In a word: WRITE
In a few words: DREAM, THINK, CREATE, WRITE, SUFFER REWRITES, TRY TO FIND PUBLISHERS OR BUYERS, AND MARKET
Jim has written many things during his lifetime. As a teenager, he tried writing fiction – novels and short stories. None were very good, and he gave up on that to complete his education.
During his professional working career, his publications included many technical papers and presentations.
His first published book was a technical reference The Dictionary for Human Factors / Ergonomics, dealing with the technical field he worked in. Human factors (or ergonomics) is a scientific and engineering field which studies and attempts to optimize the human-equipment interface to make the operations or use safer and more efficient.
When that career was complete, he returned to writing fiction.
While knowing that it was difficult to break into Hollywood, especially if you’re not there, his first major effort was writing works for the screen. He wrote three TV pilots, a feature, and some other short scripts. The feature made the quarter finals of one contest, but no success selling that or the others, even though he thought they were all well-written and great ideas.
He gave up after a few years and turned to copywriting. He didn’t enjoy that, though, and quickly began writing novels and other forms of fictional prose.
His prose publishing efforts have not gone smoothly either. Before Covid, he had contracts with a reputable publisher for two of his manuscripts. Unfortunately, the publisher was sold about the time Covid began and didn’t survive.
One of those manuscripts was what later became Spooky: Choices about two high school students recruited by a US intelligence agency for their paranormal skills despite their problems. The other was a scifi-romance story involving a crew stranded in space trying to survive. He’s still trying to find another publisher for both of those, as well as his latest manuscript about a horse named Prince who wants to race.
Sara and the Lonely Horse, an inspirational children’s picture book, was published by Clavis Publishing in the spring of 2023. It’s about how a young girl with cancer and a horse bond to benefit both. He was pleased to have Clavis as a publisher, since they publish quality books world-wide. Unfortunately, the first edition they published was in Dutch. See that cover image below left. They told him that other editions would follow. The English edition is published in the spring of 2024. An image of the front cover of that edition is below right.
He is still seeking publishers or buyers for other completed projects.
He has thought about self-publishing, but decided it was better to have a more established publisher behind the works, even though it takes longer to get the work out..