Norm Park is well-known locally for a journalism career that spanned more than 50 years. The majority of his career was spent with the Estevan Mercury.
But after retiring from his job as the Mercury’s editor in mid-February, Park was looking for a new opportunity for his creative energies. It didn’t take long for something to emerge.
Park’s first work of fiction, Tamaras: Where a Diamond Rules Supreme, was released on Amazon on May 29. The novel, which is through Wahba Publishing, will initially be available through an electronic format.
“There’s a little bit of romance and intrigue, and a little bit of character development and a little bit of conflict, and a little bit of murder,” said Park in an interview with the Mercury.
Tamaras was conceived just a few months ago. Park was speaking with Andrew Wahba, a former Estevan resident now residing in Regina who heads up Wahba Publishing, at a concert by another former Estevan resident, Chad Armstrong.
“We started talking about what he was up to, and I was being the reporter type, and asking him what he was doing, and he was talking about this marketing of authors,” said Park. “It sort of ding-dinged into us at the same time that I’m going to be free to do this pretty quickly, so why don’t we collaborate?”
Tamaras is a small, fictional village on the Prairies, he said.
“Authors should be writing about what they know,” said Park. “I grew up in small town Saskatchewan, so I know what a little bit of what small town Saskatchewan is about.”
The online version is about 240 pages long and in large fonts, so Park said it would translate to about 140 pages in a normal novel.
Online novels don’t fit in as 600-page or 900-page epic novels, he said. Rather, Park said they’re best-suited to being short stories or mid-length stories that are 35,000 or 40,000 words in length.
There are different approaches authors can take with online publishing, he said, including self-publishing, getting paid per page, or getting paid up front by the publishing company.
A physical copy of Tamaras could be released, but Park said Wahba wants to see the response for the novel.
Park admits he was surprised with how quickly it came together, but Wahba was very helpful with getting the novel to the finished stage.
“If I was going to do it, it would have probably taken a lot longer, but he knows his way around the cyber world a lot better and a lot more efficiently than I do,” said Park.
Park said he has never written fiction before, other than when he attended a writer’s retreat several years ago. He always wanted to dabble in the medium, but never knew if it would materialize into something.
“I’m kind of addicted to the keyboard, so I’ll try this style,” said Park. “I’ve done biographies, I’ve done features, I’ve done stories, I’ve done columns, I’ve done editorials, so why not try fiction?
“And it is kind of fun, being able to make stuff up. But I also found out that you still have to be cohesive, you still have to get the storyline done and through, and make some sense of it all. I came to that realization when I got about a third into the book, and said ‘I have to put this stuff together.’”
Park is happy with his first novel. There are some flaws, but he believes it must be pretty good, because Wahba is already floating the idea of a sequel. Park, though, wants to see whether people enjoy it before committing to Tamaras Part 2.
“I’ve already got some plot development if there is a followup, with the same group of characters,” said Park.
Tamaras can be downloaded by visiting https://www.amazon.com/Tamaras-Where-Diamond-Rules-Supreme-ebook/dp/B071SCV4S5/.
