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September 19, 2003
Most people know Greg Boyd as the author of the wildly popular book Letters from a Skeptic, which he co-wrote with his father Edward. Few know that he is also the author of twelve other books with more in the works.
I recently had the chance to sit with Greg and ask him some questions about the writing side of his life.
His unassuming office is no bigger than anyone else’s, and he shares it with his assistant. There are no outside windows, and his workspace is made of modular office furniture. Shelves spanning two walls of the office are packed with books, mostly non-fiction and reference, showing his love for reading and research.
I sat down on the small loveseat next to the door and asked him about his writing.
When you were younger, did you expect to be a writer?
“No, I wanted to be a drummer. Growing up I wasn’t raised in a Christian home, I wasn’t a good student. I was kind of a behavior problem kid. Never saw myself as a public speaker, or as an academic person. The only thing I did well was drum. That changed in the eleventh grade when I began asking questions about existence. What is matter, and what is time? Everyone always thought I was just a burnout. But one teacher I had in eleventh grade – my English teacher, Mrs. King – one time said, ‘Greg, you ought to read some philosophy, you’re kind of a philosopher.’ I didn’t even know what that was, so I went to the library, looked up philosophy, and just picked out a book; it was Eric Hoffer’s True Believer, and I loved it.
“That turned me on to philosophy. When I got turned on to philosophy I quit doing drugs, and within six months, I became a Christian.
“When I first started reading philosophy is when I started thinking, 'Gosh people write on this stuff? This is what I think about all the time. There are people who write books on this and sell them, and they make a living doing this?' I couldn’t believe it so that’s when I thought, ‘Okay I’d like to do that.’”
How did you get into writing?
“I’ve always had a drive to communicate my ideas. I’m a communicator – I like to persuade. If I see something I really believe in, there’s a need to share it. The most influential thing in my own life – obviously apart from God – has never been a living person, it’s been books. People have always asked who were the most influential people in my life, and they’re all dead people who wrote books. So I guess I have a respect for books, and the power of writing, and the power of literature. That, combined with my personality profile as a communicator, it was just natural that I would communicate through writing.”
Trinity and Process (Peter Lang 1992), Greg’s first book, was in fact his doctoral thesis. I asked him about getting that first book published.
“I sent it out to a number of publishers, and no one wanted to do it because it was so technical. But then there’s a publishing house called Peter Lang publishing that’s actually an overseas one. They do a lot of dissertations, but it’s subsidized, and I had to pay $400, and then they publish as is.”
How long do you work on a book?
“It varies a lot. I’ve been working on Myth of the Blueprint for three years, and I’ll probably be working on it for another three. Other times books come out very fast. Love and the Knowledge of Good and Evil - the essence of that book I wrote out in about three weeks. For about a hundred and sixty pages, I just went into a manic drive where I couldn’t sleep I was so obsessed with this thing. It just flowed. Then I went back and put in some quotes and polished it up, and that took another six months. And then getting it published has taken another six months.”
Fifteen publishers rejected Letters from a Skeptic before Victor Publishing accepted it. Now the sales in the U.S. are about 225,000.
How did the book Letters from a Skeptic come about?
“At the time I was teaching apologetics, and I thought it would be cool for [Dad] to ask questions. I really wanted to witness to him. One of the hooks I used to get him to do this was to say, ‘Hey would you help me out? I teach apologetics and you ask questions better than anyone I know, would you ask me questions?’ He did ask quite a few in there that wouldn’t have crossed my mind.
“He was full of them. I didn’t really think about the book thing until it was clear that he was going to get saved.”
Where do your book ideas come from?
“All of it flows out of real life.
“My second book, Oneness Pentecostals and the Trinity was developed out of tracts that I helped a friend write. It always comes out of a passion. I never sit down and think gosh, I wish I had something to write about.”
Greg Boyd’s drive, intensity, and commitment show a life where God is at work. A list of the books Greg has written can be found at his web site.
article by Rob Dannenberg | 
