About
I was not born a writer...
Surprising as that might be to hear, it's true. The Midnight Ruby, my first novel, is the culmination of six years of trial and error. The first two years were spent planning, outlining, and practice writing, the second two were spent putting pen to paper on the first and subsequent several drafts of the book itself, and the final two years were spent editing and highly improving upon my writing quality.
I had made several attempts at writing before, but long form prose seemed impossible to tackle. So instead, after reading "The Masque of the Red Death" by Edgar Allan Poe, I decided to try my hand at short stories. The more concise form allowed me to play around with the full toy box of literary techniques without the daunting nature of a fully fledged novel. Granted, none of those short stories will ever see the light of publication, but they provided an invaluable foundation to build upon.
The Midnight Ruby was heavily influenced and inspired by real life. The skeleton of the story was made up of the death of a friend and my first real heartbreak. These two major events came without warning and without closure, which is par for the course in life. But to isolate these events within the narrative of a story, and to place them in a different time and place, allowed me to write it all down and make a little more sense of things. I was able to achieve a wave of catharsis when I finished writing the final words of the final chapter.
That catharsis is why I keep writing. I now have proof that it works, and that I have found the right creative outlet. The emotions that I poured into this story are but drops in comparison to my cellar of bottled up thoughts, all of which I intend to uncork when the time is right. And when that time comes, I do hope you'll be there to share a glass (or a book) with me.
- Zachary Anderson