Author, Diane Tegarden, lives in Pasadena, California and in April 2004, she self-published her first book, Getting Out of Limbo: A Self-Help Divorce Book For Women. Recently, she’s written two other books Light Through Shuttered Window and Anti-Vigilante And The Rips In Time. The latter title she describes as being "a blockbuster science fiction novel featuring renewable energy, time travel and a love story that spans the ages."
When asked what prompted her to write these books and to describe the pivotal events that triggered the authoring of the books, she said each book was precipitated by a different event. "For instance, I wrote my first book Getting Out of Limbo-A Self Help Divorce Book for Women because I wanted to help other women get out of bad marriages without ending up on the streets or becoming impoverished; my second book Light Through Shuttered Window is a collection of the poetry I’ve written over the years, and my newest release Anti-Vigilante and The Rips in Time is a sci-fi novel that is a cautionary tale of what may happen to the future of the earth ,if we don’t change the way we do “business as usual” and start using renewable energy to generate our electrical power, fuel for transportation, and fresh water supplies," she said.
Every author approaches the creative act in unique ways when they launch into writing, and Tegarden is no exception. She said she uses a hand- held tape recorder as a tool to focus her thought process. " I like to use a hand held tape recorder and record my thoughts, they are then transcribed into a rough script which I start to change and perfect into the story I want to tell," she said.
"It takes place in a future where people live inside buildings all the time due to environmental pollution; a new breed of people show up from the past who came through the Rips in Time. The Rips in Time were caused by a variety of factors: basically man-made toxins including nuclear waste, toxic trash and chemicals that seeped into the earth’s crust combined with the superheated earth’s inner core and created a powerful explosion. At the very same time dark matter, or dark energy as it is known, was being attracted to the crystalline Hives (the energy-gathering structures of Earth), which was pushing the matter inward creating an implosion of incredible force. When these two equal energies met, Time ripped apart and people from the past were transported into the future, these new people were called the Senselles," she said.
When asked what have been some high and low points in the course of being a writer, and in the process of promoting her book herself. She said she discovered promoting herself proved to be the more demanding task. "I loved creating the characters and recounting the episodes from the past. Editing is arduous, time consuming, detail oriented work, but promoting myself has proved to be an even harder task," she said.
Like many writers, Tegarden carves out time to relax after a long day of writing, in order to gain clarity. "I like to work in my organic garden, play with my furfamily (three cats and a dog), read, go to movies, eat at ethnic food restaurants, play word games online and do crossword puzzles," she said.
Tegarden does not underestimate the discipline that goes along with being writer, and is often keen in sharing her ideas with aspiring writers. "You must be self motivated to be a successful writer, because no one will be looking over shoulder to see if you are doing the work of writing. You’ve got to be able to write every day, whether or not anyone is encouraging you to do so. Remember to edit, edit, edit. The first draft won’t be perfect, but the fifth one will be close! Remember, once you have finished your book/article, your work isn’t done; you’ll need to promote it as well! Don’t give up, and you’ll have a long career ahead of you," she said.
She said in 2010 she plans to write a pre-quel to Anti-Vigilante And The Rips of Time, but in the meantime, her writing life will continue as it always has, rising at 4 or 5 am to feed her animals that she refers to as "furkids," and getting right to work.
" I’ll take about an hour to read background material since I write a weekly column on renewable energy, and take notes and then use ViaVoice software to record the bulk of the article or story. After I make a note of all the sources cited for my article, I’ll take a short break, then go back to fill in the article. I always print it out in order to edit it; I find I catch more mistakes that way. Then I’ll let it rest for another couple of hours while I answer more emails, or update my website on upcoming interviews or the two talk radio shows that I host. After that I’ll go back to finish the final edit on the article. In the mornings I usually do my errands, if needed," she went on to say.
"After lunch, I post to the three online networks that I run, write/post to my blogs, and develop my publishing newsletter “The FireWalker Flare” that I send out twice a month. One last round of answering emails, and I finish my day around 4 PM."
To learn more, visit. www.firewalkerpublications.com
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