I’m always excited to welcome an author back to the blog, especially when he has become a real friend in the writing world. Richard Godwin hosts one of the deepest interview series I’ve seen on the web, and his Made It Moment appeared here not too long ago. Richard thinks about the world in ways that bone right down to its very core, and this dimension comes through in both his fiction, and his perceptions about the industry. Read on to get a flavor of both.

As my second novel Mr. Glamour makes its way in the world, I am once more reminded it’s a big ocean of literature out there. I have been writing professionally now for two years and started as a produced playwright in London. I write in a range of styles but my crime and horror fiction is what sells.

If I were to give any advice to young or aspiring writers I would say this. Write every day and read the authors who speak to you. Read them and ask yourself how they achieve their effects.

What has being published as a crime and mystery author taught me? For one, the hold the big publishing houses have had on publications has been challenged by Amazon and the rise of the E Book. What do I make of the revolution? I am in favour of it. I used to read reviews and many times bought books based on recommendations only to be disappointed. I often found books by unknown authors which I thought were brilliant. When any industry has a monopoly on taste it inevitably churns out the formulaic and the staid. That for me has nothing to do with why I write.

I write because I love it and because it is a process. You can never reach a ceiling.

This is an exciting time for new writers. I say this as someone who is traditionally published. The E Book has opened the door for many writers to reach an audience. So I say to new writers out there make use of the present time. Find your audience.

Some reviewers are going to hate what you do. If you pay attention to them you will miss out on the point of writing, and that is to find your own audience.

An illustration of the economics behind publishing comes in the form of the recent revelations about price fixing. The Wall Street Journal reports that the Department of Justice plans a suit against five publishers and Apple for colluding to raise the price of electronic books.

It will be interesting to see how this pans out. That kind of tactic doesn’t care for the reader and indicates that profit is driving the bus. But writing is a qualitative enterprise and when an industry attempts to impose quantitative standards on that, things suffer.

My debut novel Apostle Rising did well last year, got great reviews, and sold foreign rights in Europe. I hope Mr. Glamour does as well. It’s about a glamorous world of designer goods, beautiful women and wealthy men and a killer who is watching everyone.  It was released last week by Black Jackal Books and is already picking up great reviews.

Richard Godwin is the author of crime novels Mr. Glamour and Apostle Rising and is a widely published crime and horror writer. Mr. Glamour is his second novel and was published in paperback in April 2012. It is available online at Amazon and at all good retailers. Mr.Glamour is Hannibal Lecter in Gucci. The novel is about a glamorous world obsessed with designer labels with a predator in its midst and has received great reviews.

Carlie Cullen may have had the made-ing-est moment ever–because it didn’t involve making it “only” as a writer…but as a strong human being and mother as well. I don’t want to steal a single ounce of thunder from this emotional post. Read on and see how sometimes daring to put words on paper means daring to become yourself.

Isn’t it funny how it’s easier to believe the bad stuff people say to you than the positive?

Two years ago, when in the early stages of working on Heart Search: Lost, my dream of writing a novel and getting it published was almost dashed by someone who, instead of being a supportive husband, took great delight in putting me down. Phrases like, “What are you wasting your time doing that for?” and “Do you honestly think anyone will pay good money to read that crap?” and “If you’re so bored that you want to write, you should go out and get a second job!” and finally, “You’re living in a dream world – no one’s going to publish anything you write!” haunted me on a daily basis.

I’d been writing since I was a child and it was such a huge part of my life. It was my emotional escape and outlet, plus it gave me a great deal of pleasure. When I decided to write my first novel, I was excited and full of ideas. I wasn’t naïve enough to think I would land a publishing deal with the ‘big six’ (although I hoped it might be a possibility one day), but that didn’t stop me. I had a goal, one which fired me and drove me on to achieve something I dreamed about – to see my book on Amazon.

As the taunts and disparaging remarks continued, I began to get worn down. My self-esteem fell through the floor and I doubted myself and my abilities. My writing began to suffer and I started to believe I would fail before I’d even reached a quarter of the way through. But I had a shining light in my life, someone who believed in me and my writing ability, someone who encouraged/cajoled/pestered me to get each new chapter written – my wonderful daughter. She took to grabbing my laptop every time I left the room, to read what I’d just written, and upon returning was greeted with the phrase, “Where’s the next bit?” It became like a mantra. She loved the story and was eager to see where I was taking the characters next. She encouraged me right up until the final words were written, which was two months after the marriage ended and we moved out.

