I often get asked how long it took to write The Sureshot. In reality I wrote a bit while I was in the Army and the rest after my first child was born.

While I was on loan to 10th Special Forces Group at Fort Carson Colorado, I had very little to do in my off time, and very little off time. I had my own room in the barracks, but no TV, no radio, and no computer. All of those things were left at my home station in San Antonio. I was also working 12 hours a day for 30 straight days. I basically worked, ate and slept. I didn’t even have a car but had to share a rental with some other soldiers who were on loan as well. To keep myself busy I bought a bunch of binder paper and a binder, as well as a bunch of pens. I started writing The Sureshot out of boredom. Originally it started as me trying to write a back story about my role-playing character Durbar. I explained in the previous post how and why he was created. Basically I just started writing. I ended up writing the first chapter and then rewrote it several times. I had my friend Sam read and edit it for me and eventually I moved beyond the first chapter and wrote a few more. By then it was time for me to leave Colorado and I was getting married shortly after that so I didn’t write any more. I kept what I had done and forgot about it for a while.

After getting married, leaving the army, starting college and having a baby, I found myself staying at home in the summer waiting for the next semester to begin and taking care of my baby girl. My wife was working and I was home with the baby for long stretches of time. As you might imagine I was bored, so once again I started writing. I had a laptop computer by then so I began by typing up the pages I had already written, then continuing. By the end of summer I had completed a draft of The Sureshot. In reality I had already begun the second book, but I had enough to submit to publishers. To be honest it could have used a lot more editing, but I had written a couple of drafts and had a couple of people edit for me and I was comfortable sending it out, and excited that I had finished something that long. It was by far the longest piece of writing I had ever completed. It didn’t take long before I found someone interested in the story, but it was really only the beginning of the Sureshot. There was a lot more work to do. This site is a testament to that.