Writing is my Therapy

I'd found an old typewriter a long time ago... it looked like a bulky briefcase, but you flip the top up and inside was a typewriter.  I think that might have been the little thing in my life that sparked a passion within me.  I was ten years old and just returned from my first Taekwondo tournament.  I wrote as best a ten year old could... all lowercase letters in a single centered column down the middle of the page.  I talked about the experience and how my heart raced and how good it felt to win even if it was only a bronze medal.

To this day, writing has served a major purpose in my life and has helped to keep me sane in this world.  From then on I kept journals throughout my life.  The journals helped me through high school, college, the military, and life in general.

As a writer it is important to never stop writing.  Writing can be no different, in terms of art form and craft, as painting or playing a musical instrument in that if you don't use it, you lose it.  This is one of the reasons why I keep this blog, and the same goes for many other published and unpublished authors.  I find journal writing particularly helpful because I am unrestricted in every sense.  I don't have to focus on capitalization, punctuation, style, selling anything, or marketing anything... I just write.

So in a lot of ways writing has been a form of therapy for me.  Writing helps me to release a lot of tension and stress.  People may ask, "Really?  You write 300+ pages of a novel and then you write some more?"  Well, yeah, but like I said it is a different form of writing.  It has helped me a great deal in life and never gets old and boring because my life never gets old and boring... and I write about my life and those around me.  It helps me to keep my mind sharp and active in writing.  Some people even recommend just going outside and writing what you see, which I know is something that helps a lot also.

Aside from journal writing I also write poetry, essays, and long emails to that special someone.  I think they all serve a purpose, but again my favorite is journal writing.  Here in Los Angeles there are some really nice shops for writers that sell these beautiful leather bound journals.  When I was in the Navy I snuck one into basic training that had (in Kanji / Japanese) the word "Peace" on the outside... HA!  I wrote in the dark at night, when I was on bed rest from having my wisdom teeth pulled, and throughout the rest of my training.  There were a few times during the writing of The Mechanical Room that I referred to my journal because the Alliance of Defenders in the Starlight Queendom are a naval force and I had to reference some naval terms.  And though there are things I will never forget about the military... a lot of it is better preserved in my journals than in my memory.

(Recommended reading: A Handbook To Literature by William Harmon and C. Hugh Holman)

A Unique Voice

Most of my work tends to focus on a few central characters, however never neglecting the characters that also move the plot of the story along.  Given that I tend to have a number of characters, I try to make sure that each one has a unique voice.

Sometimes this can be tricky for me particularly when the characters are related (i.e. father and son, brothers, etc.).  One thing I try to remember is how many unique people I've come across in my life.  I've worked at a college counseling facility, lived on the east coast, west coast, and in the midwest, and I've been in the military.  I had to have come across some distinct characters in my travels. 

I try to dig back and reference some of these characters.  Another good tip that I read was to go to a park, or restaurant, or somewhere with people in general and just listen to the dialogue and conversations.  I'm kind of a hermit and so I hate leaving the apartment unless it's for food, family, or work.  I have, however, kept detailed journals throughout my life that also help me keep a record of the people and places I've encountered.

My main character, John Noah, was easily unique in his voice from the opening of the book, but I tried to keep it in balance with the changes occurring around him.  My favorite character to write, however, was the father of my supporting character Penn.  Elder Manaster... very wise, knowledgeable, brave but also very rude, short tempered, impatient and sometimes even a bit childish.  He was my way of getting away with some of the technical things in the book.  Whenever a character didn't understand something, Manaster would try his best to explain (as politely as he could), but then inevitably he would get frustrated and resort to belittling the person's intelligence... ha!  Almost like the character Sheldon from CBS's The Big Bang Theory.  Great show by the way!