We’re excited to introduce you to the always interesting and insightful Nick McCarthy. We hope you’ll enjoy our conversation with Nick below.

Nick, appreciate you joining us today. Learning the craft is often a unique journey from every creative – we’d love to hear about your journey and if knowing what you know now, you would have done anything differently to speed up the learning process.

Learning to write and improving has been an ongoing process. I know there are plenty of professional authors who take courses, attend workshops, get a degree in creative writing, etc… Well, that wasn’t the path for me. I have been an avid reader since junior high school and when I finally decided to try my hand at creating a work of fiction, I found myself just grabbing a laptop and writing. And rewriting and rewriting again. For me, there were only three things I could do to improve my writing: read books, write new stuff, rewrite the stuff previously mentioned.

Over the years, there have been a few times that I’ve met authors, usually with more impressive backgrounds than myself. During these encounters, I tried to find out more about how they approached the craft, thinking there was some big secret I missed out on by learning on my own. After speaking to them, I feel there isn’t any secret. It’s just a lot of hard work and dedication. But then again, the world is a big place and maybe I haven’t found the secret just yet.

Nick, love having you share your insights with us. Before we ask you more questions, maybe you can take a moment to introduce yourself to our readers who might have missed our earlier conversations?

I craft escapism. I’ve loved disappearing into books since I was in grade school and for a long time wondered if I could create the same kind of worlds as the authors I loved. I’ve been writing fiction for a long time, but I’ve finally decided to turn it into something more. My first book was designed to an homage to Osaka, Japan. I lived in Osaka during my early 20s, and have felt that Osaka deserves more play in the popular zeitgeist than it gets, especially with the rise of the Japan based Youtubers. Other than the film Black Rain, its hard to find something in films, books or other popular culture that shows the what a great place Osaka is. I wanted to craft a story that exhibited the city as a character, as much as all the people in the tale. Thus was the creation of my novel: Neon Off Snow. As I finished it up, I realized I had more stories to tell.

My goal is to entertain, to create characters that my readers will care about, in worlds they are interested in visiting, to provide entertainment, or maybe even drop some knowledge on them they didn’t have when they first opened my novel. While I’ve only independently published one novel, I have a lot more to I want to create.

Are there any books, videos or other content that you feel have meaningfully impacted your thinking?

As an author, reading other author’s works is always going to be the most impactful thing I feel anyone can do. I go to bed every night with a book in my hand (well, actually it’s a kindle paperwhite, but that’s only because my page turning sometimes wakes up my partner). I feel that the two books that have influenced me the most would be: On Writing by Stephen King, and Hard-Boiled Wonderland and the End of the World by Haruki Murakami.

On Writing is split into equal parts autobiography, and guidebook to becoming a writer. King speaks directly to the reader in a direct, causal and understandable that you feel couldn’t come from other authors of his caliber, such as Salman Rushdie. It gives you a sense a confidence that you too can write and create anything you want, breaking down the science of writing into easily understandable chunks which can be reassembled to create mastery.

While I imagine many of you readers will be familiar with the name: Haruki Murakami, they probably only know some more of his recent works and have missed this one. Hard-Boiled Wonderland and the End of the World was probably the 2nd or 3rd novel of his I read, this was back before he was really known in the West. It has all the tropes of a Murakami novel: jazz, pasta, cats, vague worlds, emotionally distant characters, yet he splits the story into 2 distinct sections that while seemingly unrelated, come together in the end in a way the reader may not expect. I find it to be a tour de force of storytelling and something I would advise any aspiring fiction author to read.

How about pivoting – can you share the story of a time you’ve had to pivot?

I feel that I am at that point right now. At the moment, I am not a full-time writer. My day-2-day is still occupied with my current day job in software sales. I started out as a coder, software developer years ago, spending time in multiple areas of the software world, including support, operations, design and others before moving into sales a few years back. However, as I get older, I’m finding that I don’t want to spend the next 20-30 years of my career surviving in corporate America and instead I’m attempting to launch a new business based on writing.

This feeling didn’t come to me in like a single epiphany or anyway, I think it was more of a gradual change, one which I wish had embraced me ten years ago. However, I am a big believer in the mantra: better late than never. I don’t know if I’ll be able to quit my corporate gig in the next few years and write all day, as much as I’d like to, but I’m going to give it a shot. I’d love to potentially retire a little earlier and keep writing until my hands stop working. And of course craft stories that my readers get lost in.

Contact Info:

• Website: https://www.subwaypizzabooks.com
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/subwaypizzabooks/
• Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/nmccarthy23/

Image Credits

Nick McCarthy