Many Are Called: A Deseret Adventure Trilogy

July was a good month for a writer. Or this writer, at least. Not only did I haul myself north to attend Writers Cantina in Salt Lake City, but I was also blessed to attend a talk by prolific author Alan Dean Foster here in Prescott. Let’s talk about ADF first.

For those who came in late, Alan Dean Foster is a science fiction (primarily, anyway) author who has published well north of a hundred titles. He’s the acknowledged king of sci-fi movie novelizations, but I remember him best as the author of Splinter of the Mind’s Eye. Never heard of it? In that case, let me take you on a quick journey deep into the past.

I saw Star Wars in its original theatrical run in 1977, when I was six years old. One of my earliest childhood memories is standing in the kitchen of my family’s apartment. My dad was sitting at the Formica dining table in a chair covered in padded pleather. He had an open newspaper in his hands, which he peered over to ask me, “Do you want to see a movie called Star Wars?”

I had no idea what that was, but little boys want to spend time with their dads. Off we went to the local movie theater.

I love my dad, but in my youth, he was one of these perpetually-late people. We walked in just as C3PO was lowering himself into the oil bath. This means we missed a LOT of worldbuilding and character introductions. I didn’t know or care. I was watching the coolest movie ever made with my dad!

The next year, in 1978, Del Rey books released Splinter. This was long before George Lucas had any idea what to do with the massive entertainment and cultural juggernaut Star Wars had already become. I was a lowly 2^nd grader at the elementary school book fair, and on the cover a book that is probably slightly inappropriate for seven-year-olds, I saw him – the Dark Lord of the Sith himself, Darth Vader! I had to have this book, so I took the $2 cash my mom had issued me for the fair and bought it.

I remember little of that book now, 46 years later. I do know it was one of the novels that set me on a lifelong reading trajectory, and I appreciate Mr. Foster for that. Which brings us back to the present.

I had no idea Alan Dean Foster was my neighbor here in Prescott, Arizona. Heck, I had no idea he was still alive (sorry, Alan). But I somehow heard he was giving a talk in conjunction with the annual Prescott Film Festival. Yeah, little Prescott is trying to become Discount Sundance. Anyway, I took the morning off my day job to attend.

I’m glad I did. Mr. Foster gave a great talk on writing characters to a packed (standing room only) room. I took a lot of notes, and I’m not much of a note-taker. A lot of it was small details, but he also reinforced, or put into brief words, two things I already try to do:

• Don’t make all your characters sound like you. Give them distinctive voices, speech mannerisms, favorite words, verbal tics, etc.
• Write the people you’d like to meet. I really do this. I want to be friends with Jack Sterling. I want to go to war beside Kyler Poe. I’d probably fall in love with Emily Lassiter. If I still drank, I’d want to toast a limoncello with Andre Eliot.

It was 90 minutes very well-spent, and it was free. It’s great to live in a place where successful authors just willingly volunteer their time so newbies like me can learn. Alan Dean Foster is an awesome guy for doing is, and the Prescott Film Festival is awesome for hosting him.

I’ll get to Writers Cantina in my next post, and boy was that an experience…