Guest Author: B.A. Sherman

I am honored by Jenai who has allowed me to introduce myself to her and her followers. I write under the pen name of B.A. Sherman but you can call me Brad. I like to write mostly about real things, real tangible life moments that have a flare of “Outer Limits and The Twilight Zone”. I think that nothing is more scarier in this world than humans and what we are capable of which is truly scary to me! Not that I won’t write about other things, but for now that seems to be what I mostly write about.  

I live in the great state of Colorado with my beautiful wife Julie, and my lovely daughter Sophia. I have an older son, Zach who is 21 and has started his exciting new life on his own in this great big world with his eyes wide open, shut.  

I have been in Law-Enforcement since I was 19 years of age, only 8 months past the cap and gown ceremony at my High School in small town Nebraska. I am a part of a small group of people who were able to get into a knobble profession at such a young age. Now in my 24th year of Law-Enforcement I have found something that has revealed itself to me by shear accident, or was it? I ask myself, I found out that I could write a decent story, and even moved this accident into authoring a Novella on Amazon called The Truth. I was just as surprised as anyone at this new found love, especially my High School peers. I am sure a few of my “Party Friends” are saying, “How could Brad Sherman have written a book? He didn’t even get good grades in school”. Yes, I am sure there are a few people saying that and I as well am dumbfounded on this writing thing as they are.  

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Paperback: 104 pages
Publisher: CreateSpace Independent Publishing Platform; 1 edition (October 2, 2013)
Paperback Link

File Size: 1090 KB
Print Length: 66 pages
Simultaneous Device Usage: Unlimited
Kindle Link

Audible Audio Edition
Listening Length: 1 hour and 42 minutes
Version: Unabridged
Publisher: Brad Sherman
Audible.com Release Date: October 8, 2014
Audible Link

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I do not have any achievements or a degree in creative writing, I just sat down one day with a story idea that had been plaguing me for a couple of years and I wrote down 90,000 words in seven days. My wife, who used to be a news reporter/anchor, read it and surprised me when she asked with a surprising tone, "You wrote this in seven days?" I figured the words to follow after I answered her question, “Yes” with a quite tone, would have been, "Well you spent 6 days and 23 hrs to long on this piece of crap". Much to my chagrin she told me it was good (Yah, I know she's biased-but you don't know how crass she can be when it comes to writing, husband or not). After that confidence booster, I sat down and wrote out 100,000 words for a second book in this series in two weeks, then the third book in a couple of months (It will probably go to 4 or 5 books in the series, once it’s done). 

It's weird how all this works, I feel less confident when I am doing my day in and day out stuff around the house, work and other places about my writing ability, wondering if I can tell a certain story well enough to be happy about it and in the same respect not letting my readers down. I lose all those feelings and thoughts when I sit down and write, the confidence seems to creep in and the story pours out of me onto my Laptop. 

Someone told me a long time ago that if something comes easy to you, it's a gift. When you have to work at something you love, it’s a calling. When you feel like something is draining every bit of your life’s energy, it's not your life or your work. 

During my surprised calling to write, and after I wrote out my three mega books, I channeled an idea for a short story/Novella called The Truth, which is the only book I have self-published (so far). I got the idea on one day and wrote it out on the second day, with a few distractions from my 4 year old daughter at the time. I felt it was a good first book, made some mistakes, should have taken a little more time with it, but it is what it is and I am happy that I put it out into the world. 

The Truth- is a fictional Psychological Thriller Novella. It’s about Brad Johnson who is having nightmares or is he waking up buried memories? While he is at work as a home inspector in northern Colorado he is called to inspect an abandon home near his home town, and the abandon home is a place he knows very well. Johnson, during his inspection finds a body in the crawl space. Scared and nervous that the Authorities wouldn’t believe that he had nothing to do with it, he decides to find the killer himself and then report the evidence and the killer to the Sheriff’s Office. Not long after he does this, Sheriff’s Investigator Nick Marcus is called to investigate the buried body that was found and begins his own hunt for the killer. Who gets to “The Truth” first, Nick or Brad? A fast paced thriller that will reveal “The Truth” and will blow you away!  

The Truth was a fun book to work on, as it was the first book to work on, Laugh..It taught me what the process was to self publish a book and what all went into it, which was a lot of work. The Truth was a success in my book, no pun intended, as it has been downloaded 1,200 times, getting several reviews which have helped me in my writing along with a great confidence builder. This success is never possible unless you have some great followers and fans of your work. Without fans and a great following this could never be possible, and I am fortunate that I have that, so thank you all that have read or will read my work!

I am working on a new Psychological Thriller Series called The Greg Dorn Series, book one called The Test which should come out in March 2015 (Unless it gets published). The first two books in this series are completed and I would love to put them both out at once, (Slow down Brad), but my Editor thinks I should send out quires for agents and publishers first, her idea, not mine. She is one of many supporters, probably more so then I am for myself. She has said that my writing is good enough to be published and is trying her heart out to get me there; and it feels nice hearing those words coming from an award winning Editor, but for me right now I am having fun writing cool, fun stories. 

The new book, The Test was a fun book to work on over a course of a year and half. It started out as a standalone book that I wrote when I was in a dark place in my life, and it felt good to get it out onto paper, or into my laptop I should say. My Editor, read it and called me one day telling me how much she enjoyed reading it. The next words that flowed from her lips into the phone was and what pushed me into this book series. “Brad, I really enjoyed this book and I love the Characters you write about, I just hate to give them up, so maybe you could keep this story going for a few more books”, she asked. I chuckled inside saying to myself, “How the hell am I going to do that, the book has a beginning, middle and an end. How am I going to continue this story further?” I ended our conversation with, “Well I will think on it”. Two days later, I had a different ending, some re-writes around the middle and the second book mapped out in my head. I sat down and wrote out an outline for the series and sent it to my editor, who wrote back in an email, “WoW”…. When it came time to change the original standalone books name to a different one, which went with the newly developed series, it came to me, like lightning shooting out from a storm cloud. I would call it The Test, saying that as if I were the Doctor after he brought Frankenstein to life. I felt it seemed to be a perfect name because the book was a test, and I think it was a test for me from my Editor to see how creative I could be, not to mention it is an important part of what is happening with the main character in the book. So we will see what my fans and followers have to say about this new book series, I hope they all enjoy it.

So that is me, B.A. Sherman with no writing awards, no college of creative writing, or achievements in writing of any kind, but all that will change in the future. What I do have right now, is some great story ideas, a passion to write those story’s and the stamina to sit down and write out those story’s with a sore butt..

Happy Writing and Reading Everyone!

Thanks,
B.A. Sherman
www.basherman.com/