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Author shares about his craft during reading

Author Craig Terlson fielded several questions about his craft of writing during a reading of his new book, “Fall in One Day”, at the Weyburn Public Library on July 11.
Craig Terlson

Author Craig Terlson fielded several questions about his craft of writing during a reading of his new book, “Fall in One Day”, at the Weyburn Public Library on July 11.
Terlson grew up in Weyburn, graduating from the Weyburn Comprehensive, and left for the Alberta College of Art, which led to a career as an illustrator for 26 years for various magazines and publishers, including of children’s books, before he turned to writing around 2000. Currently he teaches at a Mennonite university in Winnipeg, and writes when he’s able to.
After reading some excerpts from his book, including one scene that took place in the library, based loosely on Weyburn’s library, he took questions from the audience, including a query about how many books he’s written before.
Terlson noted that “Fall in One Day” is his third book, written about a boy growing up in “Garson”, which is loosely based on Weyburn, including references to the Weyburn Mental Hospital and the library, where “I spent an embarrassing amount of time.”
His first book was a crime novel called “Correction Line”, and the second was “Surf City Acid Drop”.
“I’ve been asked if everything is based on a real place. I created a town called Garson, and I changed some things,” he said, adding there is the odd thing he didn’t change, such as the name of 17th Street. His main protagonist, Joe, lives on a crescent that “might’ve been McGillivray Drive – but I’m not saying that.”
Asked about teaching at the Mennonite university, Terlson replied, “It’s a fabulous school. It’s small, with a population under 1,000. It’s a really neat environment of some of the most original people I’ve ever met.”
He added that as a writer, one needs to have a large canon of literature available to them, including the Bible, and pointed out there are many kids coming to the school who aren’t Mennonite, and many who have no faith at all. Terlson said he teaches the principles of design and graphic design at the university.
Asked if he creates an outline before writing a book, he said writers are basically in two camps: “plotters”, who do full outlines of their book, and those he calls “pantsies” who fly by the seat of their pants and just go with the flow of writing as it comes to them. Terlson said he is in the latter category, which he admits sometimes lands him in the position of writing himself into a corner that he then has to figure a way out of.
“I’ve got nothing against plotters. It just doesn’t work for me,” he said, adding it’s taken him about 10 years, off and on, to complete his latest book. During that time, he wrote several short stories and worked on another novel, as well as doing some play-writing. He noted one play he’s written was recently performed at the Winnipeg Fringe Festival.
Before finding a publisher for his latest book, he hired an editor in Colorado, and “her advice transformed the novel into what it is now. You’re always rewriting,” he said, noting when he got his manuscript back from her, it had some 300 changes that she felt he needed to make.
On coming up with a suitable ending for his novel, he admitted that can be difficult, along with having a catchy start to the book to hook the reader into the story.
Asked if he has other works on the go now, Terlson said he has work started on three different books, including a sequel to his “Surf City” novel, which is based in northern Michigan, and another book he is about halfway through writing his first draft.
“It’s hard to write a novel when you work full-time, but there’s not a lot of money in writing a novel,” said Terlson, noting his first two books are available through Amazon, while “Fall in One Day” was published by a Toronto company, Blue Moon Publishing.
Asked why he wanted to be a writer, Terlson said as a boy he loved reading, and loved stories, and dreamed of the time when he would be able to write his own stories.
An audience member, Jan Linnell, noted she was a teacher of his at the Comp when he was given the “Looking Good” award, which was created for artsy students who were in art, or Home Ec or cosmetology but who weren’t high achievers in the more academic courses. Linnell said the award lasted for about five or six years, and commented that they “got our money’s worth” with the award that Terlson received.
“I was lucky to work in such a creative career. I’ve been creative for a living and I worked very hard at it. It’s sort of nice, it all started here. That’s kind of amazing to come back here again,” said Terlson.