Just under a year later, after several rounds of editing, my book, Heart Search, book one: Lost was up on Amazon. I had achieved my goal and I felt like a kid at Christmas, faced with a pile of gaily wrapped presents. My heart soared and I was filled with joy. I’d proved the doubter wrong when, at the end of the first day, I had achieved sales on both sides of the Atlantic. If ever there was a time to flip someone ‘the bird’, that would have been it!

My daughter and I looked at the screen and she hugged me, saying, “I knew you could do it, Mum, and I’m so proud of you!”

Carlie M A Cullen was born in London. She grew up in Hertfordshire where she first discovered her love of books and writing. She has been an administrator and marketer all her working life and is also a professional teacher of Ballroom and Latin American dancing.

Carlie has always written in some form or another, but Heart Search: Lost is her first novel. This was launched 8th October 2012 through Myrddin Publishing Group and work has started on book two: Heart Search: Found. She writes mainly in the Fantasy/Paranormal Romance genres for YA, New Adult and Adult.

Carlie is also a professional editor.

Carlie also holds the reins of a writing group called Writebulb. Their first anthology, The Other Way Is Essex, was published September 2012 under Myrddin Publishing Group.

Carlie currently lives in Essex, UK with her daughter.

Stacy Green’s Made It Moment came at a place that is near and dear to my heart. I think that for many writers–indie published, those with small presses, and major houses alike–the feeling of being a “real writer” has to do with seeing a book on a shelf, or appearing at a bookstore event, or library, book club, coffee shop–something physical, tangible. As virtual as our world becomes, my sense is that the live experience of connecting with readers will always contain something special, and this may be all the more true as more and more of our time is spent in bits and bytes. Stacy, I wish I had been there to see this Moment, and may you have many more!

When Jenny invited me to be a part of her “Made It Moment” series, I jumped at the chance. And then panicked. Have I really made it? Do I finally consider myself a “real author?”

A week ago, when Into The Dark first released, I would have said I wasn’t sure. But now, after my first book signing, I can finally say yes. I may be in the early stage of my career and have a lot more to learn, but little by little, people are getting to know my name.

My first ever book signing was this past Thursday at a wonderful store called New Bo Books. New Bo is one of those tiny places with lots of character and a staff who knows their customers by name. Only about 30 people can fit inside, so it was relaxed and intimate.

But public speaking isn’t my thing, and the idea of reading words I wrote in front of people I knew was nauseating. I had my list of points to address, but when I sat down in a big, comfy overstuffed chair to face the crowd who’d come to hear ME speak about MY book, I blanked out.

I couldn’t read the words on the page, my cheeks burned, and I felt incredibly foolish. I jumped right into talking about my book and felt like I was jumping from one topic to another. Then it came time to read, and naturally, the part I’d dreaded so much was the easiest. I settled in and read two separate passages from a book I’m very proud of.

And guess what? People had questions for me! Some had read the book, some bought it that night. But they all asked the same kind of questions I would love to ask my favorite authors.

That’s when it hit me: I have made it. I may be at the early stages, but that’s okay. We all start somewhere, and I’m going to cherish every moment.

Into The Dark on Amazon in Digital and Paperback
All other digital formats at MuseItUp Publishing

Stacy Green is fascinated by the workings of the criminal mind and explores true crime on her popular Thriller Thursday posts at her blog, Turning the Page.

After earning her degree in journalism, Stacy worked in advertising before becoming a stay-at-home mom to her miracle child. She rediscovered her love of writing and wrote articles for a local magazine before penning her first novel. Her debut novel, INTO THE DARK, is set in Las Vegas and features a heroine on the edge of disaster, a tormented villain, and the city’s infamous storm drains that house hundreds of homeless.

Sometimes you can tell from the Moment itself that you’re going to love the writing in the author’s book, and that’s what happened to me here. When Richard Louden likens his writing hand to…well, I don’t want to deprive you of that quiver of joy you get when you read an image that is just so spot on, you start seeing one slice of the world in a whole new way. The author’s way.

