Todd Stottlemyre: On Mixing and Bending Genres
Author Todd Stottlemyre explains how he combined fiction and nonfiction in his latest book and what it meant as a writer to share his personal experiences.
Todd Stottlemyre is a former Major League Baseball pitcher who played for 15 seasons, most notably as a member of the Toronto Blue Jays with whom he won two World Series championships. He also played for the Oakland Athletics, St. Louis Cardinals, Texas Rangers, and the Arizona Diamondbacks. Awarded for his outstanding integrity and dedication to community service, he received the prestigious Branch Ricky Award and the Lou Gehrig Award.
After leaving professional baseball, he pursued a career in finance building an asset management business at a high-profile Wall Street firm. He is the co-founder and owner of a private equity fund that owns, manages, and oversees a number of companies.
Today, Stottlemyre channels his passion for winning as a high-performance business coach, best-selling author, and keynote speaker. Taking all he has learned both on and off the field, he works to help people achieve unparalleled success in every dimension of their lives. His latest book, The Observer: A Modern Fable on Mastering Your Thoughts & Emotions, released on December 29, 2020. The Observer is available anywhere books are sold.
In this post, Stottlemyre explains how he combined fiction and nonfiction in his latest book, what it meant as a writer to share his personal experiences, and more!
****
Name: Todd Stottlemyre
Title: The Observer: A Modern Fable on Mastering Your Thoughts & Emotions
Publisher: Made for Success Publishing
Release date: December 29, 2020
Genre: Praised for breaking the boundaries of both fiction and non-fiction / Women’s Fiction, Sports Fiction, Business, self-help, motivational, inspirational, mental health
Previous titles: Relentless Success
Elevator pitch for the book: Breaking the boundaries of genre, The Observer: A Modern Fable on Mastering Your Thoughts & Emotions is a motivational personal and professional self-help book disguised as a “coming of (middle) age” novel, wrapped in a sports story, that (underneath it all) is actually a fable about 3x World Series Champion, Todd Stottlemyre’s life.
IndieBound | Bookshop | Amazon
[WD uses affiliate links.]
What prompted you to write this book?
I wrote The Observer to serve and help others overcome their past and current circumstance to pursue their best selves. This writing was my mess that is now my message. While many know me for my athletic accomplishments, I have much more to teach from my own experiences and mastering my own emotions. I lived a lifetime with a tremendous amount of anger and resentment and was fortunate enough to learn to free myself from my own prison. This has sparked a passion in me for helping others see a pathway that leads them from suffering, and I believe that my experience can connect with readers of all different generations and walks of life.
How long did it take to go from idea to publication?
This book was a labor of love. Although it is presented as a fictional story about a 30-something businesswoman and her relentless pursuit for success ... it is actually the story of my own life. It took a little over a year. I went through this book nine different times to get it right.
Were there any surprises or learning moments in the publishing process for this title?
For me, the biggest thing I learned was how to weave lessons from my life into multiple fictional characters throughout the book. I took everything I had learned from my career in Major League Baseball and everything I learned following that when I got into business and started working on Wall Street. I’ve overcome some major emotional issues, and I know this insight can help people. What I didn’t realize was that writing this book would be such a cathartic experience for me.
Were there any surprises in the writing process for this book?
Yes, I set out to write this book pre-2020 and how the decades of the events in my life related to the current affairs of our country and how the models and principles are so relevant today.
What do you hope readers will get out of your book?
The blessing and encouragement that people can overcome any past or current circumstance to see through and pursue a better life for themselves. I hope my book gives readers motivation and encouragement, but also a pathway for discovering their peak potential both professionally and personally. My hope is that my story told through The Observer can inspire others to let go of what they’ve been holding onto and learn to live their lives freer and able to achieve what they’ve previously felt was impossible for them. That would be considered an enormous success to me.
If you could share one piece of advice with other authors, what would it be?
Everyone has a story that needs to be told. You never know who you will touch by sharing your experience.
Robert Lee Brewer is Senior Editor of Writer's Digest, which includes managing the content on WritersDigest.com and programming virtual conferences. He's the author of 40 Plot Twist Prompts for Writers: Writing Ideas for Bending Stories in New Directions, The Complete Guide of Poetic Forms: 100+ Poetic Form Definitions and Examples for Poets, Poem-a-Day: 365 Poetry Writing Prompts for a Year of Poeming, and more. Also, he's the editor of Writer's Market, Poet's Market, and Guide to Literary Agents. Follow him on Twitter @robertleebrewer.
