Every Christmas, my daughter and I collaborate on a children's book about the Three Wise Men. She is the illustrator. I wrote it when she was three years old.Today she is 16, and the book is 18 pages. So she has illustrated 14 pages so far, one a year since we began the project. The bottom right says "(P)AGE 3" etc., to capture the double meaning of how each page is a year in the process.This whole thing originated one day when Tabitha's mother showed me a drawing Tab had made of a bunny. She was two and half, and, to our surprise, it kinda looked a whole lot like a rabbit. That was the beginning of the realization that this kid had some serious artistic talent. (A few years later she grabbed some hot candle wax at church while bored and quickly sculpted a griffin with wings. I was stunned.)Anyway, years before I saw the bunny, I had a children's story in me I had always wanted to write about the Wise Men. It emerged after meditating on the bible story and being so intrigued by the fact that the smartest, most literate bible scholars in Jerusalem not only failed to identify the Christ child through their understanding of the Prophets, they actually used their knowledge to help Herod go kill him! (Go to Bethlehem, they told Herod. That's where the Bible says the Christ child will come from.)That bit of irony I thought would make a good twist for a story. And I kinda wanted to do the Dr. Seuss rhyming thing. So I wrote the first page of my story to include a bunny and used Tab's early piece of art on (P)AGE 2. Since then, she's illustrated a page of the story every year.I've written a number of books and been involved in a number of creative projects, but this one I find extremely interesting and in some ways it is an idea of which I am most proud.This video gives a glimpse of the book and Tab's drawings over the years. As usual, Jaime provides the comic relief.
Ghostwriting by Dean
I have made my living off and on the past seven years as a ghostwriter. Usually, a client has a great book idea in mind, has a lot of content they can talk about, but don't have the kind of personality to sit down and write it all out. (One of my favorite quotes is: "The art of writing is the art of putting the seat of the pants to the seat of the chair.")
I typically spend 10 to 15 hours interviewing them, recording the interviews, getting them transcribed, and taking those transcriptions and further research and turning them into a book.Several of my book projects are featured in a brochure that was designed for me by my childhood friend, current close friend, and imagery guru, Rob Tipton. I turned the brochure into a website, www.GhostwritingByDean.com. Since the time the brochure was designed, I also have this project published by McGraw-Hill in the quiver.