Talkshow Thursday: Welcome Dave Pratt
What is your favorite thing about being a writer?
My mother was an accomplished artist. Her work made people smile and think about the world around them. As for me, I can’t draw a straight line. Writing was and continues to be, my opportunity to create much like she did, but with words.
How did you learn how to write?
I learned to write out of desperation.
I was commissioned as a second lieutenant in the army right out of college. Several weeks after arriving at my first assignment, I was braced by a captain, and stood at attention as a senior officer said, in a soft, deep voice, “Pratt, you can’t speak. You can’t write. Fix it or you’ll fail.” Shocked, I signed up for the only correspondence course I could find at the time: a short story writing course. A single page in that correspondence course’s guidebook explained more about grammar and the basics of writing than I’d received in high school and four years of college. It empowered me. I published my first professional article several months later and have been going at it ever since.
Can you share a real-life event that inspired your writing?
I came to Christ late in life, after twenty years as an army Medical Service Corps officer. Having accepted Him as my savior, I felt the need to reconcile my faith with the demands of my past occupation, specifically the Sixth Commandment, which says, "Thou shalt not kill.” (Exodus 20:13, KJV)
As medical officers, we were trained to protect our patients, our soldiers, ourselves, and the innocent around us. As part of my journey, I landed at Matthew 19:18, where Jesus said, “Thou shalt do no murder.” Those words helped me reconcile the potential need to take a life to protect others or in self-defense. And that’s not murder. It was a profound moment, which became the premise of The Home Team, the first book in my Chirstian suspense Home Team series, of which the latest book, Homesick, is the latest installment.
How did publishing your first book change your writing?
When my publisher accepted The Home Team for publication, advising me that he could “see” the action and characters, it gave me the confidence to tackle the five books of the Home Team series. His words provided a lot of grace.
What was your inspiration for the story?
Homesick follows Leah, an Air Force special operations officer detailed to the Home Team, part of a
I’ve witnessed and experienced Post Traumatic Stress and mission fatigue and seen it in my friends and family who have served in the military. That experience and those observations provided the inspiration to create a fast-paced, fun, and interesting suspense novel that addresses those sorts of challenges and provides hope for those encountering them today.
Tell us about your road to publication.
After completing the short story writing correspondence course, I started publishing magazine and journal articles, as well as short fiction while serving full time in the military. Success did not come easy. I collected two small boxes full of rejection notices before my work began to sell. But I kept writing until it felt like I simply wore those editors down and it became easier for them to print my work and pay me for it than send out yet another rejection notice.
When I decided to try my hand at novels, I signed up for several novel writing correspondence courses. During that process, I met a romance writer who took me under her wing while I crafted novels for the two courses, which I later self-published. Once retired from the military and I’d accepted Christ as my Savior, I felt compelled to create a Christian suspense novel. I believe it was the link between my faith and my desire to create meaningful, entertaining stories that led me to my current publisher, and create the Home Team series.
How are your characters like you? Different?
Like most people, I have struggled with my own issues and achieved victories over long and not-so-long odds. I suppose I share that with my characters, as well as their exposure to foreign places and unusual occupations. Someone once told me to write what I know. I try to do that, as much as I can.
I usually create a character, place them in a setting, and then develop the character further over two chapters of writing. During that time, I discover who they are and what they might wrestle with as part of their work, relationships, and so on. From there, I discover the story line, plot it out in a chapter-by-chapter outline, which my characters then do their best to sabotage along the way. So, the story line follows the characters in my instance but also morphs and grows as I work my way through the book’s outline. The fun parts are all the surprises along the way.
How did your job prepare you for becoming a novelist?
My military training, martial arts training, and friends in the intelligence and special operations fields, as well as my work-related travels provided much needed fodder for my work, so far. But there’s still more to learn, more places to visit, and more people to meet, so who knows what I’ll be writing next? And that is an exciting proposition.
What is your advice to fledgling writers?
Persevere, grow and embrace your Faith.
Persevere in your writing. And that means sitting down and putting pen to paper or fingertips on a keyboard. It’s an old adage: to be a writer, you must write. No matter the rejections, objections and frustrations, write. Write when you feel the muse; write when you don’t. Feel free to write badly… at least on the first draft. Romans 5:3-4 suggests, “…but we glory in tribulations also: knowing that tribulation worketh patience; and patience, experience; and experience, hope.”
Grow as a writer. Find a mentor. Attend writer’s conferences and classes. And read, read, read. Read books you love and those you don’t care for. There’s always something to learn in each. And listen to experienced writers around you. As in Proverbs 1:5: "Let the wise listen and gain instruction, and the discerning acquire wise counsel".
And have Faith. It’s what makes us Christian writers. Talk to Him. Ask Him your questions as you create. Where better to turn for direction in our efforts than to Him? And he will never let us down, as in Deuteronomy 31:6: "...for the Lord thy God, he it is that doth go with thee; he will not fail thee, nor forsake thee."
About Homesick
Leah McCarthy, a member of the Home Team, a covert operations team reporting to the State
Photo Credits:
Author photo and book image: Courtesy of Dave Pratt
Air Force emblem: Pixabay/Nightowl
Writing: Pixabay/StartUpStockPhotos
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