Maybe that is Making It–the power to make a reader do that. If so, then Richard has.

In Goethe’s “Faust” there’s a character called the Student who says of books: “What you have in black and white, you can happily carry home.”

Okay, he makes it sound dry and pedantic. But if being a fan of words classes you as a pedant, I must be one of that tribe. Words have always fascinated me. As soon as I saw that they could grow into sentences and then into paragraphs, I was hooked.

At twenty, I was writing weekly football reports for UK newspapers. Later, I became a feature writer on education and law. Journalism wasn’t my career but it stopped my hyperactive writing hand from fretting and straining at the leash.

My move into creative fields began with short stories. I had two published in national anthologies. But short stories never fired me up, so I tried my hand at TV. Two of my drama scripts were produced on BBC and ITV, which I hope may qualify as mini-Made It Moments.

It took me ages to get round to attempting my first novel, The Girl with the Haunting Smile. Even then, I had to rely on the skills of Gillian Stern, a superb London editor, to reshape it and weed out my self-indulgent excesses.

I sent my reworked baby to various literary agents and thought I had acquired one but in the end she didn’t take me on. She did, however, tell me her firm’s reader “adored” my novel. That was my big Made It Moment. If a guy of his status and experience felt that way about my book, I must get it out there somehow.

In today’s market, the obvious solution was to issue it as an ebook. Here – slightly amended – is the blurb I’m using to promote it:

Greg quits Scotland for North Carolina to track down Ellen, the lost pen pal he has never met but has loved for many years from a distance. But a huge doubt surrounds his mission. Even if he finds Ellen, will the secret he has kept from her – that he has had Tourette’s since he was a boy – destroy his dream of happiness?

The great adventure begins now. The Girl with the Haunting Smile has just hit Amazon’s virtual shelves. I’ve done my share of social networking, like blogging and building strong followings on Twitter and Goodreads. Now I must wait and hope.

Richard Louden lives in Glasgow, UK. A teacher of modern languages, education director and freelance journalist, he learned some of the tricks of the author’s trade by writing two dramas that were produced on BBC and ITV and short stories which appeared in national anthologies. His first novel, The Girl with the Haunting Smile, was published by Amazon Digital Services in November 2012. He is now in the later stages of a second novel, Spring Chicken. All he is saying for now is that it is an inspirational tale for our times and it isn’t about poultry.

I am very proud to bring Suspense Your Disbelief readers this Made It Moment by someone who is both a good friend and former student of mine. I’d like to say I had something to do with Leah getting published–I did not. But I *did* know that she would be published, maybe sooner, maybe later, and that is enough for me to feel a hearty hear, hear about her accomplishment.

By the way, a while ago Leah did a guest post about meeting Stephen King. I mean, can you say writing on the walls?

Congratulations, Leah!

On November 1, 2010, a friend of mine said, “So, are you going to do this NaNoWriMo thing?”

And I said, “Huh?”

I had no idea what she was talking about. Once I googled, and found out it was short for National Novel Writing Month, I laughed.

Write a novel in a month? Write a novel at all? You must be crazy.

But I signed up anyway, gave myself a daily word count goal, and started writing.

The road was long and sometimes arduous. My first draft (finished in mid-December, but who’s counting) was terrible.  But I set to editing it, sent a draft to my brothers, and then edited some more.

Along the way, I queried a bit, got rejected, decided I was only telling half the story, wrote the other half, edited some more…you know how it goes.  A lot more rejections happened, and a lot more querying.  I took a class, learned more about the publishing industry, and edited some more.

Finally, in May, I got an email.  “We love your book,” it said.  “We’d like to publish it.”

I cried.

It’s been another long and sometimes arduous road since then. More editing, file formatting issues that almost drove me insane, and the endless waiting game that is the world of publishing.

But on Halloween…October 31, 2012…after a crazy two-year journey, my book was released via MuseItUp Publishing.

On November 1, 2012, my book appeared on Amazon.com. Two years to the day after a challenge set me on a mission.

And seeing my name on Amazon? Well, that’s a Moment if ever I’ve had one.

Leah Rhyne is a Jersey girl, but she’s lived in the South long enough to lose her accent and most of her attitude. Her first novel, Undead America: Volume 1: Zombie Days, Campfire Nights is in e-bookstores everywhere, via MuseItUp Publishing. It’s the first of a planned trilogy, and she hopes you love it.

