Rick Taylor

Why I Started Writing:

I felt attracted to the written word in junior high school where required summer reading lists made me admire good plots, interesting ideas, and clear writing especially in historical fiction. Then an English teacher encouraged my fiction and poetry.

Later with a Journalism degree, I wrote non-fiction for the Army and a bunch of secular media, but I felt fiction would be the real proof I wrote well. After several rejection letters I wasn’t so sure.

Moored to the house after retirement, I dusted off my card catalogue of story ideas and found a writing group. I entered contests and read “how to” books. Something niggled at me until I added a Christian substratum to my work. I aimed at robust adventure with a Christian worldview. The Holy Spirit prompted me with ideas in my books and short stories helping me finally find a good track. Christian fiction needs more action books and fewer romances. Men read too. Jesus is a shepherd, but often shepherds must also be warriors. I hope to write that.

 

Authors Who Have Influenced Me:

My journalist Dad was an early influence. He wrote musical comedy in college, did Public Relations work for forty years, and created slyly humorous Christmas letters. He demonstrated the subtleties of good writing.

We both loved Hemingway’s biting short stories and Kipling’s ability to create atmosphere while turning common men into epic poetry. I read Dad’s latest copies of Judith Merrill’s sci-fi anthologies in the back seat as we drove cross-country to his next assignments. I absorbed Poe’s definition of the short story and envied O. Henry’s quirky endings. (Both are found in Jesus’ parables).

James Warner Bellah’s cavalry stories and C.S. Forrester’s Hornblower sagas were inspiration to incorporate what the Army taught me about leadership. Patrick O’Brian showed me that historical adventure loves authentic dialogue.

Modern favorites include Tom Clancy’s early work and Jim Butcher’s Dresden and Spire series.

In the non-fiction world Thomas Cahill, Charles Krauthammer, and Rabbi Jonathan Sacks incorporate wonderful scholarship with independent thinking. Brennan Manning and John Eldridge stoke my spiritual side. Their influence, several pastors, and the Bible triggered my soon-to-be-published Snippet stories.

 

Books I Have Written:

I self-published two adventure novels: Ballad of the Blacksmith’s Son and Lament of the Blacksmith’s Son. Both feature Scandinavians (OK, you can say Vikings) in the fledgling Russia they helped found. My characters deal with an odyssey, weather, wolves, Turks, love, and evil people while struggling to understand their new Christian faith. Oh, and there’s this girl…these girls…

 

What I'm Working On Now:

My kids (all adults) want a third Blacksmith book, but my publisher wants my devotional book based on stories found on the floor of heaven’s press room after the Lord God finished compiling the Bible. I will do the latter first but someday I will revisit my blacksmith family. It would be fun to write a noir mystery or a sea saga where the protagonist has a Christian worldview that fights with his cynicism: Sam Spade with a Judeo-Christian ethic instead of an unwritten tough guy code. I’ve started it several times.

I am open to hear your ideas at My Father’s Writing Desk or rickistaylor.com.