What do you write and where did it begin?

When I was a little boy, all bright-eyed and full of wonder about what the future would hold for me, I never would have thought that 20 years later I’d end up in virtually the same place. I foresaw a Mars landing in my future. A metamorphosis into some kind of intergalactic hero a la Buck Rogers. I’d do that after I rescued a few damsels in distress and put away some bad guys while wearing trademark yellow Dick Tracy coat and hat. Perhaps I’d even swing across the rooftops of a place not unlike Gotham City and do harmless battle, invincible to any effects the Joker could throw my way, because I was a kid, and that’s what we were. Invincible.

My list of fantasies were my reality, and life was a long enough time to experience them for real. Unfortunately, life can do a lot to knock those dreams out of you. But in my case, an unfaithful ex-wife, several missed opportunities, and other unexpected losses along the way have not been enough to take away one dream from the 10-year old boy that still resides somewhere in my psyche. When I’m not busy writing things that keep the lights on, usually for other people, and usually stuff that’s a lot more of a job to me than I would care for it to be, I let the child out to play, and he writes some pretty dastardly, horrific things, some of which you will see when my debut horror novel THE CONGREGATION lands with Kindle, iBooks, and Barnes and Noble in October.

Every scrap of torn flesh, each drop of spurting blood, can trace its roots back to a single comic book that my father allowed me to have one summer day about 20 years ago. I’d heard of the old movie TALES FROM THE CRYPT. I’d also heard that HBO would be doing a TV show of the same name. I was excited about the possibilities, but it wasn’t until I saw an old Gladstone Comics reprint on the newsstand of my local Waldenbooks that it would come to me this was, in fact, the original source material. TFTC was a comic book before it was anything else, and here I was holding a beautifully rendered full color reprint on cheap newsprint and standard four-color cover. The Jack Davis werewolf drawing, the corpse stretched across a tombstone under moonlight, was one of the most beautiful things I’d ever seen. I couldn’t wait to get home and tear through every last page of it.

And that’s what I did. Along the way, I read about a group of poor Hungarian immigrants accused of lycanthropy by a bigoted sheriff. (I actually learned “lycanthropy” was the technical term for werewolf from this book.) The tragic twist of fate that closed the story left me stunned and excited to move on to the next story. “Midnight Mess,” the Vault-Keeper’s offering, was a cozy little small town vampire story with another glorious twist ending that all but took my mind off the fact that there was more than just the Crypt-Keeper in this book. The next tale was one of a cheating spouse looking for a way out and finding that murder was the only way to do it. In the end, just desserts were served. Such was also the case in “This Wraps it Up,” a fast-paced and exciting mummy story.

Beyond these stories, there was a reprint of CRIME SUSPENSTORIES in the back 32 pages. It was filled with more of the same kind of lurid tales, each with a twist at the end I didn’t see coming. When I finished those 32 pages, I went right back to the front of the book and tore through them all again, focusing on advertisements for other books and old Crypt-Keeper’s hilarious verbiage in the letter column.

My whole life I’ve been drawn to horror movies, but this one day is when the dream to become a horror author was born. It’s something I’ll do for the rest of my life, whether I make a dime from it or not. It’s a passion and it was born to me on that hot summer day in our dearly departed bookstore. A lot has changed for me, and a lot has changed for publishing, in the last 20 years. I feel the biggest changes are yet to come, and I’m hopeful of where they’ll take us all on this journey into the future. But the one thing that hasn’t changed is that little tinge of excitement that I still get whenever I break open that old comic book and relive those stories that awakened my creative spirit and showed me how truly fun the world could be through blood colored glasses.

What is your passion, writers? What do you love to write about, and where did it begin for you? I’d love to hear the stories behind the stories. Feel free to share them below.

Having Apathy for Your Work: Good or Bad?

It doesn't seem like my young adult novel "Bearcats All the Way" has been out now for six years, but that's apparently what the time stamp on Lulu.com's website says. In the early days, I was filled with hope that Lulu's publishing platform would catch on with the general public and that my book would miraculously be whisked away into the realms of bestsellerdom, wherever that actually is. That didn't happen.

Of course, most of the fault lies with me. Books don't sell when you're too shy about pulling the marketing trigger, and for the longest time I suffered from just such a malady. Today, I'm considerably less shy about discussing my work. Earning a few paychecks on your writing ability will give you the confidence that you need to stop making apologies for your career choice. Nevertheless, the book has stagnated, and honestly, I'm okay with it. I've moved on to other projects, and I've grown considerably as a writer since then, both in education and practice.

I'm very proud of "Bearcats All the Way," but at the same time, if I thrust all of my marketing efforts into the past, there wouldn't be much of a future to take hold of, would there? This reality brings to mind a generally negative word that is, for me, somewhat positive in connotation: apathy. When one is apathetic about something, they just don't give a rip. Apathy is really a two-sided coin not unlike the one Two-Face flips in the Batman comics to decide whether you live or die.

(I know--geek!)

Heads, you stop caring so much that you refuse to participate. That can be on writing projects, homework assignments, or the plant/office/professional football organization, where you work. Tails, you're such a forward thinker that you know when to pull the plug on a project and move on to the next big thing with an enhanced set of skills to accompany you on the journey.

To illustrate:

• Putting away an old writing project and focusing on something new with renewed enthusiasm and vigor--good.
• Shutting down your football organization because you only stand to profit $5 billion instead of $7 billion in a down economy--bad.

(That's the sort of thing your fans hate you for, and I'm looking at you, owners.)

So when do you know if a project has run its course? Do you look at the dwindling sales numbers? Do you stop marketing because of a change in marketing trends--like when you wrote that young adult wizardry book, Harry Potter was all the rage, but now even J.K. Rowling is moving on to other things? Do you stop if your book gets a couple of 1-star reviews on iTunes, or when you read an anonymous Internet troll's diatribe on why you're the most illiterate idiot on earth? When is it really time to pull the plug?

For me, the process is very organic. You can't be instructed on when the time is right, but you can be told what to look out for. You'll know it when it happens, but you may feel that you need permission to move on without being considered a failure. Guess what? Everyone fails. Your critics are probably the biggest failures of all because they cannot actually "do." They haven't the courage or perhaps the ability to put themselves out there for the world to see. Chances are they work a job they hate, which may or may not pay well, and pieces of their souls die each day they have to go in and punch a clock. Don't worry about them. Worry about whether or not you want to spend time with the project anymore, and whether or not it still excites you enough to talk about it when you're asked the all important question: What kinds of things do you write? The moment I decided to no longer answer that question with "Bearcats All the Way," was the moment I decided it was time to refocus my efforts.

That's not to say the book isn't worth a read. You could probably polish it off in one day, it being summer and all, wink-wink. But I'd much rather focus on future writing plans because I am a writer, read, "one who writes." Not one who has written. "Bearcats All the Way" has been written. Now on to other things!