Judy Hogan is the first author I’ve seen who let her Made It Moment be revealed by the voice of another. Yet what Judy did makes an awful lot of sense, because if you read through the more than 250 Moments in this forum (first let me collect them into a book, a project I would love to do), one thing that seems pretty constant is the role readers play in a writer’s making it. Judy’s first published mystery, Killer Frost, has spoken powerfully to readers, and when you hear from this one, you’ll see why.

Judy’s first Moment appears here, and it ran even before her book was published. Prophetic, as Judy speaks about below. And while I’m on the topic–she makes a mean loaf of bread!

Then, when a wind comes along and lifts you,
you have to trust it, let it take you into a whole
new place in your life and in the lives of other people,
a new room where communion is frequent and possible.
The Telling That Changes Everything XIV.

My poems have often been prophetic, as was this one, which I wrote last March, five months before Killer Frost appeared.  To have my first mystery novel published was a high point in my literary life, but even more reassuring and reinforcing has been the discovery that people love it, that for my readers the characters live and breathe; they have a real existence apart from me.  The biggest challenge for me, as a writer, was to find and delight readers.  Why else did I go to all this trouble to get published?  Yet I had no idea how much it would lift me into a whole new place, give me a deeper, more permanent sense of my identity, and put me into communion with other people.  My self-esteem now feels profoundly and permanently rooted.

These new readers keep telling me how real my characters and their dilemmas are to them.  So many agents and editors rejected my mysteries, including Killer Frost, but so far the readers are in my corner, and they want the other books in the series which I have written: nine in all, for I kept writing.  Killer Frost is the sixth.  I did the whole thing backwards in one way, but it feels to me now like I did it right.  Killer Frost found me readers.  They’re a small number, but they’re talking.  Here is one comment I especially treasure, coming from Gary Tyson, the African American Chief of Police in a neighboring town in my county, Siler City.

Judy, I just finished reading Killer Frost. It was one of the most incredible books that I have read.  I became engulfed in the reality of the plot.  In my mind, I became an eyewitness to a struggle that is all too common in many African American families.  The characters were indeed real.  They were as real as folks that I come into contact with on a regular basis.  The unsung heroes that make a difference in so many young people’s lives each and every day.  Folks like Malvina (AKA Margie Horton Ellison) who was community organizing before it became fashionable.

The book flowed with such grace.  It kept me engaged.  There were also some jewels that could be plucked from the plot.  One was the awesome power of protest.  If only folks still remembered the protests of the Civil Rights Movement.  Folks would be doing more than “being sick and tired of being sick and tired” with ungodly stuff that is on the news and spoken at our kitchen tables on a daily basis.  Another jewel to be plucked was the dire need for good leadership and mentorship.  The raw kind of leadership that is willing to go down with the ship if the cause is right.  (We know that God looks after his soldiers.)  The kind of leadership that will either give a young person a gentle push, or, if needed, a swift kick in the butt to get them back on track (Mr. Oscar’s type).  The book offered a lot of drama with no blood, guts, and sex that dominates our airwaves and books in our current society. You were able to capture a lot of drama, with a few horrific moments, in a clean kind of old-fashioned manner.  How refreshing to read a modern day drama with an old-fashioned twist.

Wow!  Thanks for a narrative that reminds us all that, even with the dire problems we face today, “the frost” has not destroyed our determination to overcome.

Judy Hogan founded Carolina Wren Press (1976-91), and was co-editor of Hyperion Poetry Journal (1970-81).  She has published five volumes of poetry and two prose works with small presses. She has taught creative writing since 1974. She joined Sisters in Crime in 2007 and has focused on writing and publishing traditional mystery novels since.  In 2011 she was a finalist in the St. Martin’s Malice Domestic Mystery contest.  The twists and turns of her life’s path over the years have given her plenty to write about.  She is also a small farmer and lives in Moncure, N.C.

