2010

"You never know what's coming for you."--Benjamin Button

This year started out with an empty bank account and an anxious feeling of what I was going to do next. But soon two major things happened that would impact the rest of 2010. First, I landed not one but two publishing opportunities. Second, we discovered we were going to have twins.

So at the start of the year, armed with these two amazing blessings on each side like guns in holsters, I stared down the future and momentarily freaked out. I was supposed to write four novels (all completely different) and hand them in by September. And then yes, the twins would be arriving sometime.

So for nine months this year, I worked like a madman. I wanted to see if I could reallly do it. This was, after all, what I'd been hoping and dreaming for. A plate of projects in front of me, a growing family. I took it a day at a time. It was like Groundhog Day from Hell in some ways. Same day, different stories, typing away at them little by little.

When September arrived, I finished the last of the novels. I was emotionally spent. But of course, I didn't have the first idea what the word exhaustion really truly meant.

Since then, I've been taking it an hour at a time. With twins, you have to do that.

So it's December 31st and I'm glad to say that I'm leaving this year behind. It wasn't a fun year. It was brutal, to be honest. But it was also beautiful and blessed.

Dreams can be funny things. You wait so long to wash up on their shore and then you're too exhausted to really, truly enjoy them. Sometimes you don't even recognize them. Sometimes you ask yourself Is this really what I wanted?

At the start of this year, there were many times when I asked myself if I could really get through it all. But I did. Somehow. Day by day. With God's help.

Having said that, I realize how fortunate I am. God really did bless us this year. The writing is secondary to those lovely little ladies born September 3. The writing will always be second to my family.

In a year where I had to motivate myself day after day, in the end, I realized that this life of mine is really not about ME. Guess it's taken me 39 years to realize that but I think I'm there. That's okay. I'm a man in a passionate world of pink. And I can live with that.

What happens tomorrow and the day after that--I don't know. I just know that I gave it my all this year, and I hope that 2011 will be a little more gentle and kind. I can't see it being any more generous--no, 2010 will always top that. Always.

Happy new year to everybody who has been a part of this writing journey of mine.

Looking Ahead

A new year is coming and as usual I'm wondering what doors will open and which ones will stay shut. Yet instead of worrying, I remain hopeful. I've been pleasantly surprised this year by the unexpected doors that have opened. I'm excited to see what lies ahead. It's out of my control. All I can do is keep working hard and keep inspired and keep trying to become a better writer.

Top 100: #40

"Home" by Depeche Mode

Here is a song from the wrong side of town
Where I'm bound to the ground by the loneliest sound
And it pounds from within and is pinning me down

Here is a page from the emptiest stage
A cage or the heaviest cross ever made
A gauge of the deadliest trap ever laid

And I thank you for bringing me here
For showing me home
For singing these tears
Finally I've found that I belong here

The heat and the sickliest sweet smelling sheets
That cling to the backs of my knees and my feet
Well I'm drowning in time to a desperate beat

And I thank you for bringing me here
For showing me home
For singing these tears
Finally I've found that I belong

Feels like home
I should have known
From my first breath

God send the only true friend I call mine
Pretend that I'll make amends the next time
Befriend the glorious end of the line

And I thank you for bringing me here
For showing me home
For singing these tears
Finally I've found that I belong here

Line From 40

From 40:

I believe everybody in life has a sound track, has their top ten albums, has their top one hundred songs. Not based on a critic’s criteria, but based on their own life experience. The girl who got away. The sunset seen on vacation. An unpreventable move in the middle of childhood. A loss. A victory. An episode. A love. A life.

Life

Some things in life are out of your control.

