Most high school students have goals to be on student council, ride on the homecoming float or even make the varsity soccer team, but sophomore Dylan McManis may be in a class of his own with his accomplishment.
McManis began writing the book when he was in eighth grade. “The God Tournament,” a teen supernatural book that is a part of a planned series, The Ragnarok Chronicles, incorporates concepts from different mythologies and has a world-end scenario.
Since finishing the manuscript in December, McManis has been editing and working with his publishing company, Rowe-Publishing Design. Rowe-Publishing Design is a homegrown, family-oriented publishing company centered in Kansas.
“I’m mostly planning right now [for the next book in the trilogy],” McManis said. “I have a fifth of one done right now.”
For McManis, the prewriting process is just as important as the final copy. When he prewrites, he lists out the major events he wants to accomplish, like adding in a new character, and goes from there.
“I would usually jot down into my iPod [concepts to cover in the book],” McManis said. “I see how it links to my book and if it’s really cool, I’ll see how I can incorporate it.”
Along with prewriting, the publishing process is just as important when producing a book, he said.
Before showing his book to his publisher, he said he had to go through and make any edits. Next, he took his work to his publisher and they discussed any possible edits that need to be made.
“My publishing process took about seven months,” McManis said. “Even for the big publishers, that’s what it’s probably going to be like especially with first-time authors. After you get your first book published it’s going to be a lot quicker and it would only be about two months.”
McManis also writes short stories and poems for the Graffiti Magazine and has started writing novels that don’t belong to the trilogy.
“I’ve always been a creative person and I’ve never been good at sports,” McManis said. “I wanted to do something with my life that could make people smile and entertain them.”
But writing hasn’t been all fun and games to the young-adult fiction writer. Writing and publishing his first novel was a chaotic process due to the amount of time it took as well as the high stress-level. But for McManis, the amount of time and effort paid off in the end.
“It really makes you look at the world through different eyes whenever you read something or write an essay,” McManis said. “You’re thinking of it more on the technical and creative side then you are on the ‘Oh my gosh, I’m writing an essay this sucks.’”
Even though writing has been and will be a major part of McManis’ life, he does not intend on solely being a writer in the future, but does want to write on the side for some spare pocket change. He hopes to major in English and teach or get a cooking degree and go from there.
“[Writing is] a real good and happy part of my life but it won’t ever be able to take up the entire bit,” McManis said.