For the Armchair Genealogist‘s writing challenge today, I spent a couple of hour talking with my Dad. We went over the maps of Key West and I have a better idea where the key places are. I’d made a list of all the settings I could think of for this story that we went through. He is a visual person like I am. I didn’t realize that until Saturday when he told me that most of his memories of the Navy are visual images of places. We are getting together again either tomorrow or Thursday and start working through just how they taught each of the lessons plans for the Underwater Swimmers School. (The day depends on if the battery he needs to take up to the cabin comes in tomorrow or not.)

We are exploring the idea of hiring a mentor or writing coach for this project. He really wants it to be good since he is taking it to the next U/WSS reunion in May. And I just don’t have the knowledge and skills to do it on my own. We talked about just hiring someone else to write it but with 17 more years of Navy history to do, it makes more sense to help me to gain the skills and then it will have a more consistent voice through the whole project. Have any of you ever worked with a writing coach?