Local author releases novel
Contractor and author are unusual dual professions, but that doesn't matter to North Liberty resident S.C. Sherman. The writer discovered his creative passion a little late in life, and he has no plans of letting it go anytime soon.
"In school, I had a lot of people prodding me to write because they felt I was good at it," he said. "I just ignored it. I didn't think it was a thing to do for life at the time."
After finishing school at the University of Iowa, Sherman went into construction and continued to avoid his creative calling until roughly five years ago.
Around that time, he became intrigued by a story discovered by his uncle about a past relative who immigrated to America from England with John Winthrop in 1630. This inspired him to write the novel Leaving Southfields based on the event, and he hasn't stopped writing since.
Sherman just released his second novel, Hell and Back — The First Death, in which the author moves from historical fiction to fantasy. Both Leaving Southfields and Hell and Back are the first books in what will eventually be trilogies.
A friend of the author, Alicia Dawson, notes that the change in genre between Sherman's first two novels does not cause a change in quality.
"It's totally different," she said. "You can hand somebody a chapter out of all of his books, and I don't know if they would know they came from the same author. They're all good, but they all have very different perspectives."
Hell and Back tells the story of a warrior, Joe Rellik, whose daughter committed suicide. With his own death looming, Rellik develops and pursues a plan to get his daughter out of Hell.
The plot came to Sherman suddenly while listening to music.
"I was in my truck, listening to a country song a friend had given me about coming back from Hell," he said. "It hit me in a flash of inspiration. The whole book practically downloaded into my head. I spent the next hour in my truck writing notes."
The spontaneity of the writing continued throughout the book's creation, and the work was largely finished within 30 days. For him, the writing process for Hell and Back varied significantly from that of his previous novel.
"It was a totally different experience," Sherman said. "… With a fantasy novel, you're not really restrained by any of the research. Most of the research [for Hell and Back] was just talking to people about their thoughts on heaven and hell. After that, it was just writing the story."
In addition to his writing, he has also recently ventured into a third career as a publisher. While he initially made this move to help himself, he has found he can use it to help other up-and-coming authors as well.
"I started a small publishing company to publish my own works," he said. "In the process I'm now capable of publishing other people's works … I've discovered, especially in Iowa City, that there are manuscripts in lots of closets that are great writing and deserve to get out there."
Sherman reached back to what he had learned from his original occupation as a contractor in order to start his publishing company, Ancient Path Publishing.
"I had run other businesses in my life," he said. "… After a while, I said, 'Why am I not treating my book writing like a business?' [Before], I had kept my creative side separate from my working side. A publishing company was sort of a melding of the two."
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