Monthly Archives: August 2008

Tom Swift and his Outpost in Space

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My introduction to reading came when I was ten years old. Of course I could read before that and had read some books as a kid, but I hadn’t read for the sheer pleasure of it. That summer, I discovered, in my grandparents’ basement, a dozen Tom Swift Jr. books. The first one I read is pictured above. I loved it. I read the rest of those books that summer and discovered that there had been other Tom Swift books published all the way back to the early 1910s.

I began going to my local bookstore and buying the rest of the series. Then I ordered those that they didn’t have. When I had read all the Tom Swift that there was, I read the Hardy Boys, and then John Carter of Mars, and then Tarzan. By then of course, I was hooked. I’ve been a reader ever since. I still have those Tom Swift Jr. books from my grandparents’ basement, as well as the others I bought as a kid. Looking back on them, they are pretty simple little stories, but they have tremendous nostalgic value for me and they hearken back to a time when the world was a much simpler place, science was going to change our lives only for the good, and hot chocolate and sandwiches solved almost every problem.

The Steel Dragon – Three Novels

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I wrote a three part 330,000 word manuscript that I called The Steel Dragon. Originally I thought of it as one big novel. Each of the three parts is a self contained story, though each of course is connected to the one before it. I named the three parts Expedition, Colony, and Dominion. There is a time difference of three to five years between each. My heroine is nine years old in part one, twelve in part two, and seventeen in part three. Once I had it complete, it seemed obvious that if I wanted it published, the book would have to become a trilogy. I needed names for the three volumes. The first was obvious– The Steel Dragon. I tried out several possibilities, and eventually came up with the other two titles– The Sorceress’s Apprentice, and The Two Dragons. The final title is both accurate, as there are two dragons in the story, and a nod to J.R.R. Tolkien’s The Two Towers.

Princess of Amathar – Setting

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The setting for Princess of Amathar is a Dyson sphere. I read about it many years before one appeared on Star Trek: the Next Generation. It is the ultimate construction project for a species. From a story-telling perspective, it provides a writer with an unlimited amount of room for his characters to roam around in.

Here is more information on the Dyson Sphere from Wikipedia.

Princess of Amathar – Names

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Princess of Amathar has only one human character. All the rest are aliens of one type or another. One alien character is Malagor. He is a rather wolf-like fellow and the name just seemed to fit. For the Amatharians, I created long complex names that would look good, but would be difficult to pronounce aloud. I wanted them to sound vaguely french, because my main character had described their language as sounding that way. So my Amatharians became Norar Remontar, Vena Remontar, and the title character Noriandara Remontar. For the only human, my main character, I needed a name that implied heroic exploits and also to fit in with a plot twist, it needed to begin with the letter A. Alexander was a natural fit, though I don’t remember if I decided upon this before or after I wrote a major college paper on Alexander the Great. For a long time he didn’t have a last name, but I finally named him after a young lady I was working with (as I worked my way through college) whose last name was Ashton. So Alexander Ashton was born.

The Steel Dragon

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When I finished self-publishing Princess of Amathar, I suddenly felt like I could write another novel. I had an idea for a fantasy setting and a plot that I outlined. It was a story in three parts, and as I began writing it, I didn’t know if it was going to be one very long three part novel, or three novels in a trilogy. I began writing and wrote almost daily for fifteen months. It seemed that the story just came out. It was great. I made copies for ten teachers and other staff members at school who wanted to read it and give me feedback for revision. The drawback to this is that they have had the book the entire summer, and I’ve only yet gotten a bit of feedback by email from one. But, I return to work next week. In the meantime, I’ve already begun sending out queries to literary agents. I decided that I am going to send it to every literary agent and book publisher who deals with this genre. I’m already getting rejection letters. More about that later.

Princess of Amathar – The Novel

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Princess of Amathar is a science fiction adventure novel in the tradition of Edgar Rice Burroughs. Alexander Ashton, an earth man, finds himself mysteriously transported to another world– the artificial hollow world of Ecos. There he encounters a wide variety of alien races, including the reptilian Zoasians and their mortal enemies the human Amatharians. The Zoasians and the Amatharians have been at war for thousands of years and Alexander’s first encounter with both of them is when he stumbles upon a vicious battle, which the Amatharians lose. In the heat of battle, Alexander sees a beautiful female warrior, the Princess of Amathar, and falls in love with her then and there. When the Zoasians capture her and take her away, he vows to rescue her. The running series of adventures which he embarks upon includes a stop at her home city of Amathar, where he gets his first look at the human yet alien Amatharian civilization.

Princess of Amathar

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My first novel was Princess of Amathar. I originally thought up the story when I was a teenager. It was not a particularly brilliant plot, but was like the adventure stories that I enjoyed reading at the time. I wrote the first chapter several times over the years, but never got much farther. Writing a novel is really hard if you haven’t done it before. Just continuing takes a great deal of will power. About the time I started college, I made my last attempt to begin the book. I expanded the beginning while writing other things (mostly fanfic, which thankfully because no one ever heard of the internet in those days, never saw the light of day). I worked at it sporatically for years. After I got my first job teaching Junior High English, I began to share my writing with my students as I encouraged them to write, and they in turn encouraged me to keep going. It still took a long time. Then, when I was about 75% done, I began to share my writing with some of my teacher friends. With their feedback, I finally managed to finish. It was about eight years from start to finish, and this was only 93,000 words. Four fellow teachers helped me revise the book. When that was done, I was so proud that I immediately sent it off to a dozen book publishers. I recieved a dozen rejection letters. I stuck the manuscript away and forgot about writing for a while. Then one day I mentioned my book to a coworker, who suggested I check out Lulu and self-publish Princess of Amathar, if just for myself and my friends, family, and students. I did. I self-published it. Then a funny thing happened. I felt like I could write another novel and a new story just popped into my head.

City of Amathar Press

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Amathar is the primary setting for my first novel. It is a mega-city in the artificial world of Ecos. As you have guessed, it was a science fiction novel. When I decided that I would self-publish this book (more on that later), I wasn’t thinking about creating a personal imprint. Later however, I saw that others self-publishing books had done so, so I immediately thought that “City of Amathar Press” would be appropriate. This is particularly so, since the Amatharians are described in my book as being extreme bibliophiles. Now that I am blogging, and especially since I am blogging about my writing, “City of Amathar” seemed more than appropriate for the blog title as well.

For any who would like to purchase books from City of Amathar Press, the entire catolog of which consists of one book (albeit in hardbound, paperback, or pdf), here is the link.

What is the City of Amathar Blog?

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As you can read in my bio, I have been a teacher for the past fourteen years. I’ve taught English and History and my current position is as a seventh grade U.S. History teacher. I just finished teaching two semesters of high school level U.S. History Summer School. I am also an aspiring novelist. So while you may expect postings about education and school and all kinds of other things that might impact the life of a forty eight year old male American, the main focus of this blog is my writing. I would of course, like to promote my writing. But just as importantly, I intend to focus on my struggle to get published. I am set for the long haul. I am going to write, I am going to submit my writing to publishers and agents, and I’m going to let you know what happens.

Hello!

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Hello and welcome to the City of Amathar blog. I am just getting set up, so more to come on what this blog is and why, who I am (though probably not why I am), and whatever else I can think of.