Guest Blog: Paul Rimmasch about The Lost Stones

I never set out to write a book. In fact, if my beloved high school English teacher has heard that I have, he probably choked on his stale teachers’ room coffee. My problem was, I had a story in my head; it was a story that so occupied my thoughts that I figured the only way to get rid of it was to write it down. I did and it worked.  The Lost Stones is out of my head and on paper.

Writing may have started out as a cathartic exercise for me, but it ended up opening up a whole new world. I never knew there so many people who wanted to write a book before I wrote one myself.  As I talked and gave encouragement to aspiring authors, I began to wonder why people didn’t end up accomplishing their goal. Why had I succeeded where others had failed?

I came to the conclusion that I was just dense enough not to know that people like me didn’t write books. So many would-be writers listen to the doubts of their friends and family and, worse yet, the nagging fears in their own minds. A lack of faith kills more stories that all of the acquisition editors in the world combined.

Finding faith is one of the main themes in The Lost Stones. My main character, Ammon Rogers, loses his faith in God as a teenager. During his service during the Iraq war, he feels a yearning to find it again.  As he endeavors to do this, Ammon discovers the continual conflict between proof and faith.  Conventional wisdom says that faith follows proof.  Wisdom of a more ancient variety says that proof follows faith.

As Ammon traverses the pages of The Lost Stones, he finds that the latter is true.  Anyone trying to write must find this out as well. I truly believe that many people are waiting for some sort of proof that they can write a book before they start. It doesn’t work that way. One has to have the faith first, ignore all of the naysayers and work your tail off.  The proof comes when you take your finished manuscript out of the hole-puncher and slap it into a three ring binder. There is no other way.

           

I guess when it comes right down to it, Ammon and I made a similar journey.  Won’t you join us?   

Paul Rimmasch was born and reared in the Salt Lake Valley. He graduated from Weber State University with a Bachelor of Science in Criminalistics and a minor in Photography. Paul has spent the last fourteen years working as a Crime Scene Investigator for Weber-Metro CSI and is active in  Forensic Science education and Law Enforcement training. He lives in Ogden, Utah, with his wife and three children and is an avid hiker and gardener. Paul has parlayed a life-long interest in Book of Mormon archaeology and LDS Church history into this, his first novel.