About me…
Dwayne Carr is the pen name I use when I write fiction (which is sort of like having two personalities, but not quite). In real life I live near Atlanta with my wife and our dog who is (according to the American Kennel Club) a Shih-Tzu but (according to everyone who knows him) is actually a Pit Bull in the federal Witness Protection Program. So I guess I’m not the only one in the family with two personalities.
By day I work for the government (nothing exciting, like spying, I assure you), and that’s one reason I like to use a pen name when I write fiction: I don’t have to worry about anyone confusing what I’m saying with what the government is saying. Or vice versa. There are other reasons for using a pen name: my real name (unlike Dwayne Carr) is tricky to spell, which makes it hard for potential readers to find me online; and I write a lot of non-fiction (fairly successfully, I might add) in a narrow, technical field. I don’t want people who are looking for my fiction to have to wade through a lot of (to them) boring technical books to finally find me.
I write fiction because it relaxes me, and people who have read my work usually tell me it’s really good stuff. (Of course my wife tells me it’s great, but I discount her opinion just a bit.) Several years ago I was a winner in the Maryland Writer's Contest, the only prize awarded to an entry aimed at Young Adults. The Basilisk Plot (buy it here!) is the only Christian fiction I’ve written, but even though my other fiction isn’t exactly Christian, I would call it “family friendly,” meaning: no sex scenes, no gore (there’s violence, but it tends to be human versus demon rather than human versus human), no overly graphic descriptions of blood and guts (except demon blood; I don’t mind spilling demon blood). That’s not to say that they aren’t realistic; I just assume my readers have some imagination of their own.
In the past few years I’ve written a couple of time travel novels with a teenage hero (which I’m polishing up before I offer them here), several stories for younger readers, called Sam Adler (read them free, here), and, of course, The Basilisk Plot.
Like most fiction writers I have my own impressive stack of rejection letters, though I’ve also had some good encouragement from editors and others who know the business. I finally decided that I didn’t need to make money from writing (though, it would be nice), so I decided to skip the publishers for now and offer my stories for the Kindle and in print (at Lulu.com). The Kindle version of The Basilisk Plot is just 99 cents.
Although my fiction isn’t all Christian, I am a Christian and that informs all my life (including my writing). I grew up in the Christian and Missionary Alliance. Now I'm a member of Southside Church, an affiliate of North Point Ministries (Atlanta), where my wife and I lead a Community Group.