BEGINNING CREATIVE WRITING A Learning Experience

From Jack and Jill, Marie and Donnie, and Jiggs and Maggie through twelve terrific lectures on creative writing, this illuminating book by Stephen Byers, an engineer who published his first novel at age 74, now fourteen years later is centered on ....

The Theme of This Book
Storyweaving = Storyforming + Storytelling

The art of developing characters’ strengths, weaknesses, conflicts and problems with defined guidelines that will keep you on track from beginning to end.

“I learned more in Mr. Byers' four-hour lecture than in a whole year at school.” A senior high school student, Grove, OK.

“The best lecture on creative writing I ever heard,” An author, Mountain Home, AR.

“Before Stephen’s lecture, I never knew how to begin. He made it so simple.” A housewife, Bella Vista, AR.

The story of my life and how I existed for 88 years does not make exciting reading. I have no medals on my walls, no trophies in my cases, save a moment of recognition in 1999. I am flotsam in life's stream, nonetheless appreciating my bountiful blessings-superb health, plentiful energy and buoyant humor, to mention a few. I married Mary Elspeth in 1948, the most fortuitous act of our lives. We were both born in Montreal, Quebec in 1924; I, the youngest of five children, Elspeth, an only child. Elspeth obtained a Bachelor of Arts, McGil University, 1944, while I served in Europe in the Royal Hamilton Light Infantry. After he war, I earned a Civil Engineer degree, McGill University, 1949. My lifetime work was construction management, participating in a variety of projects in Canada. In 1972, we relocated to Kansas City, where I worked as Construction Manager on several prominent commercial developments in Missouri. The active theatrical community throughout Kansas City presented us with recreational opportunities we never would have found in Montreal. Elspeth became a seamstress in a professional theater company and volunteer costumer for a summer theater group; I participated as both actor and director with several companies, my most notable venture portraying Clarence Darrow, a one-man two-hour tour-de-force of the same name. In 1988, we retired to Arkansas where I embarked on a storytelling and creative writing career, serving ten years as the president of the Tellers of Tales, the storytelling guild of the Shiloh Museum of Ozark History. In recognition of many contributions to the museum, I received the prestigious Arkansas Museums Association "Friend of the Museums Award," March 11, 1999, followed the same year by the Volunteer Excellence Award from Governor Mike Huckabee. Despite a colon cancer incident (2002) and a heart attack (2011), I continue my active writing career, combined with daily physical exercise. Currently, most observers, estimating our ages to be around 75, are surprised to learn the truth, a fact we judge to be a testament to a joyous union and lives well-lived. Meanwhile, as I write these notes, Elspeth is busy on her sewing machines, about ten feet from my computer, making her new clothes for the coming summer months. So here we are, in a retirement community in Rogers, Arkansas, living in eager anticipation of each and every visit from our four children, six grandchildren and four-oops, four and a half-great-grandchildren.