"Roll with the punches, tomorrow is another day."--Dicky Fox (Jerry Maguire)

Top 100: #39

(I've loved this song ever since getting this album after making my final move in high school)

"Compulsion" by Martin Gore

Charms in limited supply
And refusing to stretch
That indefinable nothing
Somehow keeps pushing you
Finding the right words
Can be a problem
How many times must it be said
There's no plan
It had to happen

Got to move on sometime
And it's about time
By putting one foot in
front of another
And repeating the process
Cross over the street
You're free to change your mind
Strength through diversity
Couldn't have put it more plainly

Got to move on sometime
Got to move on sometime
Got to move on sometime
Got to move on sometime

Charms in limited supply
Under threat of extinction
That indefinable nothing
Somehow motivates you
Finding the right words
Can be a problem
How many times must it be said
There's no plan
It had to happen

Got to move on sometime
And it's about time
By putting one foot in
front of another
And repeating the process
Cross over the street
You're free to change your mind
Strength through diversity
Couldn't have put it more plainly
Got to move on sometime

40 Back Cover Copy

Here's the back cover copy for 40 which comes out May, 2011:

What if you were told the exact date when you were going to die? What would you do with this information and how would it affect the way you live your remaining life?

Tyler Harrison is nine months shy of turning forty when he is approached by Matthew, who claims to be an angel and tells Tyler he’s going to die on his birthday. As disturbing visions blur the lines between reality and hallucination, Tyler recalls Matthew’s prediction with foreboding. When he tries to avoid dealing with the issues staring him in the face, he discovers that the more he runs the more horrific his life becomes.

In this unpredictable and moving novel about mortality, one man is given an opportunity to see the sum of his life. A story about choices, mistakes, fate, destiny, life, death, and eternity, 40 is an emotional ride right to the very end.

Top 100: #38

"Shape Of My Heart" by Sting

He deals the cards as a meditation
And those he plays never suspect
He doesn't play for the money he wins
He doesn't play for respect

He deals the cards to find the answer
The sacred geometry of chance
The hidden law of a probable outcome
The numbers lead a dance

I know that the spades are swords of a soldier
I know that the clubs are weapons of war
I know that diamonds mean money for this art
But that's not the shape of my heart

He may play the jack of diamonds
He may lay the queen of spades
He may conceal a king in his hand
While the memory of it fades

I know that the spades are swords of a soldier
I know that the clubs are weapons of war
I know that diamonds mean money for this art
But that's not the shape of my heart

And if I told you that I loved you
You'd maybe think there's something wrong
I'm not a man of too many faces
The mask I wear is one
Those who speak know nothing
And find out to their cost
Like those who curse their luck in too many places
And those who fear are lost

I know that the spades are swords of a soldier
I know that the clubs are weapons of war
I know that diamonds mean money for this art
But that's not the shape of my heart

Every Breath You Take On Sale

The novel I self-published a year ago, Every Breath You Take, is on sale this month for $9.99. It's available through my website. Would make a great gift for anybody looking for a moving love story.

Why I Write

Sometimes the sentiment can go somewhere. Sometimes it doesn’t have to stay bottled up inside, simmering or sinking deeper. Sometimes it can go somewhere.

Sometimes it can fit into a story.

Fourteen books have shown this. In small and big ways. Four more books will continue to show it next year. And hopefully many more in the future.

Memories shared. Thoughts documented. Expressions uttered. Feelings felt. Feeling felt and unshared and untold. Feelings bottled up like a genie, just waiting for a chance to be spoken, just waiting for a chance to be known.

The maelstrom that’s gone on off in my mind since my teen days has rarely been fully seen and heard. But glimpses come in the work. Doubts, frustrations, joys, passions, curiosities, ironies, hilarities, tragedies—pieces of these have all gone inside the work.

The work.

The story.

The chunk of memory and emotion wrapped up in someone else’s story.

I know a thousand other novelists and every one writes for his or her reason.

But this is why I write.

To do something with all that stuff.

To take the insecurities of a teenager and remember. To take the ideals of a twenty-something and remember. To take the insanity of a thirty-something and remember.

To remember and to try somehow to move on.

Sometimes it can be a dream I wake up from. Sometimes it can be the chords of a distant song heard while driving. Sometimes it can be a fading sunset.

They can all recall something. A mood, a moment, a melancholy button that’s pushed inside of me.

"Where do you come up with your ideas?"

The clichéd question sometimes is completely wrong.

Because the ideas are endless.

The reasons I write them are the real question.

Windows into my heart and my soul and my history. That’s what the stories are. That’s why I write them.

That’s why I’ll always be writing.