Rising Stars: Meet Jason Lee Willis

Today we’d like to introduce you to Jason Lee Willis.

Hi Jason, so excited to have you with us today. What can you tell us about your story?
I believe in the power of storytelling. As a kid, I grew up on a hobby farm, so my grove of trees became mystical forests, my barn became a pirate ship, my treehouse was a futuristic spaceship, and the guest room floor would hold dozens of drawn maps for my chess pieces to explore (a chess board is so limiting). In high school, I’d be the guy who would tell the stories to the others who hadn’t read the homework, cutting out the boring stuff to go right to the heart of the narrative. By the time I was in college, I fell in love with literature and public speaking, so I became a teacher, where I’d help kids learn to write, interpret, and read tales. All the while, I cranked out manuscripts as a hobby in the art of world building.

In both competitive speech and creative writing, I loved helping my students find and develop their stories, but in recent years, I got around to writing my own tales again. I blindly began self-publishing and wrote five books to discover two truths: I still had a flair for storytelling and also had a lot of improving to do. So about 2013, I began to study creative writing more earnestly and began to write prolifically. Rain or shine, I’d wake at 5AM and crank out approximately 2,000 words before getting on with my day. In a few years, I had almost a million words in several genres. I tested the market with a few of these self-published stories, and ran into a new publisher, Kiersten Hall at Fox Pointe. She enjoyed my Dream Catcher Chronicles and expressed an interest in my “unreleased” manuscript ideas.

So in 2020, I sent her a query letter that became The Alchemist’s Map. With Kiersten acting as publisher, agent, and marketing expert, and her daughter and co-owner Chelsea Farr as my editor, we produced the novel I’d been hoping for. Although Covid restrictions cooled the market, I had a lot of success in 2021, with my storytelling coming through as a lecturer, Youtube editor, and writer. Heading into 2022, I’ve a diverse platform: a new book in the Alchemist Chronicles, a re-release of the first book in the Dream Catcher Chronicles, The Fire Handler (now with Fox Pointe), several nonfiction Bible studies, and a collection of historical fiction stories.

We all face challenges, but looking back would you describe it as a relatively smooth road?
My biggest struggle in writing has been my love of teaching! I’m always trying to find new ways to “perform” for my students, and my personal time vanishes. I’ve been more disciplined recently just to focus my love of storytelling into writing. Now, I can share my own stories with readers of all ages.

My biggest challenge as a writer is that I love EPIC storytelling, so as a writer, I often try to grab for too many ideas. I’ve learned how to tell a more focused story after many trial-and-error self-publications. Even now, having a team of editors at Fox Pointe helps me focus on the best story elements.

The publishing market has seen dramatic change, also. With eBooks and social media, reading has seen its place in the entertainment market shift. The big publishers take fewer gambles, and self-publishing has flooded the void with too many authors. With a new publisher, I hoped to build a regional platform, and the support in producing novels has been outstanding, but releasing in the shadow of Covid has been a challenge to find the readers. When I do find them, the sales have been great.

Thanks – so what else should our readers know about your work and what you’re currently focused on?
I grew up in some pretty boring places, so as a writer, my theme is that things are never as simple as they seem. I like to look at things from different perspectives, to explore possibilities. My novels are set in Minnesota, and are often based on real people, events, and places, but I like to insert fantasy into the equation. The ordinary pink worm we see is actually the tongue of the angler fish lurking in the shadows.

My ALCHEMIST CHRONICLES, for example, takes a few figures from Minnesota history, like Nicollet, LeSueur, and Lahontan, and using the details of their lives, I give them the “Dan Brown Davinci Code” treatment.

My other series, THE DREAM CATCHER CHRONICLES, does a similar thing with a family living in northern Minnesota, where the lake holds a key to a more fantastical past. Somewhere between the Ojibwe, Dakota, Norse, and Christian stories of horned serpents and End Times prophecies lies the truth.

Again, things are never as simple as face value.

Do you have recommendations for books, apps, blogs, etc?
I grew up on Indiana Jones, Lord of the Rings, and more recently, Robert Langdon (Dan Brown), so when I decided I wanted to improve as a writer, I studied these masters. Conveniently, Master Class featured Brown and a dozen other writers, and I watched them all. I also turned to YouTube where I watched writers like Brandon Sanderson post his BYU lectures for other writers.

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