OKAY, BACK TO WRITING THE TWO BOOKS

Sometimes when I think about how long it took to write A DREAM LOST and THE DEVIL'S DUE, I can't believe that much time has passed. During those years I've learned so much, and had so many new experiences, that I'm simply not the same person who began these two books by typing out thoughts on a word processor.

I say fourteen years, but it's actually been longer. I got my first computer around 1994 or 95. My preliminary notes were on a dinosaur called a word processor. For those of you who don't know what that it, it was basically a typewriter that had a little bit of memory. When you selected print, the keys would bang out the document automatically, like machine gun fire. I swear the next door neighbors probably thought there was murder and mayhem going on right under their noses. Well, yes, there was mayhem, but it was all on paper.

I was delighted that this Smith-Corona word processor had a little 3 1/2 inch disk that could actually store some of what I'd written. Anyway, back in those days, it was possible to save in a format that later could be read by a computer. That's how I know it was more than fourteen years, because I transferred the information on those disks to my computer when I got one. Without that, I never would have been able to rescue the original manscript after I'd put it down for two years, discouraged that it wasn't going the way I thought it would. Once it was on a computer, I was enthused again. Oh, I guess I could have retyped everything from the printed pages, but would I? It was so easy to put the disk in the computer and have it all done for me..

I was a workaholic back then, (as if I'm not now) and I'd sit down to write this "great American novel" after working fourteen or fifteen hours at my "real job". I'd tap away into the wee hours of the morning. The next day I'd read what I'd written, thinking it was brilliant. Oh yes, when I was done, the publishers would be bidding against each other to get their hands on this heart-wrenching novel. Except, they weren't. Why? Well, I gave you the answer before. I simply didn't know how to write fiction. The story premise was good...the author sucked. Better stick to magazine articles.

Still, I always say there is a benefit in most things. Sure, I'd written published magazine articles, but I definitely knew nothing about writing fiction. The work was professional in its presentation, but filled with information dumps and devices that work in articles, but have no place in fiction. It was not one of those books that grab you by the throat and won't let go until you've read all night, because you just had to find out what happened.

So what was the benefit? I got those thoughts out of my mind--down on paper. They became something tangible...something that I could tweak, cut, expand, edit and use as a training ground over many years. If I had never made that first step, it would still be in my mind. If I hadn't made that first step, I never would have studied my craft until I learned how to find the voice for my characters, learned to do a "machete edit", and make people care what happened.

It doesn't come overnight. But it can come. That's where I leave off tonight. Not exactly a cliffhanger, but there is so much more to tell...so much more to talk about...that every time I post I also have to decide when to stop.

Arliss