What’s your home life like?
I live with my wife Lindsay. We were married five years ago. We enjoy cooking together, watching movies and exploring the beautiful city of Chicago.
What genre(s) to you like to write? To read?
I write (or at least, try to write) entertaining stories for smart readers. So far, that approach has led me to write a dystopian fiction novel, a choose-your-own-adventure novel for grown-ups and a short literary novel. I’m currently working on a literary/crime novel.
I like to read similarly engaging books in a variety of genres. I tend to bounce between science fiction, historical fiction and literary fiction, as well as non-fiction, especially health, history and philosophy (my undergraduate degree was in philosophy and I like to keep up with that field). Really anything that makes me think while offering an engaging narrative.
Why did you start writing?
I started my first novel the summer after seventh grade. It was based on a short story I had written for class the previous school year about the passengers of a shipwrecked cruise liner forced to coexist on a deserted island. So I started writing because I was assigned to write stories for school. I continued writing because I found that I enjoyed telling stories and I seemed to be pretty good at conveying my ideas on paper.
I didn’t get very far with that first novel. I quickly realized I preferred to spend the summer playing outside with my friends rather than being cooped up in my family’s basement in front of our computer. Eight years later, I began to find a better balance between writing and the rest of my life. I wrote the early drafts of a screenplay during my last two years of college, doing most of my work in the dead hours of Friday and Saturday evenings before going out with my friends. After college, I spent a year in Sundsvall, Sweden and Cape Town, South Africa, playing and coaching for local baseball teams. I didn’t have a fulltime job in Sweden and only worked in a temporary position for a few months in South Africa. So aside from a couple of baseball practices and games each week, I had plenty of time to write. During that year, I wrote the first draft of my debut novel Our Dried Voices. What do you do when you’re not writing?
I have a day job as a forensic scientist. I work in the firearms section of a crime laboratory analyzing guns, bullets and cartridge cases from gun crimes in and around Chicago. Sadly, because of where I work, I have great job security. I write and edit during my breaks at work, usually longhand. On the weekends, I type up what I’ve written during the week.
I’m also an endurance athlete. I’ve competed in several marathons and have recently shifted my focus to triathlons. I grew up playing a variety of sports and played baseball during college and overseas after I graduated. Racing provides an outlet for my competitive side now that my baseball career is over.
My wife and I also love travel and food. We try to take at least one big trip a year (this year was France) and we’re always looking for the next great restaurant in Chicago and wherever else we visit. Where do you like to go when looking for a new book to read?
At what point do you call it quits when reading a new book?
I don’t remember the last time I did that. I generally choose books to read because I expect I’ll enjoy them, and for the most part, that expectation holds true.
Are you independently or traditionally published?
Both. My first two novels were traditionally published, and I have also self-published a short novel.
How long have you been working on it?
The Friar’s Lantern began over ten years ago with a single line in my writing journal: “Write a literary choose-your-own-adventure novel.” I had no idea what I wanted that novel to be about; I just thought it sounded like a cool way to play with story structure. (At the time, I didn’t realize other authors had adapted the choose-your-own-adventure style to write stories for adults in a wide variety of genres.)
Two years after that, I came up with an idea for one of the main story threads of the novel. In 2011, I submitted my first novel Our Dried Voices to publishers and began to outline the basic elements of the story that would become The Friar’s Lantern. It was published six years after that, in 2017. When will it be available to buy? Where?
How can readers find you?
My many thanks to Greg for participating in My Laughably Inane Blog. I imagine your adventures around the globe with influence your stories for years to come. My best wishes for your personal, professional, and literary success.
Sincerely,Nicholas P. AdamsJust a small-town boy with an overactive imagination.
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