Dig Diary #1 – The Mission

“What’s it like to be a published author?” people ask me. The truth is I don’t know. I’m not there yet.

In 6 months, Dig: A Personal Prehistoric Journey will become an experience you can share with me. It’ll be a paper time machine that will take you into my mind, and back into my childhood, and across ancient continents. The book will take you back to the Jurassic, 150 million years ago, and to many of the places where the remains of the most enigmatic animals that ever lived are being pulled from the stone.

So, the 7 ½ years this book took to write doesn’t seem that long on the geologic time scale, right? But the journey of writing Dig began long before I hopped on a train from Pennsylvania to Colorado. Long before I was touring museum storerooms or interviewing paleontologists, I was just another hyper dinosaur-obsessed kid that couldn’t get enough of the Mesozoic superstars.

In Dig, I grapple with why dinosaurs cast such a spell on us, why we care so much about them, and why some of us just can’t seem to outgrow our childhood fascinations. For me, it’s been an incredible experience and I can’t wait to share it with you this fall. Seriously, this is the coolest thing ever.

But for all those people–and especially all my fellow writers and readers–who want to learn more about the journey Dig is going to take, from manuscript to galley to a bookstore shelf near you, this blog is for you.

Hang on tight! We’ve only got 6 months to go and there’s a lot to do. But it’s going to be an exhilarating ride, and I hope you’ll join me along the way.

-Sam

P.S. Got questions you want me to answer? Tweet me @dinophilesam and I’ll be happy to roar (politely) back at you.