Sneak Peak at My Answers for the Local Author Fair Panel

On Thursday, November 5, I will be one of four authors participating in the Local Authors Fair Panel through Woodneath Library Center, Kansas City, MO. You can attend virtual panel through this link.

Below are a few of the questions I may be asked and my rough draft answers.

What inspired you to write this piece?

The Secret Club is the sequel to my earlier novel, The Power Club. Both are set in a world in which some kids develop super-powers. My main character, Damon, joined a group called the Power Club in the first book. Damon has the ability to create darkness. In the Power Club, he becomes friends with Kyle (who teleports), Denise (who sees the future), her brother, Vee (who has super-speed), Ali (who flies), and Danner (who grows to giant sizes). Initially, they just hang out and have fun testing their powers. But after Damon and the others spontaneously stop a riot, he realizes they can use their powers for good . . . they can make a difference for ordinary people—“ords”—who fear kids with powers.

But in The Secret Club, everything has changed. The old Power Club is no more, and Damon enters a new school where he has to make new friends. Two of his old Power Club buds, Danner and Ali, have started a new club without him. And, on top of that, Damon’s old enemy, Calvin, returns.

Calvin has the ability to open rifts in space and send people he doesn’t like into other dimensions. Sometimes he forgets to bring them back. Because of this power, he has been separated from other kids and he’s jealous of Damon and his ability to make friends. When the Power Club rescued Damon from one of Calvin’s other dimensions in The Power Club, Calvin was forced to flee. Now he returns in the company of the others who work for a super-powered terrorist called, ironically, The Liberator. These terrorists want to start a war with ords, and only Damon can stop them—if he can form a new club in time.

What inspired all this? When I was a kid growing up in St. Joseph, MO, my friends and I immersed ourselves in comic books. We imagined ourselves to be Superman, Hawkman, Green Lantern, The Atom, The Flash . . . my friends gradually outgrew this obsession; I never did.

What is your writing process like?

My writing process changes for every project. I love to experiment. A project such as The Power Club usually begins with a burning desire to say something, an idea that has to be expressed, or an idea I can’t let go. I think all writers feel this way to an extent . . . something in the world isn’t the way it should be, and we try, with our words, to make it right. We feel we have something to say, and we know words have power. We hope our words have the right kind of power to make positive change.

The next step, for me, is to decide who my characters are, what they want, and who or what is stopping them from getting it. You have to spend some time fleshing out your characters. I write extensive character biographies. I want to know everything about my characters—their birthdays, their hobbies, how they get along with their families . . . if I do all this, I usually find the plot takes care of itself.

Then it’s a matter of applying seat to chair and writing. You have to actually do the writing. Not think about writing. Not talk about writing. Write. Some writers keep a daily schedule. If you work a full-time job or go to school, you work in writing when you can, but you have to write something every day and don’t stop until you finish.

How has your writing process changed during these new times?

I’ve been on hiatus from writing for some time. I finished working on a graphic novel earlier this year, though there are still a few touch-ups on which I’m currently working with an artist. I'm also exploring options for publishing it.

Another thing that has changed is that I’m exploring different forms of writing. I’m writing poetry and dabbling in flash fiction. Some of my poems and also essays can be viewed here. 

Do you have any writing tips?

Study the craft of writing. A lot of people think they can be writers just by coming up with ideas for stories. Bad news: Anybody can come up with ideas for stories. A writer is someone who actually sits down and does the work. But you also have to understand things like plotting, character development, theme, subtext, and world building. Study the masters. Figure out who inspires you and learn from them.

But also study other things—nature, mythology, history, science, politics. These things will help you fill out the world of your story and your characters’ lives. They also give you more ideas. There’s no sense in being the best writer in the world if you have nothing to write about.

. . . Those are my preliminary answers. Will I give the same ones or different/better ones? What other questions might be asked? Tune in on Thursday to find out.

Damon Starts the Eighth Grade in THE SECRET CLUB, and Then Things Get Worse

When I was a kid, the coolest thing I could imagine would be to possess a super-power. I wasn't picky. Any power would do: super-strength, super-speed, flight, hurling energy bolts from my hands... heck, even the ability to bounce like a rubber ball would have its uses (well, it did for Bouncing Boy of the Legion of Super-Heroes).

In my first novel, THE POWER CLUB, I tried to tap into that feeling of being a kid and what it would be like to have have a power. Of course, powers come at a cost--in this case, freedom. Society simply can't have kids who teleport or grow to 30 feet tall or create rifts to other dimensions running around without keeping an eye on them. Thus, the kids have to live in the District, where mysterious leaders monitor what they can do.

Another cost? The power you have may not be the coolest or the most useful--at least at first.

Those were the themes I explored in THE POWER CLUB and take a step further in its just-published sequel, THE SECRET CLUB.

Set almost a year after the events of The Power Club, THE SECRET CLUB finds Damon entering the eighth grade--but things are nothing like he expected. Due to the influx of more kids with powers, the District has grown and the eighth grade has been moved to the high school. Instead of being in the top grade at the old school, Damon finds himself in the lowest grade at the new school.

He has to start over with new friends, new teachers, and new dangers lurking around every corner.

On his first day at the new school, he runs afoul of one such danger simply by walking down a hall:

Watch it!”

            Damon heard the warning a split second before he rounded a corner and collided with a wall. But this wall looked like a torso. He bounced back as if he’d landed face first on a trampoline and fell back on his butt. His books, class schedule, map scattered across the floor.

            A chorus of kids burst into laughter. Terrific. First day of school, and I’ve already made a fool of myself. He looked up to see what he had hit.

            The wall was in fact a torso. A towheaded youth towered over him like a mountain. Damon had never seen so many muscles, which rippled through the boy’s arms as if he were a cartoon character. A thin, long face perched atop a massive torso. The boy wore a plain t-shirt with the sleeves rolled up so there was no mistaking that the muscles were his.

            “That’s what you get for not paying attention!” the youth said.

            “I would,” Damon fired back, “but I didn’t expect to run into Mount Kilimanjaro!” He remembered Mount Kilimanjaro from geography class. Using humor might help him recover face.

            The youth’s smug expression turned into a hateful scowl. “I don’t like smart-asses!” he said, as he stomped toward Damon. The floor shook. The boy grabbed Damon and lifted him up over his head. Damon felt a rush of blood as he stared down at other kids, who paused in the hallway to laugh at him.

            He breathed in sharply. He could exhale—but what good would the darkspace do him in this situation? (THE SECRET CLUB, p. 13)

And that would be bad enough if his darkspace--his ability to create a cloud of darkness--didn't keep turning itself off and on at will.

And then things get worse.

What do you do when an old enemy shows up and wants to start a war with ords? Why, you form a Secret Club, of course!

Find out what happens in THE SECRET CLUB, now available on Amazon!