By Wayne E. Rivet

Staff Writer

Fascinated by books, Michael Goodwin has been a voracious reader since he was a child.

“Every story allows the author to share their imagination with the world,” he said.

So, Michael decided to share his imagination when he started writing in the seventh grade. Michael’s writing career started in 2008 when he began writing an online blog under a pseudonym. He wrote there for several years, and its rising popularity lead him to publish articles on such sites as GoodMenProject.com and TheFatherLife.com. These articles gained enough interest on their own to land an interview with the Chicago Tribune. He published a collection of short stories in 2011.

Earlier this year, Goodwin published his first novel, The Liberty Key. Although Goodwin resides in Windsor, he has a strong connection to Harrison.

“Bridgton and Harrison have had a place in my heart ever since I was a child,” he said. “My grandfather had a camp on Crystal Lake in Harrison, and my great-grandparents owned a house not far from Long Lake in Harrison. I always looked forward to going into Bridgton to visit the shops on Main Street.”

As an adult, Goodwin lived in Bridgton and Harrison between 2007 and 2009.

“My parents purchased my great-grandparent’s house after they passed, and I often helped them with their home-based bakery, White Wulff Farm, which was known around town for their delicious pies,” he said.

As part of its continuing Worth a Browse series, The News posed the following questions to author Michael Goodwin:

BN. Do you schedule time to write or do you start when ideas strike you?

MG. My day-to-day life with a full-time job and a large family is usually quite busy, but I try to find time every day to write. It is always easiest to write when motivated by inspiration, but even if it is a couple hundred words, the act of writing every day helps keep things fresh. My longest writing session was last year, when I was working on the ending of The Liberty Key. I wrote more than 6,000 words that day, which is the most I had ever written in one day before or since.

BN. What was the “inspiration” behind this book?

MG. About a year or so before I started writing it, I lived nearby an old house. For its age, it looked like it was in great shape, but it had been vacant for a very long time. The idea that the house could heal itself surfaced one night, and that was all it took.

BN. Give a brief account of what the book is about.

MG. The story is set in fictional Hamilton, Maine and focuses on Spencer, who buys a house to fulfill a promise to his deceased wife and child, who he lost tragically years prior. Shortly after moving in, he learns that his house has the ability to heal and restore itself. When he finds a skeleton key that has powers of its own, he uncovers dark secrets about the house’s past and is taken on a journey that forces him to confront the darkness within himself. 

BN. Did you experience bumps in the road while writing, and how did you move forward?

MG.I wrote the first half of the story in November 2009, but I stopped at a point where I wasn’t sure what was going to happen next. I set the story aside and didn’t touch it again for nine years. My then-fiancée read it and gave me the motivation I needed to pick up the story again. I finished writing it over the next 18 months, and put the final words down in January 2020, more than 10 years after I started.

BN. How did you go about developing the story?

MG. I started with an idea and an outline for the beginning but had no plan at all for the ending. When I picked up writing the story again in 2018, I had an idea that would let me continue where I left off, but still had no plan for the end. The ideas and storyline just started flowing, and I did some brainstorming with my wife along the way, but the events that unfolded pretty much wrote themselves.

BN. What worked well?

MG. The best parts of the book happened when I allowed myself to see the potential it had. I also found a lot of success writing while listening to Mozart’s Requiem.

BN. What didn’t?

MG. Sometimes, I would try to steer the story in a different direction because I worried about disappointing the reader. I realized that my best writing is when I am being true to myself and scrapped several sections as result.

BN. What do you think readers will enjoy most reading this book?

MG. It is a paranormal, light horror thriller, with the first half setting up a fast-paced and emotional ending. I think they will relate to the characters and find their own sense of healing by the end.

BN. How have you grown as a writer?

MG. My writing improved exponentially when I stopped trying to prove my abilities. Whether to myself or to others, it was a crucial moment for me when I learned to let my words speak for themselves. That lesson coincides with keeping my ego in check, being receptive to suggestions from my editors, and understanding that not every idea is a good one.

BN. Any advice you received from others that positively affected your writing style or choice of genre?

MG. An author that I look up to, as many others do, is Stephen King. He said, “Write with the door closed. Rewrite with the door open.” For me, that means to write the story that I want to tell, not the story that others want to hear.

BN. What is next?

MG. I’m currently working on a sequel to The Liberty Key, as I realized there was more of the story left to tell.