's just call it "everything" cancer. Three other aunts had died of cancer between my high school and college years and my mother had already given us a pretty good scare right around that time as well.) My father told me if I wanted to write, then that's what I should do.
I listened to that advice about as well as I kept my promise to quit smoking (which is to say I didn't...yet). For the next four years I found myself continuing the existential crisis I described earlier. By the time I hit 36 I realized not only had I contributed very little via my professional life, I wasn't getting any closer to my cabin by the lake, and I had no spouse or kids to compensate for it... OMG what Legacy was I going to leave behind when I died?
2.) In July of 2016 I hit what's clinically referred to as "crisis." I was off for the summer so I attempted to quit smoking because that's what I promised Dad I would do. Turns out there were a lot of unresolved issues tied to that promise., like letting down my dead father (which in itself I hadn't really processed effectively). I found myself fighting depression and anxiety, and I was losing. Big time. I thought if I got back to work at the school in August the regular schedule and diving back into work would fix the issue. I didn't make it that far before I realized I needed professional help. Unfortunately, access to help is a much slower process if you aren't an immediate threat to yourself or others. (Demonstrating otherwise means help finds you and that wasn't a direction I felt like going.) It also turns out that when you're already in crisis, going back to work with children who have severe emotional and behavioral issues after having the summer off from the structure of school is a TERRIBLE idea.
I made it exactly one week before I determined I could make a good decision and quit my position, or I could try to stay and very likely make a bad decision later that would have a horrible impact all around. I chose door number one.
Jobless and in crisis, I finally got access to the help I was needing. Turns out there was a lot of things I had been ignoring, a lot of things I had been burying, and way too much going on in the world around me that I was allowing to affect me. But the one question I couldn't pin down was, "What do I do now?"
Felicia Day and her web group "Geek and Sundry" were promoting a writing contest back in October of 2016 which my counselor was pretty much in favor of me pursuing because I had mentioned the bit about "wanting to be a writer but...". I didn't do it unfortunately, but there were some sparks still managing to smolder from that strike of flint and steel.
Early November came and went. Thanksgiving was a nightmare. I'll sidestep the political commentary, but it had its impact.
3.) In the mean time I made an effort to go on a date. This was huge for me. I felt it was a good sign of my recovery progress. I don't date. In fact I hate it. I was soon reminded why. I'd say "but never mind" but this actually ended up being the point. This person made me feel less than. This person made me feel like I was one more stressful inconvenience in their day. To top it off, they threw it in my face that I wasn't working and they were. I had come far enough in my counseling and personal reconstruction that this abuse wasn't about to fly. Oh, hell no.
Two things happened as a result of this breakup. One, I started smoking again because I'd finally hit my limit and I was teetering towards another anxiety attack, (stupid, I know but we do what we need to in order to survive). Two I finished writing the last chapters for Ash to Ashes, because...well... screw that person. I know my worth, and by God, I'm going to show it to everybody. So I guess, "Thank you asshole for lighting the fire (of vengeance) under my butt that gave me my final boost of motivation to overcome my writer's block."
... And that is why I became a writer.
Fran also asked, "What made you want to write in this particular genre (Fantasy)? What is rattling around in that head of yours?" (To save her the need to seek therapy, I kept the discussion on topic. I know, I know, it impressed me too.) My answer verbatim:
Fantasy is one of the few genres where anything can happen and anything goes. You have magic, bizarre steampunk technology, an endless source of mythology and existing fairytales to draw inspiration from, monsters and creature races inspired from legends across the globe. There's romance, horror, supernatural events, adventure, and amazing locations that wouldn't naturally exist in the real world. But most importantly, everybody still has a story. From the lowly street sweeper, to the prince in the royal city, everybody still has a story, and in a fantasy setting that story can become as big or small as the writer imagines. Heroes are real. Villains are classically trained. Evil may lurk in the hearts of men, but it's also something that you can punch in the face.
It's funny because Mom (until very recently, under my niece's challenge to read Harry Potter) always hated fantasy. She never understood the genre and didn't like things that weren't plausible or realistic. Dad was indifferent, but he preferred modern action and comedies. How I came to appreciate Fantasy as a genre is a bit of a mystery, but it had its roots in He-Man, She-Ra. Krull, The Neverending Story, Legend (Tim Curry was terrifying as Darkness when I was a kid), Gummi Bears, Smurfs, The Dark Crystal (gave me nightmares for weeks, OMG the Skeksis!). In retrospect, the 80s were a great time to grow up loving Fantasy. Piers Anthony's Xanth series was a big draw into my reading the Fantasy Genre, as was Patricia C. Wrede's Dealing with Dragons. I didn't read The Hobbit or The Lord of the Rings trilogy until after I graduated from college (movie hype got me interested), but I'd already played Advanced Dungeons and Dragons in high school and played as one of the dwarves in a college stage production of The Hobbit. It's an ongoing and ever expanding geeky universe inside my head: Fantasy, Sci-Fi, Comic Books and Movies, Supernatural Thrillers, (some Horror, but admittedly I like to be able to sleep at night).
I got the tabletop gaming bug (again) when I was in my mid-20s. The short version is: I ended up with a whole mess of characters with backstories and concepts that I was really excited to play, but never had the chance. All the while I was percolating ideas for what I wanted to do with my writing, not realizing that the backstories I developed for my gaming characters were serving as writing exercises for future efforts. Ashton Firebrand and Riley Stillwater were originally D&D characters that never saw the tabletop, but became main characters in Ash to Ashes. THAT's how big of a geek I am. LOL
Someday...