Charles Salzberg is an author who has played such an important role in my writerly life that it’s hard to encapsulate it in an introduction. First, there was the fact that I met Charles when I attended NYWW’s Perfect Pitch…after which I met the agent who not-so-long-ago sold my first novel. Charles helped craft the pitch for the novel I was working on into something that attracted an agent (and 3 editors). He’s a master at seeing through to the bones of a novel, of developmental editing. He’s also an author himself–and if you like your mystery taken with a dash of shrewdness and a dollop of realism, both Swann novels are for you. Last, Charles’ website is a true work of art, worth a visit just as eye candy.

Did I say last? Last is really contained in the Made It Moment you’re about to read. Because now, as I stand poised on what feels like the rim of a cliff, Charles’ influence continues. One thing we writers–we humans–have to learn is how to meet failures with something besides a crash landing. How to turn them, wherever possible, into successes. In this Moment, Charles shows us how.

Before I received the confirming email, Google alerts kicked in.  My first detective novel, Swann’s Last Song, had been nominated for a Shamus Award for Best First PI Novel.

I was shocked.  Not because I didn’t think the novel was good, though not good enough to win an award, but because the whole thing was a mistake. I’d never meant to write a detective novel and certainly not one that might be taken seriously by the crime community.  In fact, when I first wrote the book, almost 25 years ago, I thought of it as an anti-detective novel, a literary exercise that would play with the genre, turn it upside down by creating a traditional detective who follows all the clues but doesn’t solve the crime.

But that didn’t go over so well with agents or publishers, so I stuck the manuscript in a drawer, and buried it on an old computer, only to resurrect it years later when I caved in and changed the ending, thereby getting it published.

And now it was nominated for an award.  I didn’t think I’d win, but after a while, I don’t care what anyone says, you get a taste for it.  You can see all those bios that read “Shamus Award winning novelist,” and you even say to yourself, “little do they know that it’s a one-off,” because in SLS, at the end, the detective is so disillusioned that he quits the business.

I lost, as I knew I would.  But then something strange happened.  I got pissed off.  I wanted another shot at it.  I wanted to win something, anything.  And so I did something completely unplanned: I wrote a sequel.  I rescued Swann from the dung heap of a real day job and put him back to work as a skip tracer.  The result was Swann Dives In.   And now, since I’m having so much fun with the character, I’ve just finished a third.

So I guess the “made” moment was not being nominated for an award, but losing it.

Charles Salzberg is a freelance writer whose work has appeared in Esquire, New York Magazine, GQ, Elle, Redbook, Ladies Home Journal, Good Housekeeping, The New York Times Arts and Leisure, The New York Times Book Review, the Los Angeles Times Book Review,  the Cleveland Plain Dealer, and various other publications.

He is the author of From Set Shot to Slam Dunk, An Oral History of the NBA, and On A Clear Day They Could See Seventh Place:, Baseball’s 10 Worst Teams of the Century, and co-author of My Zany Life and Times, by Soupy Sales, Catch Them Being Good, by Tony DiCicco and Colleen Hacker, Phd., and The Mad Fisherman, by Charlie Moore.

His novel, Swann’s Last Song, was nominated for a Shamus Award for Best First PI Novel.  The sequel, Swann Dives In, will be published in October, 2012.  He also has a Swann short story in Long Island Noir (Akashic Books.)  His novel, Devil in the Hole, will be published in July, 2013.

In keeping with the theme of family and legacy we have going on the blog right now, today’s guest describes how not only his ancestry, but also his wife’s, dates back to the Civil War…and what it’s like to immerse yourself as a writer in that kind of history. But David Williamson’s Moment ties into subjects we discuss here on Suspense Your Disbelief in another way, too. I think many writers will relate to the stumbling block David ran into when the story he wished to tell didn’t quite fit his publisher’s needs. The new paradigm of indie publishing gave David an outlet for his writing–and gave his forefathers’ voices. Please join me in welcoming them *all* to the blog.

David, I’d say you made it.

I would like to thank Jenny for asking me to contribute to her writers’ blog with the understanding that I accepted the offer even though I have never had a “made it” moment.  Over the years I have had a variety of “no kidding” moments though—as in, “No kidding, you want to publish my manuscript?”—and perhaps that qualifies me.

The latest two moments as a writer came when McFarland & Co., Publishers accepted my manuscript on the history of the 3^rd Mississippi Battalion/45^th Mississippi Infantry and the second came a number of years later when they asked me if I had another one to send them, which I did.  (Maybe a third moment came when Jenny asked me to contribute to her blog.)

