Matthew Dicks

From a Q & A with Matthew Dicks, author of Something Missing:

You’ve been a Boy Scout, a pole-vaulter, a bassoonist, a teacher, a McDonald’s manager, a DJ, and a reporter. How did these roles prepare you for the role of novelist?

Some of these roles certainly helped me more than others, but most probably helped me to become a more persistent, creative person, two qualities that have served me well in my role as a novelist.

As a McDonald’s manager, I went to work from 4 AM until 2 PM five days a week, managing mostly non-English speaking employees, while also attending college full-time. Around this time, I also launched my DJ company, with no previous experience in the industry. Just a desire to hang out with my best friend and make some money. To combine the three endeavors effectively required a great deal of persistence and creativity.

As a teacher, I have learned that never giving up on a student and trying everything within my means to reach a kid, including some occasionally unorthodox methods, can often yield surprising results. Again, persistence and creativity can win the day.

I took up the bassoon in an attempt to flee the flute, the first instrument that I learned to play. Being the only male flutist in my school and still unaware of the benefits of hanging around large groups of female flutists, I jumped at the opportunity to learn to play the bassoon, but taking up an instrument so late in my schooling required quite a bit of persistence in order to play well.

As a Boy Scout, persistence and creativity are a must. My friends and I would literally walk into the woods with a sleeping bag, some food, an axe, and a ball of twine and spend days building and sleeping in shelters that rivaled some homes that I see today. When I became lost in the mountains of New Hampshire for two days as a teenager, I was more relaxed and at ease than when I was in algebra class, because I knew that persistence, knowledge and a little creativity would allow me to survive.

The pole vaulting, however, had perhaps the greatest impact on my role as a novelist. In choosing pole vaulting candidates, our track and field coach took all of his sprinters, myself included, and identified the two who were crazy enough to run as fast as we could with a fifteen foot fiberglass pole in our hands and then, without slowing, jam that pole into a metal box in the ground while simultaneously throwing our bodies into the air. This is how I have learned to approach my books. Dispensing with planning and outlining, armed with just the glimmer of a character or a plotline, I begin writing, pounding away at the keyboard with little concern for where I might be going or what might happen to my story. Reckless abandon...[read on]

--Marshal Zeringue