Cameron Dockery is a fine example of the neat connections we can make with people through writing. He and I have never met face to face, but I’m happy to call him a friend. Here’s a little about how we met.
On Christmas day this past year I was surfing Amazon on my Kindle app when I came across John’s Short Story, The Christmas Lights. I read it, liked it and shared it with the family before breakfast.
That was seven months ago and little did I realize how reading that story would pull me into the rising tsunami of Indie publishing. This past week Borders Books announced they would be closing and with that my wife and I walked into the local Borders Store to check out the sale.
I was amazed at the rush of people and at the same time saddened by the fact that another local business was going down which meant more hurting people in our small town would be filing for unemployment.
As I browsed through the chaos of people I walked over toward the restrooms and noticed they had been roped off and a sign was hanging that read, “Sorry no public restrooms are available, try Amazon.com.”
I stood there in absolute bewilderment. They stated the obvious with an attitude. To be honest it ticked me off a little. Enough has been said by people far more capable than I about how the world of publishing and distribution is changing.
However if I may suggest… we are living in a time of extreme change that brings an enormous opportunity. I am a pastor who loves poetry and prose. My taste in literature is rather eclectic in that I love the Psalms, Robert Frost, Czeslaw Milosz and Edward Hirsch to name a few. I also follow a guy from Charlotte N.C. named John Hartness whom I have found to be polite, accessible, encouraging and even allowed me this guest post.
Though I’m am not sure how high the tsunami is going to rise or how far this wave is going to go, it does appear if you have ever had a passion or desire to publish now is the time, to pull out the stops and go for it.
In May I wrote a short story called, The Note. It is a true story of how an eleven year old boy gets himself into trouble and lies when he is caught. In the end he learns something about the nature of living in a small town and he also learns something about his father’s heart. It is a story about Grace.
I would invite you to check it out http://www.amazon.com/THE-NOTE-ebook/dp/B0052VXDD8/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1311906387&sr=8-1
My website (camsquill.com) went live on August 1st. This is an invitation to stop by and spend a little time with a novice. Maybe we can link up and take the journey together. Opportunity is knocking.