When I first learned about it as a youngster, I wanted to find out as much as I could about what my maternal ancestors had done during the Civil War (my paternal ancestors were in Scotland at the time and were involved in other matters).  Gradually I picked up bits and pieces of information about my great-great grandfather, Pvt. Ferdinand Kirkbride of the 104^th Ohio, and my great grandfather, Pvt. Eli E. Rose of the 47^th Indiana.

Years later, while trying to write the history of the 47^th Indiana, I met my future wife, Brenda, and she diverted my attention to, among other things, the history of her great-great grandfather Pvt. William B. Johnston’s unit, the 3^rd Battalion/45^th Mississippi Regiment, which her father had asked her to research.  I helped her to find out what unit William B. was in and began working on the 3^rd Mississippi Battalion as well as on the 47^th Indiana and the 104^th Ohio, believing that they would result in three very different histories.  Eventually, while gathering information on the movements of the 3^rd Mississippi Battalion, I noticed that at the outset of William T. Sherman’s 1864 Atlanta Campaign, their path began to converge with the 104^th Ohio’s and they continued to close in on each other during John Bell Hood’s movement into Tennessee later that year, which, to our surprise, culminated in their direct confrontation at the breastworks in front of the Carter cotton gin during the Battle of Franklin, Tennessee.  With that, I put aside my other research and wrote the history of the 3^rd Mississippi Battalion, including both their perspective and the perspective of their adversaries in the 104th Ohio.  McFarland accepted it and it became The Third Battalion Mississippi Infantry and the 45^th Mississippi Regiment: A Civil War History.

I then turned my attention to the long delayed history of the 47^th Indiana.  Much of their history is based on letters from the front written by their chaplain, Rev. Samuel Sawyer, an interesting character in his own right, as well as letters from enlisted men and from the newly emerging profession of newspaper reporter (the “Bohemian Brigade”) to a variety of  newspapers; but the bulk of my information came from some 120 letters written by their organizer and commander, then Colonel James R. Slack, to his wife, Ann, from 1862 to 1865.    Utilizing my sociologist/historian background, I focused on the social and political context of life on the home front, which, for those interested in things or events other than battles, includes the stuff thrillers are made of:  violent antiwar activity, espionage, sabotage, conspiracy, treachery, intrigue, military trials, and a precedent setting Supreme Court habeas corpus case (Ex parte Milligan), which Slack became involved in, that remains relevant in today’s so-called “war on terrorism.”  McFarland accepted the manuscript and it became The 47^th Indiana Volunteer Infantry: A Civil War History.

What they did not accept were the verbatim transcriptions of all of General Slack’s letters, insisting, because of the length of the book, that I excerpt only the pertinent military-related comments he made.  That meant much of Ann’s home life, which included raising their three children, taking care of their farm, and seeing to Slack’s law office while he was away, was left out, as were most of Slack’s comments about other townspeople, Milligan excepted.  When they did not want the full letters as a second book, I decided to try my hand at self-publication; and, with the help of booknook.biz, converted them to an e-book called Slack’s War: the Civil War Letters of General James R. Slack, 47^th Indiana Volunteer Infantry, to His Wife, Ann, 1862 to 1865.

Nor did they want the regimental court-martial records, which included all of the 47^th Indiana’s court-martial records for both officers and enlisted men held at the National Archives.  Since there were only nine cases, I transcribed them all verbatim, wrote summaries of each, and again with the help of booknook.biz, turned them into an e-book called The Forty-seventh Indiana Volunteer Infantry Court-Martial Case Files.

 

David Williamson lives in Mississippi with his wife, Brenda, and their cat, Wilde Oscar.

Chris Angus’ Made It Moment contains a lot of elements that speak to this time of Thanksgiving. Family and legacy and tradition. All three became part of Chris’ road to this writing life–and he blends them uniquely, like a great Thanksgiving feast. I hope you will enjoy this Moment in the aftermath of yesterday’s feasting.

And I hope you will take it as an offering of thanks from me to you. Being able to introduce new authors–or a new slice of a known author’s life–to readers on this blog is something that’s both a thrill and an honor. This blog is a family of its own, and today I give thanks for every one of you.

