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It seems a past life, but there was a time when I ran a writing blog that carried some weight to my name. My heyday, if we can so call it. The blog was called Get it Write Tonight. I posted weekly, and being in the thick of writing my fourth (fifth?) scifi novel I felt I had advice and experiences to add to a conversation, particularly for younger writers.
My name is Alex Martin. I’m 31 years old and have been writing scifi novels for a little more than 20 years. My claim to fame is a Tumblr post about the process of editing books. I wrote the post in April 2015, and it garnered more than 300,000 notes. To this day, I still meet people who remember seeing that post in those fleeting months when it was running viral on Pinterest, Twitter, and Facebook.
Then life went on.
I’ve never stopped writing. My eighth book, the fifth in the Recovery series, is due for release in April 2025. Here’s where you can find the first four in the series (#s 1-4): Embassy, Resonance, Perihelid, and Belvun. (All are also available as Kindle). Or feel free to email me at sidewalksciguy@gmail.com and we can arrange for you to get signed copies. Reader beware: my books are self-published. My following is small. In the years since my heyday, I have built my identity as an author on two foundational pillars.
- I’m writing for myself. I have a story to tell, and I want to get it on the page. Whether people read that story or not, I’m proud to have created these worlds and characters. My books exist, and I’m glad they do.
- I don’t write to impress, or to become acclaimed and famous. Some people will love my novels. Some will find them interesting but not noteworthy. Some will toss them to the wayside and never come near them again. I’m not in this for a competition. I’m in this for my own fulfillment, and if that fulfillment is shared by others along the way, then I’m glad for it.
Since my last days as a blogger nearly a decade ago, I’ve graduated college, lived in two new states 1,000 miles from my hometown, attempted grad school, worked odd jobs at malls, visited Finland, worked at a children’s museum, tutored, ran a planetarium for two years, taught high school, traveled for three weeks in Arizona, and my proudest achievement: in 2018, I started an education nonprofit called Sidewalk Science Center.
This blog will serve as a reflection of my current goals and advice as a writer, and also, in part, as a portrait of me: a kid author who failed out of college twice because I developed an unhealthy obsession with writing, who now runs a non-profit with a mission to provide free education in public spaces, and low-cost programs to families and schools and organizations. Now, I volunteer hundreds of hours every year, teach science and astronomy pretty much every single day, and a few evenings a week, I head to a coffee shop to write and edit my books.
I’m also here to help. If you have questions, need advice, need a fresh set of eyes to review a chapter for you, or just want to discuss your writing journey, leave a comment, send an email, give a follow. Writing is a journey, and perhaps our paths will cross.
Alex
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