Meet Daniel Willams

We caught up with the brilliant and insightful Daniel Willams a few weeks ago and have shared our conversation below.

Daniel, so good to have you with us today. We’ve always been impressed with folks who have a very clear sense of purpose and so maybe we can jump right in and talk about how you found your purpose?

I was a shy child, which you wouldn’t know by seeing me now. As such, I was a media consumer at the time, mainly in the 80s, even though I was born in the 70s. I grew up watching He-man, Super Friends, Transformers, etc.… I was also big into comics, especially the X-men at the time. Now, like all children, I was a budding artist who would make superheroes and, in my head, pit them against the characters I grew up loving. At the time, I didn’t have a purpose behind any of it. It was just a hobby. Three people helped me find my purpose as a storyteller who hopes to inspire others as I was inspired when I was young. My mom, Thelma Williams, was the first person who started my path to a purpose.
As a poet, she self-published her books and started going to various shows at elementary, middle, and high schools and setting up at flea markets. She took me with her to these shows, where I would draw in the room while she performed. Eventually, she asked if I could let her make copies of my characters, and we started to sell them. This showed me that something that I created had value.
The second person who sparked my path to my purpose was my high school art teacher. As someone who drew almost every day, I was allowed mainly to draw on my own and turn it in for a grade instead of whatever the class did that day. One day, while looking at my artwork, she said, ‘Why don’t you do one of those funny books?’ She meant comic books. As a typical student, I blew it off by saying something like, ‘Sure, why not, ok,’ and that should have been the end of it, but a seed had been planted. A few years later, that seed bloomed as a throwaway prompt from an English class assignment and birthed my first twenty-page story. That started the ball rolling.
The third person who refined my path to my purpose was the famous writer Chris Claremont, who wrote the x-men and the sequel to the movie Willow, the Shadow War Trilogy. Funny enough, the thing I thought about Chris Claremont was a lie; I tricked myself into believing. That lie was that Claremont had all these X-Men stories planned out years in advance, which is why his storyline was put together so well. Mind you, no one has said this in any article or anything; I just assumed it. And that assumption led me to plan these elaborate storylines before I had even written anything in them. Later, I learned the trick he used was to go back and pick up loose threads, one-off lines, etc… and use them to create new story beats over the year. But it was too late; the die was cast, and my purpose had been forged. The first fruit of that purpose was the creation of my Starfighters Chronicle story, which was a remake of that original 20-page story

Thanks, so before we move on maybe you can share a bit more about yourself?

As a storyteller, I build worlds. Over the last 20 years I’ve come up with eight universes of stories. Each of these Universes features various stories and seeds for potential stories. Three of these universes have over a 1000 years of backstory built I to them.
I have self published four poster books, three poetry books, two portfolio books and over 75 character prints (including color variants.
I’ve published one composite novel with illustrations in my Tales of Mythicore Series (Champions Quest) that features several of my characters from my different universes and have written one novel in my Five Armies of Destiny Trilogy (A Gathering of Forces) that is in the process of being edited.
I just finished working on a novella titled Shadows of Self, about a young boy who wakes up in a fantastic land, learns he is supposed its savior. As he journeies through the land and restores it, he is actually healing himself.
I’m currently working on six prequel to Champions Quest, and a possible future animated series in the realm Mythicore established in Champions Quest., called Legends of Mythicore. For the Legends of Mythicore, I have created a 300+ page Story Bible, which features the various characters, lands, cultures, lore, the summary of all the seasons, OVAs, and movies and several complete episodes from the first season.

If you had to pick three qualities that are most important to develop, which three would you say matter most?

Three skills or areas of knowledge that helped me on my journey are reading, analyzing, and adapting.
First and foremost, I read a lot when I was young. I read comics, animal books, encyclopedias, books about planets, science, etc. This helped with my knowledge base and vocabulary. Reading helped expand my mind as I introduced myself to new concepts and ideas. Reading is basically being open to learning more.
The next skill is basically curiosity, but let’s call it analyzing. When I learned something I was interested in, my curiosity led me to analyze it. I asked how, why, and what-if questions as I deep-dived into the subject.
The last skill is adaptability, both in my ideas and opinions. Learning something is one thing, but you have to know how to adapt it to your needs. For example, most stories follow similar themes or genres. To make a story your own, you have to learn the rules, be curious about what’s possible, and then adapt the various elements into something new.

Is there a particular challenge you are currently facing?

My biggest challenge is focusing on one thing at a time. Because I am a writer, artist, and poet I have a lot of ideas spinning around in my head most of the time. Also since I have multiple stories as well, ideas can popfor any of them at any time. So, the way to overcome this is to lean into it. If I’m working on an idea and a idea pops my head then I write it down, sketch it out, and then go back to what I’m focused on.
One reason I learned to do this is in the past, I’d held ideas in my head until later only to realize later that, I’d forgotten that great idea. Another reason I learned to focus is as go older I looked back and saw that I hadn’t accomplished much despite all the set up. I learn to appreciate completing a project and then celebrate when I got the finished book, print, etc… based on that project.

Contact Info:

Image Credits

All art created by Daniel Williams and are owned by Storm Works Designs

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