I\u2019ve been writing stories since I could write (which was before I started school). The earliest work I remember (that my parents saved anyhow) was a horrid poem entitled \u201cSilly Mouse.\u201d It didn\u2019t even rhyme. However, as I matured, my writing (I like to think) improved.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
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<\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n\nWhen we were in grade school, my sister and I found a nifty new game in one of those Scholastic-type school magazines. It was called \u201cPlot Luck\u201d and the goal was to write a crazy story as you moved your token along the pathway to the finish line. It provided word prompts at various points, which you had to incorporate into your story. My sister and I used to compete to see who could come up with the silliest story, then see if our parents would laugh at it. We cut the pages out of the magazine and mounted the game on a piece of cardboard so it would last longer. We played for hours at a time, exercising our imaginations and creating tale after tale. I wish I still had that old game, just for nostalgia purposes, but it fell apart long ago.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
When I was in middle and high school, I kept up my reading and writing, even getting a short poem published in the local newspaper for a contest. Unfortunately, I was convinced by well-meaning adults that writers didn\u2019t make a good living and encouraged to make a career in the other area in which I excelled: science. I have to say that the paychecks have been satisfactory, but there are times I wonder what my career would have been like if I\u2019d taken the leap and tried to become a full-time writer back in the beginning (or maybe took the writing more seriously and tried harder to get published).<\/p>\n\n\n\n
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<\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n\nIt wasn\u2019t until the mid-90s that I began seriously sending out short stories to magazines and getting paid for my work. I even got a couple of stories compiled into two \u201cBest Of\u201d anthologies, which was heartening. Then I found out about NaNoWriMo, where you sign up to write 50,000 words in 30 days. My best friend dared me to do it, and I dug out an old fan-fiction piece I\u2019d done, changed the names and a bit of the scenario, and had a go at it. I ended up with a finished novel. It\u2019s been through a few revisions, but it\u2019s ready to be published if I can just find a publisher who doesn\u2019t think \u201ccaper\u201d stories are dead. Like I said, I should have started publishing sooner, like back when those were more popular.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
I now have three historical novels written, along with a (now out-of-print) anthology of short stories that sold tolerably well. One of my alter-egos has five e-books at a small press and the other alter-ego is editing our first science-fiction novel. I\u2019ve published several of my short stories in magazines and anthologies. I\u2019m hoping to attract the attention of a sci-fi agent at sometime soon. And, as with Disney, it all started with a mouse.<\/p>\n