I waited a long time for my first book to be published and wondered how that moment would feel. Would it be like shipping the initial release of the flagship product from my first software company? Or more like the birth of my sons? Would it be that “Rocky” moment, when Sylvester Stallone, after defeating Apollo Creed, cries out: “This is the greatest night in the history of my life…YO, ADRIAN! I DID IT!”

Well…none of the above.

The moment for me was when I received the cover art for There Comes a Prophet. There were my protagonists, Orah and Nathaniel, facing the toughest decision of their young lives. I’d lived with these two characters, born from my imagination, for the past few years. And here they were come to life.

Friends ask what the biggest difference is between writing now and when I was younger (besides going from a typewriter to a word processor). My answer: Before I wrote for myself. Now I write for my characters. And as I sat there, staring at Orah and Nathaniel, I was, most of all, happy for them that their story will get to be told.