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It's funny how you can start out with one dream, and when that's achieved you want more. First I just wanted to get a book published. Then I wanted it to do well. Then..

I have a friend who wrote a compelling memoir. Her book is still going strong years later, and she is at the point where she can command a fee for showing up for events, for which she is still requested. A friend of mine in a different town is going to one of her events and she talked about how good the book was and how much of a fan she was, and how unbelievable it was that I was a friend of the writer. To which I... Read More...

Next Book in the Hopper!

I can't believe I did this, but I finished an 82K manuscript in 2.5 months. How did I do it, you ask? Especially because the last three took, cough cough, five years? I got a big jumpstart when I was on furlough for 35 days and that momentum carried me forward. I also made the time, something I haven't done before. Anyway, it's a novel called The Lightning Within Us. It is looking for a home. I am not sure if I will be hunting up a new agent, or if my current one will take it on. I'll figure that out in the next couple of weeks. 

This one was super messy. I didn't really have writer... Read More...

So, I'm accidentally writing a romance novel

There may be some authors who can sail through one book effortlessly, but that is not me. Eventually I get completely nauseous at the sight of my work in progress. I hate my main character; she is a wimpy whiiner and I want her to just go away. The other main character is vague, what is it with him? For some reason, I find writing secondary characters much easier than the main ones. Also, I obsessively look at word count (don't do this). So after a while of wanting to throw up, I need a change of pace. 

Furlough Fling started as a joke. I was on furlough for 35 days, as were a lot... Read More...

Us and Them

Because Fire in the Heart has been out for a year and a half, I sometimes reflect on what I could have written and what I did write. These sometimes diverge. If I wrote it today, it would be a different book (remember, there's a huge lag in when you finish writing and when it is published...sometimes years.) I was thinking about all the reasons I left fire, and most are still true. But there's one big iceberg most people don't mention, and it's the big divide between us and them.

In the old days, everyone who was capable "did fire", whether you were categorized as full-time... Read More...

Finding Why

One of the most valuable things I have learned about writing is this: You need to know your why.

As in, why are you writing about this? Why do you want people to read it?

For Fire in the Heart, The Geography of Water, and The Last Layer of the Ocean, I have a why.

I'm still struggling to find it for the work in progress. That, I have realized, is why it has been so difficult. And why it has required considerable thought and changes. I still have hope I will find the why. Otherwise, it's not worth bothering. Yes, some commercial authors can churn out many books a year,... Read More...

Camp Fire Lessons

In my day job, I've been working on "fuels reduction" projects in northern California, and it's never as easy as people like to think it is. Blaming the California fires on "tree huggers", lack of forest management, or the need to rake the forest floor is the easy way out and not true; it is a combination of factors that caused the devastation.

Paradise, California, is built on a slope, in an area born to burn. When it did burn, the area had not seen rain for two hundred days. But that's not what I want to write about. Just viewing the homes and lives lost, and looking at the sad... Read More...

Discount Book Madness!

Stopping by to say that I bought a bunch of my books at a discount--yes, authors have to buy their own books beyond the initial ten or so--and I will pass savings on to you if you are hunting a Christmas gift. $15 includes shipping, so hit the contact button and write a message. (As I have mentioned before, I don't put my email address on here, because I don't need to attract spammers.) This is a while they last offer, so be quick!

I haven't gotten any extra Geography copies but I am going to see if I can. Show Geography the love and keep it in print if you liked it.

... Read More...
Giving it up

Next year will be the first that I haven't had an "arduous" rating on my firefighter red card since 1986. Back then, the test you had to pass was a one and a half mile run. Depending on your elevation, you had to complete it in eleven minutes and change, a time that I found easy to beat. Once I was the only one completing the test, and my supervisor hung his belt on a tree lining the dirt road. I had to grab the belt and run back with it to prove I hadn't turned around short. Another time, my friend Roger pushed me to a nine minute finish time, a fast pace for me as I entered my thirties.... Read More...

Little things that annoy writers

(or at least, this writer)

A non-comprehensive list.

  • "What should I do? Take up a hobby, go to Africa, write a book.." While it's perfectly fine for people to "write books", I wish there was the same level of professionalism to being an author as there is for other professions. For example, I don't say, In retirement, I think I'll do brain surgery. I feel like people believe that writing is easy and anyone can do it.
  • Reading a blog, essay, whatever with obvious errors. It's not "Wah La." It's not "Per Say." It's not "All in the Same". There's more! I... Read More...
2500, or don't quit your day job

That's the amount of copies Fire in the Heart has sold. You can look at it in a positive way--Yippee! 2500 people have bought my book! Or, like this: Dang! I still haven't earned back my advance. And Geography sold even less! Why am I even doing this?

It's times like this that test a writer's soul. Yes, like the park ranger I once was, who was "paid in sunsets," you can tell yourself you are "paid in appreciation." The emails and responses I have gotten from former firefighters and present ones have been priceless. At the same time, you are basically writing for free. You'd better... Read More...

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