Interview with David Disspain

Author of Mallory Brown At Super Fun Town

Where are you from originally and where do you reside now?

I was born and raised in Phoenix Arizona but currently live in a suburb of Washington D.C.

If you currently reside somewhere besides where you were born, what’s the story that lead from there to here?

In a roundabout way, September 11th was the source of our move. My wife and I lived in Arizona when the attacks occurred, and she felt a strong desire to help bring those responsible to justice and do her part to make sure it doesn’t happen ever again. After several years and two out of state moves, she’s doing her part to help maintain the safety and security of the United States, and has been for more than a decade. Hats off to her dedication and devotion to that goal. I love living in DC.

What made you decide to write and publish your first book?

A growing need to get the story out of my head and onto the page. I found myself thinking about it at odd times of the day and night and after a time, I felt strongly about telling it. Since it’s a children’s book, I thought it was a fun story that many of us former kids have dreamed so my hope is that the kids that read it enjoy the story and the illustrations. My hope for the adults reading it to their kids is that they re-live that dream again.

How would you describe your books to first time readers?

I like to describe them as Sci-Fi Superhero Fairy Tales.

Who do you feel is most likely to connect with the topics you write about?

People who are fans of the same things I’m a fan of. My influences aren’t hard to find and show up in the stories I tell, so if you like the same shows and books I do, I think you’ll like my work.

What unexpected or surprising thing did you learn during the process of writing and publishing?

I’ve always known since grade school that I wanted to write. I didn’t expect to love it as much as I do and enjoy the process along the way. I find myself reading more now to how others do it. I find authors who inspire and electrify me and then I try to break down what makes their work sizzle. I didn’t know I’d be such a geek about language, words, and sentence structure.

If you could, what advice would you give to your past self before embarking on this journey?

Focus on telling a good story. The length, the format, the sales, the business side will all eventually make their way in their own way. But you have to have a good story first for that train to move down the tracks.

How many people would you ideally like to reach with your books?

The easy answer is as many as possible right? I bet that’s the most common answer. I’m no different in wanting that but in addition, I hope to reach folks that want to talk about stories with me, or other authors and really engage in the stories. I’m happy to sell a book to someone who will take it home and read it and then be done with it. But I’d much rather sell a book to someone who talks to me on social media, or at a signing or convention or some other venue where we can discuss characters or scenes and enjoy it together.

What has been the biggest challenge and frustration during the process to date?

Sales. When I finished the book, I was really confident it was going to make a much bigger splash. I felt it was a very unique story, and the end result was really something very different, which I assumed would translate to sales. It didn’t, and it hasn’t yet. I’m still hopeful, but it’s easily the biggest disappointment so far.

What’s your biggest strengths when it comes to book a) writing, b) publishing and c) marketing?

Biggest strength is the writing itself. I love to sit and really dig in to a story, work on it to try and make it better and I spend a lot of time thinking about stories and plots and characters. I’ll never have a hard time writing a story.

In regards to marketing I’d say my biggest strength is communication. I love to talk about books and stories and there will always be a desire and a need for me to talk to people about books.

With publishing, I think the biggest strength I have is potential. Since I think about my stories, and my words and my books a lot, I’m combining a desire to improve, with an ever present focus on freeing up more time to write every day, so there’s a good chance for me to get stories out and have content. I don’t know if I’ll ever be considered prolific, but I do really want to be known as good.

What’s your biggest weakness when it comes to book a) writing, b) publishing and c) marketing?

I’d say publishing is my biggest weakness right now. Although I have several published titles, I don’t yet feel like I’ve broken through enough to get an agent and go through a traditional publisher. So the publishing part looms large.

My biggest weakness when it comes to writing is discipline. Filtering out all distractions and sitting and getting the work done. Having a full time job cuts down on the time available, so I have to be better at using the other hours in the day and on the weekend to work on my craft and write.

When it comes to Marketing, I think my biggest weakness is not knowing where to spend time and money to market the book. I was confident that social media would cover a lot of ground when it came to getting the word out and generate interest, but it never quite took off the way I hoped or expected it to. I definitely want to invest more time working with stores, sellers, publishers, blogs, reviewers, etc to help get the word out to a larger audience.

When do you think you will write your next book?

I have two projects in the works right now. The first is a short story anthology and the second is a full length sci-fi / fantasy novel. I’m hoping to complete both in 2020.

Are you self published or did you use a hybrid publisher, or a traditional publisher?

Mallory Brown at Super Fun Town was done through a hybrid publisher. My next two will be submitted to traditional publishers and if no one bites, it’s very likely I will self publish.