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"A good character is one that you enjoy writing. A great character is one that can still give you a few surprises as you go."

I've always been fond of starting anything I create off with a quote of some kind, whether my own devising or one who's wisdom I find worth it to retell. The above is one of the former and its wisdom is questionable, but I believe in it wholeheartedly. Such is the way I write these works of fiction, letting my characters take the reins of the world they live in. It's only proper, after all.

Oh, where are my manners? My name is J.C. Bell, aspiring author and sometime artist, at your service. I'd take a bow, but somehow I don't believe that would translate well through text. At any rate, I imagine you're reading this bit of text below my name to find out more about me and I, an ever arrogant troubadour, will oblige your curiosity.

At the tender age of six years old, I created my first 'book', such as it was. It was about an Oddish, a name many of you former Pokemon masters might recognize, looking to make friends with other of the pocket monsters in her area. Seven pages it was, full of illustration and a few lines of text on each. My parents oohed and ahhed, of course, which only stimulated my creativity. Fast forward ten years and I had several short stories under my belt, each longer and more impressive than the last. I spent time on a forum dedicated to teaching authors to write, a strict and taxing crucible that churned me into the writer I am today.

You may think me pompous, spouting such things as if I were the cock of the walk, but there is no need. I am well aware that I am still only a beginner on the scale of authors who delve into worlds of their own making and coax the multitudes of tales from their characters. Yet I have still written a novel sized work of fiction, fan though it was. Gears of War: Haunted Echoes. 280 pages long, would it have been in a paperback book. My pride and joy for a year.

Then I created Unmarked and at the time of this writing, it has reached past the eighty-one thousand words that Haunted Echoes achieved to a staggering 104,000 word story and it is only now beginning to reach toward the climax. I suspect it will end up at 150,000, my goal.

And after that? Who knows, I may do a sequel. Or perhaps I'll reach into a universe of my own making and enjoy the stories it tells me so that I can share them with all of you.

But that's the future and this is just a small biography. Keep writing, whomever you are. It's a wonder few enough in this world experience.