Q. When did you first realize you wanted to be a writer?

Dames: I’ve been writing my entire life. I even wrote in my little military notebook when I used to go out to the field. But becoming an actual writer and publishing in the big wide world is something that I kind of fell into after I wrote a book for my Dungeons and Dragons players putting the exploits of their characters into a prose story format.

Q. What was the most surprising thing you learned about creating books?

Dames: That no matter how well you outline your story, it won’t be what you planned for it to be. Your characters take on real life and a bit of their own sentience when you pen them out, and you suddenly realize that they would react to situations quite differently than how you planned them to. When Ching Goo fails his quest, and things turn bad, he reacted in a way that wasn’t planned for, and that pivot from my original plan made the story real.

Q. What do you think makes a good story?

Dames: Brilliant characters and a riveting world. The plot is there to steer the story and is important, but books transport us to other places, and if the world and people that we are watching aren’t that fun, I’m out.

Q. What do you love most about the writing process?

Dames: Learning what the plot is going to be. I was a Gamemaster for a lot of years, and I have made hundreds of worlds and thousands of quests, but that was also so I can enjoy seeing what the players did with it and where the story would go. I’ve found that in writing, the experience and joy are the same. In both cases, I know where I’d like them to go, but players and characters have a tendency to buck your expectations and forge their own story.

Q. How did you become involved in the subject or theme of your book?

Dames: I played a game with my son and my wife. I made a story, and they made fairy characters — Ching Goo (a word meaning ‘friend’ in Korean) and Oma Bell (Oma is a word meaning ‘mother’ in Korean), then we played and the way the two played off of each other was magical. Oma was the responsible one, trying to keep Ching on the right path while Ching was the headstrong and goofy unpredictable one, always forging his own path. It led to trouble, as you might imagine, and it lead to unforgettably glorious scenes that I knew I had to immortalize into text. 

Q. What inspires you as a writer?

Dames: My son and my wife. I almost never published anything. My son had a stroke and almost died, and spent months living at the hospital undergoing brain surgeries. I dropped that very first book I had been writing and went to living life day by day. But when he finally came home and while he recovered, something emerged inside me. 

I was determined to put all of the pain and hardship behind by not letting ‘the badness’ win. And I started that path by finishing my first book and publishing it. I felt that if I didn’t, I’d forever remember all of the horror of the experience. And it worked in ways I didn’t expect. 

My son was proud, my wife was proud, my students were proud, and I pushed on with writing. Now my son is writing his own novel, and it is my turn to be proud. I am inspired by the change that writing has bestowed upon others, like my middle-school student who said she now wanted to be a writer. 

I am inspired by the happiness, joy, and overall positive influence that I hope my works can bring to other people’s lives.

Q. Can you tell us about one of the most rewarding moments you have had as an author?

Dames: A father contacted me and told me that he had finished reading Fairy Knights to his 5-year-old daughter, and now she was spending her days talking about how she was going to do good things for people so she could level up and be a powerful hero. Hearing that made me so incredibly happy. 

Q. Are you working on anything at the present that you would like to share with your readers about?

Dames: I was contacted by an in-country publisher here in Korea, so I’ll be publishing a separate Korean version of the books this year. I am always working on something at present, and I would love to gush about current projects, but honestly, right now, I’d love to shift the limelight to my son if I could. 

His book is named Nightmare Spider Apocalypse and it is probably a month and a half from being finished. It is a silly and funny kids action novel that very much showcases his creative and comedic mind. I wish I had the imagination my little guy has and I hope he outsells me. He said he wants to sell so many copies that he can buy the best gaming computer in the world!

Q. What do you hope your readers take away from this book?

Dames: Each of the Fairy Knights books has a life lesson, and I hope that the kids that read or listen to their parents read this book pick them up and keep them throughout their lives. 

I hope that kids realize that being good at something requires patience and hard work, that jealousy is natural but should be thought through and talked through with your friends, that they should make a plan when preparing to do something big and complicated and that, always, it is better to work together than to try to tackle the same task individually. I am a teacher, and it is in my blood to hope that my kid readers learn something.

Q. Do you hear from your readers much? What kinds of things do they say?

Dames: I do! And I welcome the feedback. The Fairy Knights books have received phenomenal praise here in Korea, and people tell me stories about how their children have reacted to them. It is always so cute and powerful. It is addictive, to be honest, and even though my outline says I will only write twelve, I, like my characters and players, might forge ahead and make my own path and shoot for twenty or even more. 

I will write until I don’t hear from my readers, I suspect. Because, while I enjoy writing the stories, they are the ones who validate my hobby and make all of that typing ultimately worthwhile. Plus the stories are always super cute!