Month: December 2012

I want you all to meet Jeff Horton who has a new book coming out in January called Cybersp@ce.  He has other books to his credit as well but currently he is preparing for the release of his new book so more on the other writings later.

Here you will find Jeff’s bio as well as his reason for doing what he does, and so well at that.

Biographical Information

Jeff Horton was born in North Dakota, the youngest son of a career Air Force master sergeant, where he spent the first four years of his life before moving to North Carolina. A voracious reader growing up, he read the Bible, and stories by many popular authors including Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, H.G. Wells, Jules Verne, Edgar Rice Burroughs, Michael Crichton, Tom Clancy, C.S. Lewis, and J.R.R. Tolkien.

Jeff Horton’s novel, THE GREAT COLLAPSE-SURVIVORS OF THE PULSE, a story about the coming of the pulse and the end of civilization, was published in 2010. THE DARK AGE-SURVIVORS OF THE PULSE, the sequel to The Great Collapse, was published in 2011, as was THE LAST PROPHET, a fictitious story about the life of John March, one of the witnesses sent by God to warn humanity about the antichrist, and the end of days. Released on September 1, 2012, THE WAY OF NACOR:TALES OF EDEN is a tale about four children, who find themselves lost and stranded on a strange alien planet and struggle to find a way home. Jeff Horton’s fifth novel, entitled CYBERSP@CE, is a techno-thriller, in which the world is brought to the brink of nuclear war after a string of deadly cyber warfare attacks against the United States.

When he’s not penning his next novel, he enjoys reading, going to church, and spending time with his family. Jeff Horton is a member of the North Carolina Writers Network.

For more information visit http://www.hortonlibrary.com or his Facebook Fan Page at http://www.facebook.com/Author.Jeff.Horton.

What Writing Means to Me

My name is Jeff Horton, and I am a novelist. I say I am a novelist and not an author because an author can be someone who writes about anything including novels, historical biographies, travel guides, etc., while a novelist is an artist, a painter if you will. Imagination is the paint and the keyboard the paintbrush.

I enjoy writing because for me it is pure creativity. From my imagination proceeds people, places, sights, sounds, and events which have never really existed. For me, writing a novel is sort of like watching a movie. I start writing with an idea of what I’m after, but the story truly takes on a life of its own as I write, often taking me in a direction I never could have imagined it going in before. The end result is that I have no idea how the story is going to end myself until I have finished the first draft. Even then, the story can morph as I make my way through a series of inevitable revisions where the rough stone is cut and chipped away at, before being polished into what I consider to be a work of art.

When I write, I strive to create storylines that are meaningful on many levels. I like to explore and understand the emotions, the struggles  and the pain that we feel as human beings, as well as the joy. It is also important that there is a message in the story, a warning, a message of hope, etc. I want readers to always come away having learned something new, something valuable, something important. These are ambitious goals, of course, and unfortunately, I’m never as successful as I would like to be at meeting these goals.

Another thing that is important to me as a novelist is that the characters, the events, and the setting all feel very real to the reader. This then is a key, in my opinion, to drawing the reader more deeply into the story. People are complex creatures and rarely (if ever) do we really know anyone. It is unfair therefore to suggest to readers that a character is a cardboard figure. While I may not spend as much time on every character as I would like in the interest of brevity, I do try to ensure that at least the key players are well-developed, and that they also change and grow as the story progresses.

My first three books were mostly futuristic, apocalyptic thrillers, all written for the masses but from a Christian worldview. My faith in God makes up a big part of who I am and what I do, and I’m sure it comes through in my writing. My next book, which reflects that faith, is different from the first three because it’s more of a YA/juvenile novel entitled The Way of Nacor. My goal (always lofty!) with The Way of Nacor was to create a well-blended recipe of a little Chronicles of Narnia and a little Pilgrims Progress, with a pinch of science-fiction thrown in as well. In The Way of Nacor, a family of children are stranded on another world, where they face many obstacles as they try to find their way home.  The novel following The Way of Nacor is a techno-thriller entitled Cybersp@ce. I like to think of it as Tom Clancy meets Michael Crichton (two of my favorite authors).