I started writing A Sweet, Soft Glow, my debut novel, sometime in early 2017. I had just started college for the second time, following the closure of a factory where I had spent the better part of the previous two years. My days consisted of going to class and talking about literature in the morning and afternoon. Then in the evenings, I returned home and spent time working on my novel. It was a writer’s dream come true.

Prior to beginning A Sweet, Soft Glow, I hadn’t written a creative work in a number of years. Back in high school I had spent a lot of time writing short stories and poetry, but that was years ago. I really didn’t have any experience writing something like this, but I was ready for the challenge, or at least I thought I was.

I read Stephen King’s On Writing and some of Hemingway’s notes on the craft, but otherwise I didn’t seek advice. I needed to figure out how I wrote best. I knew that if I asked for advice, I could probably get a million different answers on the right and wrong way to write a book. I once heard someone talking about photography and their advice to new photographers was to not open the manual until you had been taking photos for a year. That was kind of what I felt I needed to do with my novel. I had to try this for myself first, then I could look at what worked for other people.

So, when I started my novel, I began with a prologue and went from there. I didn’t outline at all, I just had a rough idea in my head of where I wanted to go with my story and I slowly worked toward it. I can’t tell you the number of days I spent sitting at the computer struggling to get more than a sentence or two. But for every slow day, there were those days where I would sit down to write and churn out two or three thousand words in a couple hours.

Because I didn’t really outline there were times where I was surprised by the events in the novel. At times it was like the story wrote itself. Even if I wanted something else to happen, this was the way it had to be. I think watching the story sort of take on a life of its own was one of the most rewarding aspects of writing A Sweet, Soft Glow.

In order to create my novel, I think a number of things came together at just the right time for me. I was first inspired by a podcast I had heard. Then I read some of Nicholas Carr’s work about technology’s impact on society and I was inspired even more. It was after reading Carr’s books that I began work on the prologue. At the time the only character I had developed was the villain, Harry Davis. Soon after, I began building a larger story consisting of multiple characters and storylines.

Throughout the novel those characters struggle to stay alive as a murderous crowd rampages through New York City. A black metallic armband worn on the forearm is presumed to have some sort of mind control over members of the crowd. With an understanding of what the armbands are, John Malley and Melanie Parker attempt to save the city from total destruction. Meanwhile, Maggie Wu and Walter Makichinski face personal struggles as the armbands take control of their lives.

Josh Magnotta is the publisher of the science fiction anthology Odd Dreams and an award-winning reporter for a small newspaper in rural Pennsylvania. He continues to write and find inspiration in everyday life. A Sweet, Soft Glow will be released December 15, 2020.