Member Spotlight: James T Dakin

Why is writing important to you and why do you think it’s an important medium for the world? I have enjoyed writing since childhood school days, through my profession, and later in life especially, without the earlier pressures. My three nonfiction books have been important in capturing experiences and knowledge. The first, a personal memoir, titled Life and Light, was entirely for close friends, family, and future generations. It captured a great deal of family background information which I feared would be lost otherwise. The second, titled Wrestling with Light: History, Science and Applications, was formatted as an interdisciplinary college level textbook. It had a heavy emphasis on developments in many disciplines since around 1800, especially developments touching my formal education and career. The third, titled Shining Art on Light: Colorful Insights, drew upon the second, but used art from museums to illustrate the many aspects of light from the Big Bang to the present. It uses deliberately simple language, without any equations or graphs, so as to make the subject accessible to the curious of all ages, from 12 to 112. You might say that I am obsessed with light in all of its manifestations. With the latter two books I have especially enjoyed doing the scholarly background research required to present the complete and credible stories which few others are inspired to tell.

What are your tried and tested remedies to cure writer’s block? I can’t say that I have ever experienced “writers block,” but have sometimes had trouble getting started. With my second two books, especially, I have spent long periods just thinking about my subject, taking notes, and making outlines, trying to determine how best to tell the story. My third, and I feel best, book germinated in my head and notes for almost three years before the writing actually started. There was one brief false start along the way. Sometimes inspirations come to me in my sleep. Feedback from others has always been helpful in refining drafts.

What is your favorite time to write? My favorite time to write is during the morning and afternoon when I am uninterrupted and feel inspired.

What’s the best piece of writing advice you’ve ever received and would like to impart to other writers? When working on my first book, the memoir, a friend with a career in publishing advised me as to the importance of the first page of introduction in capturing the reader’s interest. He also advised me to keep it short so as not to lose the reader. In my third book I deliberately kept the story short so as not to lose the age 12 to 112 reader. Instead of expanding on simple ideas I provided book references and internet search suggestions to the reader who wanted to know more about a sub topic. My friend advised me to push certain material into appendices so as to streamline the main flow. This latter advice was less germane to my second two books. Writing fiction, which I have never done, would follow completely different rules.

What excites you most about being a writer in today’s age? Having grown up in the age of typewriters, carbon paper, and USPS communication, I am impressed with how easy the actual mechanics of writing have become. It is now so much easier to lay down ideas, get the spelling and punctuation right, share drafts, get feedback, and make major changes. You can now devote a much bigger fraction of your time to the writing itself. It can be faster, more fun, and produce a better end product.

James T Dakin’s Shining Art on Light: Colorful Insights is out now with Mountain Arbor Press.