In that old 1940s film, The Naked City, a sort of police procedural set in New York City, the famous tag line was: “There are eight million stories in the Naked City.” That sounds about right for the number of ways there are to become a writer.

I come from a family full of writers. As a result, I resisted it as career choice for a long time. I was thirty when I began to write a weekly newspaper column on canoeing. It showed me not only how writing can grow into a profession but also how one thing leads to another. I went from newspaper columnist to article writer to book review editor to finally publishing my first book, an expanded collection of essays from my column. That will always seem like my “made it” moment, to be able to show the other writers in my family a book of my own.

Early on, when I was just starting out with my newspaper column, my mother had grown too ill to continue writing her murder mystery series about an Agatha Christie-type character she called Mrs. Wagstaff. With her blessing, I tried to keep the series going. I wrote three Mrs. Wagstaff novels. None were published, but it got me interested in writing fiction. I gravitated to a genre that appealed to me more: thrillers.

I love the fast pace, the exotic characters and locales. I enjoy weaving plots rich in history and science. My books are set all over the world, in Greenland, Iceland, China and Africa. One classic bit of advice all writers hear sooner or later is: “Write about what you know.”  That always seemed wrong to me. What could be more boring than to only write about things you know? And if the writer is bored you can bet the reader will be too. What I tell young writers today is: “Write about what interests you, and if it happens to be something you know nothing about, then you will have to do a lot of research. But research is not drudgery if you are fascinated by your subject, and I guarantee your passion will shine through in your words.”

Christopher Angus comes from a literary family consisting of seven published writers. His father and mother, both professors of English Literature and authors of numerous works of fiction, were the best-selling collaborators of a series of anthologies published by Random House.

For ten years, Book Review Editor for Adirondac magazine, he has also been a newspaper columnist and has published more than 400 essays, articles, book introductions, columns and reviews in a wide variety of publications, including The New York Times, Albany Times-Union, Adirondack Life, American Forests, Wordsworth American Classics, Adirondack Explorer and many more.

He is the award-winning author of several works of nonfiction, including Oswegatchie: A North Country River (North Country Books–2006), The Extraordinary Adirondack Journey of Clarence Petty: Wilderness Guide, Pilot and Conservationist (Syracuse University Press—2002), Images of America: St. Lawrence County (Arcadia Press—2001), andReflections From Canoe Country (Syracuse University Press—1997).

He has been active in efforts to reopen Adirondack rivers to the public.

Chris recently released The Last Titanic Story  with Iguana Books and Flypaper  from Cool Well Press.

His third novel, London Underground, is now available from Iguana Books!

In life there are second acts, despite F. Scott Fitzgerald’s feeling on the subject. Indie publishing has provided one for writers all over. And this Moment proves it. Careers change–whole industries may meet an upheaval of tsunami-size–but Rita Kempley didn’t allow herself to be swept away.

Rita faced the plunge of print media, and the even worse specter of depression, with the kind of creativity that I think is the salvation for many writers. Most of us struggle with some kind of inner demon–they’re often what appear on the page. But Rita got beyond her own story to give us a futuristic thriller. And as she takes the reader to another world, so did she stage her own second act.

Sometimes you don’t know you need a change until it’s foist upon you. So it was for me after 24 grueling years laboring at The Washington Post. I had written my heart out, but like Rodney Dangerfield, I got no respect. That didn’t stop me from waging an ultimately futile political battle to remain a movie critic in the toxic environment that was The Post’s newsroom.

Really, the party was so over, but I dug in my heels. Sixty-hour workweeks, lame editors, much less pay than my male colleagues: What’s not to like? Hoo-boy, did I ever need a wake-up call. In retrospect, though, I doubt even a smack in the puss would have awakened me to how the creativity had been sucked out of me. I hung on until a fairly lucrative buyout was offered, then was stripped on my press credentials and shown the door.

I didn’t know it then, but I would soon learn how worthless I would feel without that position. Though it was a relief to get the hell out of what I had come to call the land fill, I felt as if I was in mourning. Indeed I was. The Rita Kempley who reviewed movies, interviewed stars and went to premieres, film festivals and yes, even the occasional Hollywood party, was no more. Though I had never realized it, I had become my byline. And now that me didn’t exist.

