Today we’d like to introduce you to Michael Krogh.
Hi Michael, we’d love for you to start by introducing yourself.
I’ve always loved books, and I’ve always been a voracious and enthusiastic reader. I’ve excelled at it. That’s not me trying to boast, but just a simple telling of the truth. In kindergarten my show-and-tell story that I read in front of the class was “Jaws”, a book not generally intended for five-year-olds.
I was blessed with a gift for which I am constantly grateful, though at the time it was just an outlet for my imagination. I wrote stories in the margins of my schoolwork all through elementary school. When I got to middle school English, my teacher took away all my homework for the year so I could work on a book instead. That was another blessing, though pre-teen me didn’t have the wisdom to appreciate it. Instead, I squandered it until the very end of the year when I realized that it was coming due and squeezed out a dozen pages of forgettable writing. Sorry, Mr. Mercurio. You gave me an amazing gift and I was too distracted to realize what you had done. If you’re out there, I owe you a book.
In high school, I came up with the idea for the book I would finally finish writing thirty years later. The idea I had then only vaguely resembles the novel I’ve released, but some of the bones still remain. For years, I would get inspired, write furiously for a few days and then be overcome by the normal rhythm of life. Sometimes another idea for a novel would occur to me and I’d get pulled in that direction. Focus eluded me for a long time, but not forever.
Long story short, I did finish the manuscript for the novel, in many ways in spite of myself. It took even more time to ultimately get it ready for publishing with revisions and editing until I finally felt it was ready. not to mention designing a cover.
Ultimately I made the decision to self-publish my book rather than pursue a traditional publishing company for a number of reasons, but it was greatly influenced by a desire to have my work read by whomever the story called to. Knowing that there might be someone out there who might be changed by my story just as much as I was changed by the books I read is a feeling unlike any other.
Can you talk to us a bit about the challenges and lessons you’ve learned along the way. Looking back would you say it’s been easy or smooth in retrospect?
I’ve detailed some of my struggles in my story above, but I think the biggest thing that any creator struggles with is themselves. I was no exception, as I’ve explained. I’d had this story in my head in some form or another since I was a teenager, but I found that if the external world wasn’t inserting itself in the way of me putting pen to paper, then I was often doing it myself.
Even when it was finished and ready for publishing, there was still a voice inside of me asking whether the work was as good as it could be. That’s hard to overcome. And there’s always the worry of writing in a genre and time period that aren’t well-known or understood. Those fears sometimes stopped me before I got started, and pushing through them was critical.
That said, I think my book is better off for it. Going back to tighten up the story or revise the plot helped to make it better, and I’m proud of the finished product.
Thanks – so what else should our readers know about your work and what you’re currently focused on?
I’m a longtime reader and writer of all kinds of fiction who has taken the leap and published my first book.
My novel is called “Across the Breach”, and it’s historical fiction set during World War 1. That’s just a backdrop, though. Mostly, it’s a story about the relationships between parents and their children, and the ways that our family affects us, and how we affect them.
The novel follows a teenager named Robert when he finds out his father has gone missing during the war. Amazingly, Robert finds a way to get to the war to find out what has happened to him. But even a resolute teenager is no match for the larger forces at stake, and his expectations of what will happen are vastly different than reality.
The one thing that really stands out to me and which I’m most proud with this book is the research and attention to detail I’ve tried to put in for accuracy and for effect. It takes effort to find the balance of what details are important to delve into versus what things can be left to the reader’s imagination. As I wrote, I was researching and learning and that knowledge became ingrained into the work.
As far as what sets me apart from others, I think I have a style that is informed by all the authors whose books I’ve loved to read, from the distant past all the way to the present.
As one review of my book said, “The writing style seemed like it could have been written almost a century ago even though that was just a flourish, it was modern conventions/readability all the way.” That hits me in exactly the right place, and helps me to feel like I’ve accomplished what I set out to do with this book, in tone as well as story.
Can you talk to us about how you think about risk?
Being alive is being a risk-taker, because there’s no path we can take that doesn’t close off other roads to us.
I think we all try to choose whatever seems like the best choice at the time. For example, quitting a steady job to become a street artist feels like a risk, but what experiences are the person keeping that steady job losing out on? I don’t think money or security are the only things of value: youth, experience and love are just as precious, and their worth varies from person to person.
I think there’s a beautiful poetry in that, because nobody can really have it all. You can become a beloved pop star with wealth and fame, but in doing that you lose your anonymity and normalcy. You can love with all your might, and have the person you love not feel the same way about you.
Everything we do has a cost, and thus everything we do is a risk. But despite all of the uncertainty and fear we continue trying, and sometimes those risks, regardless if we succeed, reward us in ways we could never have imagined.
Contact Info:
- Website: https://michaelkrogh.com
- Other: a.co/d/6i9tmS9 My book – Across the Breach at Amazon
