I had many misconceptions about how my first month as a published novelist would go. It didn’t go how I expected so why not peel back the curtain and write about it?
Confession from the Trail: Being Comfortable With Being Uncomfortable. Breaking your characters with realism: The intersection of ultramarathons and writing fiction.
A good character is one who is not only told “no,” but “hell no,” then kicked in the teeth for good measure. They’re the character we root for when we watched them come to the brink and faced with the choice to accept the inevitable yet rise against all odds. And that breaking is where ultramarathons and fiction writing intersect. I love the adage, “write what you know.” Dear readers, let me tell you, I know what it’s like to be broken. To rise again. To stare into the void, see the eyes that stare back, and tell them to fuck off. And hot damn, when I put it into my writing, it’s some powerful stuff.
Confession from the Trail: Gear Monsters – “You carry HOW MUCH?”
Another question I fielded as I started talking ultramarathons on this blog was, “What [piece of gear] do you use?,” “How much does your pack weigh?,” or the ever incredulous “You carry HOW MUCH?”
Confession from the Trail: Welcome to the Pain Cave – What It’s Like to Run for Hours
Pulling from the list of questions about ultras again, here is a great one: “What’s it like to run for so long?” The answer is different for every person, but for me (and many others), it’s a period of highs and lows as well as trips into what we call “the pain cave.” And at the end, you have something you have truly earned.
It was a big week. Races, birthdays, and of course, the official launch of my debut novel.