I had a husband, a cat and many friends, but all I could see was time, vast lingering voids waiting to be filled. For two years, I slept as much of the day away as I could. I was depressed, which is nothing new for a bi-polar person, and hoped to die in my sleep as there was a good chance that was what I would be doing when the time came.

If I’d been a child star, I probably would have become addicted to crack and signed on to a pathetic reality TV show. Luckily my husband was there to support me along with former colleagues who had been through the same ordeal. My garden beckoned. I’ve found digging in the dirt puts one back in touch with reality more effectively than hallucinogens. I ordered hundreds of bulbs. I’ve always found that planting bulbs is a reaffirmation of life. Cooking fancy meals is good, too, so I began to add new dishes to my repertoire, had friends over to dinner, threw parties and started going to the gym again.

The cat and I still took too many naps together, but I began to think about a second act. I could teach, everyone said, or volunteer. Perhaps I could walk dogs or sell my gardening skills. Thanks anyway, I said, but I was beginning to feel like putting words on a paper again. Whether anybody ever read those words mattered, but not so much as putting them there in the first place.

Words have always dazzled me. Like a fairy tale heroine in a bewitched forest, I lose my way in a dictionary or a thesaurus. I love to play with them, polish them, toss them into the air and see where they fall. I love to line them up and knock them down like bowling pins, spin them around and watch them get dizzy. I used to get dizzy, too, and sometimes couldn’t see the story for the words.

That may be why I got out a old screenplay that my husband, Ed Schneider, and I had co-written years earlier. It was a futuristic thriller called “Birthright” and as far as I was concerned, it was done. We had some interest in the script initially, but ultimately there were no takers. Although the characters weren’t compelling – I would have called them cardboard in my reviewing days – I had always liked the mystery and the setting. This will be quick and easy, I thought. A tweak or two at best.

If you want to get Hollywood’s attention, I have been told, it is smarter to write a book than a screenplay. All righty then. Let some other schmo do the adaptation. Only I discovered, writing screenplays is more like building a house while writing a book is more like gardening. Lots of digging, lots of pruning, lots of weeding.

Two years passed and the characters were beginning to take shape, but the story still wasn’t there. I realized this because I was learning to become a storyteller. It was no longer about the words or me, it had become about the book.

Initially, I hesitated to call the pile of paper a “book” as I only had about a hundred pages. I’m not a fast writer, but I pressed on till I had a hundred more. And then more after that. How could this be? The longest piece I had ever written in my previous incarnation was a celebrity profile that ran 52 inches. Now I had well over 300 pages in a narrative form. Tada! The time had come to find an agent.

A flurry of rejections later, I made an appointment with my psychiatrist. We came up with a diagnosis of post-partum depression. The rejections weren’t the problem – a writer friend said I had some of the nicest rejection letters she had every seen. No, I longed for my book, especially my characters. We had spent most days and many, many nights together over the past four years and I missed them terribly. The book, now called “The Vessel,” went back in the drawer while I explored memoir writing and finally took a couple of webinars on writing a novel. I gave up on the memoir because I was sick of writing about me – hard to believe I know – and took a second and then a third pass at “The Vessel.”

That’s when I began to really like what I had written. I began to suspect I knew what I was doing. I sent the novel out to a few agents in January and February, but as expected, none were interested. It didn’t matter so much anymore. The publishing industry was obviously going the way of print journalism and self-publishing was practically legitimate. So I thought to myself, as I often do when authority is concerned, “Screw ’em,” and sent the manuscript off to start the e-publishing process.

Weeks later, as I was reading the proofs one last time, I caught myself thinking “Hey, this is pretty damned good.” From that point on, it really hasn’t much mattered how many copies I’ve sold. (Of course, I want to complete the circle, because a book isn’t really a book until it’s read.) What matters is that I’m not beating myself up anymore. I don’t know if it will last, but writing a book and publishing it myself seems to have done more for me than Prozac.

Rita Kempley, writer, journalist and editor, spent nearly 25 years in the dark as a film critic for The Washington Post. Thousands of screenings later she swears she can review a movie without seeing it. In addition to covering the Cannes and Sundance film festivals, she profiled scores of film personalities. She was also a regular commentator on two local FM-radio shows and hosted “Usual Suspects,” her popular weekly film chats on Washington Post Live Online.