Writing

    I've known that I wanted to be a writer since elementary school. Ever since third grade when I wrote a short story called "The Mystic Waterfall" with a friend it's been pretty clear. Over the years my writing interests have gone in different directions. For most of my childhood and adolescence it was short stories, primarily of a fantasy, science fiction, or escapist nature, often heavily influenced by superheroes, X-Men comic books, and "Star Wars." In fifth grade, roughly about 1995, I began a very large, ambitious fantasy/science fiction series called "THAW: The Human-Alien War." Throughout junior high I kept multiple notebooks in which I wrote stories, often featuring friends and classmates with super powers.

    My writing also drifted toward nonfiction and journalism in junior high during my "Christian period." I began writing religious and philosophical essays. I also started writing for the school paper. This continued into high school when I really found the journalistic writing that interested me most, the review and opinion column. I was on the staff of the Carmel High School HiLite in various capacities between 1999 and graduation in 2002. I worked as copy editor, entertainment editor, "content editor," review writer, and columnist. My high point of this period was winning a first place Harvey Award from the Indiana High School Press Association for my review of "Requiem for a Dream," that just happens to be my favorite film of all time. I've also kept journals since elementary school.     

    When I got to Ball State I managed to start writing for the Ball State Daily News by my second semester, first as a columnist and later as a film critic. By sophomore year I was writing a weekly opinion column. A year later I was also doing a weekly film column. During college my fiction interests shifted from short stories to poetry, primarily as a result of having great poetry professors. I also took a course in screenwriting and wrote several short scripts, one of which was actually filmed. My political op/ed columns also led to an interest in blogging, first solo and later as the leader of a team blog.

My writing for the Daily News led to professional journalism. I've written on a freelance basis for the The Indianapolis Star, writing primarily for their custom publications department. These articles have tended to be stories about companies and organizations, often times for job fair publications. Since spring 2006 I've written for the website of WTHR, primarily as film critic. I've also written two story series for WTHR, one on blogging and the other on atheism. I'm now writing a review every week for WTHR. I've also blogged for Nuvo's website.

Starting in December of 2008 I began free lancing for David Horowitz's Front Page Magazine. These pieces were initially limited to political readings of TV, film, and music. I eventually branched out into book reviews and other pieces as well. My writing for Front Page led to contributions to such other online journals as American Thinker and Parcbench.

In July of 2008 I began blogging for Horowitz's NewsReal blog. This led to being offered a position to act as the blog's Assistant Managing Editor as well as Associate Editor of Front Page. And that's what I'm doing now and I've never been happier.

Updated 08/17/2009

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