The good that has come out of the pandemic is creativeness, so comes the first novel from creative writer Doug Davis. A modern-day mystical Love story that takes the reader from the world of drugs and prostitution in the West to the serene landscapes of North-eastern India. Making the reader realize there is a bigger plan for all of us and try as we may it can not change one’s destiny.
The novel YOGA: A Love Story ~ Tells the tale of John Yogacara Asanga. A direct descendent of the eponymous saint Asanga, John is yet to realize his destiny. For now, he is just a young man grappling with his part-Indianness in an American world. Through the pages of this book, we accompany John on his journey from the safety of Kokomo, Indiana, the city he called home, through the world of drugs and prostitution in Chicago and his days in prison in America to an ashram in India where he meets Aanya, his soulmate from a previous life, to finally discovering his destiny as an Asanga. From Indiana to India to the centre of the earth and back, Yoga, a Love Story takes you on a journey that will enthral you and also open to you the secrets of yoga, the universe and of love and life.
Some insight from the author…. This is my story in all its nakedness. It is the truth as much as I remember it. I tell you this because it’s been many years since it occurred and sometimes, even I don’t believe that it happened. Yet, it did. All of the mystical, magical details are true.
About the Author….Douglas W. Davis is a writer, father, husband and a constant spiritual seeker. He has a passion for Eastern and Western religions, particularly how they are intertwined. He currently resides in Los Angeles, California with his family and his two poodles. His lifelong goal is to unite all religious and spiritual seekers by revealing they all stem from the same tree.
- What literary pilgrimages have you gone on?
I have gone on several pilgrimages – I visited Saul Bellows writing spots in Chicago, Gwendolyn Brooks and Lorraine Hansberry, also in Chicago. I made the trip to Canterbury in honor of Chaucer and T.S. Eliot. Red Cloud Nebraska for Willa Cather and Last, I went to Bowdoin College in Maine and Padua, Italy in honor of Hawthorne - What is the first book that made you cry?
That was then this is now. - What is the most unethical practice in the publishing industry?
That publishers don’t look at new writers fairly and want you to sign away a good portion of your rights including sequels. - Does writing energize or exhaust you?
It mostly energizes me. - What are common traps for aspiring writers?
Falling in love with their work and not taking their time to set up verisimilitude. - Does a big ego help or hurt writers?
Big ego helps and hurts. It allows writers to conceive great stories but it also prevents them from properly judging their work. - What is your writing Kryptonite?
Starting another project and losing my groove on a former. - Have you ever gotten reader’s block?
Yes, sometimes you have to put something away until you are ready to accept its premise. - Did you ever consider writing under a pseudonym?
Yes, Ellison James in honor of Ralph Ellison and James Baldwin - Do you try more to be original or to deliver to readers what they want?
I strive more for originality. - Do you think someone could be a writer if they don’t feel emotions strongly?
It makes for a boring read in fiction but it could work with scientific writing. - What other authors are you friends with, and how do they help you become a better writer?
As Hemingway’s character said in Midnight in Paris. You can’t have other writers for friends. You will hate them because they don’t like your work or you will hate them because they are too good. - Do you want each book to stand on its own, or are you trying to build a body of work with connections between each book?
I go with whatever comes to me. There is probably an overriding theme in my work but it is more subconscious than purposeful. - If you could tell your younger writing self anything, what would it be?
Use more active voice. - How did publishing your first book change your process of writing?
It gave me confidence to know that others wanted to hear what I had to say. - What was the best money you ever spent as a writer?
Travelling the world. - What authors did you dislike at first but grew into?
Willa Cather - What did you do with your first advance?
An expensive dinner. It was not very much. - What was an early experience where you learned that language had power?
I wrote a comic strip in first grade and people would stop me on the street to share similar experiences. - What are the most important magazines for writers to subscribe to?
Any magazine that they enjoy reading. Every writer is different the more you read the more you will learn what you like and don’t like. - What’s your favorite under-appreciated novel?
Pudd’nhead Wilson by Mark Twain. - How do you balance making demands on the reader with taking care of the reader?
It is very difficult. I expanded my vocabulary by being constantly challenged by my father. I like to do the same to readers but you can’t go too far because for most it is not enjoyable to have to have a dictionary when you read. - As a writer, what would you choose as your mascot/avatar/spirit animal?
A pigmy hog and a hummingbird. - What do you owe the real people upon whom you base your characters?
A debt I could never repay. - How many unpublished and half-finished books do you have?
Too many - What does literary success look like to you?
Being able to travel the world while writing and touching as many people as possible with my message of kindness, love and spirituality. - What’s the best way to market your books?
Still trying to figure that one out. - What kind of research do you do, and how long do you spend researching before beginning a book? I spend a great many hours before and during writing. Research takes my books into unforeseen directions.
- Do you view writing as a kind of spiritual practice?
Yes, I only write when the spirit speaks to me. I stop when I feel I am just pontificating. My goal is to be a medium for characters. - What’s the most difficult thing about writing characters from the opposite sex?
I have a difficult time writing dialogue for the opposite sex. Once I start, it flows. I talk like a man with limited details but I write like a woman with long detailed sentences. I have to really focus when I am speaking as a woman.
Not the Usual LICK Publicist! 27 yrs in the biz ~Worldwide! Actual Peer of the Realm~Unitarian Universalist Pragmatic Buddhist~ PROUD GAY Liberal
