meet the author.

I found a story that I wrote (AND ILLUSTRATED) when I was 8. The story is called “Jaws Goes to College” and is about a shark named Jaws that wants to go to college.

[I wish it was as quaint and cute as it sounds but there are plenty of curveball elements like parents who died before the story, burned down homes (underwater homes, which seems impossible), and a cousin to whom Jaws had not spoken in 15 years. Also, the climax is that Jaws is given a check for $10,000,000, for college. Yeah. And I realize that that information makes the story sound really adult and progressive but that assumption is also weak. It’s just an 8-year-old’s really poorly written story about sharks, okay?]

Anyway, at the back of the book (which was spiral-bound by my teacher), there is a “Meet the Author” page. This page is approximated below:

Name: Justin T. Brown

Age: eight

I’m an expert at: baseball

My favorite book is: Kat Kong

My best school subject is: physical education

Because: I’m good at being physical

What I like to do most is: play baseball

When I grow up, I will be a: baseball player or a lawyer

Other books by this author: Jaws Goes to College, The Sun 

Notes:

• Kat Kong was totally a book. It was basically LOLCATS in print form, about 12 years ahead of LOLCATS. So yeah, I continue to be way ahead of the trends.
• I was “good at being physical” during PE class because from the ages of 6 until 15, I was generally about 31% larger than all of my classmates. I hit “Turbo” on the whole puberty thing a little too early.
• I was never an “expert” at baseball. Aforementioned size disparity between myself and classmates provided a serious hitting advantage for a few years but… even then, I was just coasting on the innate athletic gifts — there was no expertise involved.
• Related: I never became a baseball player beyond Little League. And I think I only wrote “lawyer” there because I wanted my dad to feel like my goals were attainable. Relevant: I never became a lawyer.
• I recently also found my book The Sun. It’s basically a bunch of facts about the Sun, coupled with colored pencil drawings of all the planets, spiral-bound. The best part is a caption below the Solar System: “The Solar System has 9 planets. Some people say that we’ll have ten in 1999.” Such a sweet kid.
• 8-year-old me would be thrilled to know that 18 years later, I was still actively fascinated by sharks, baseball, and outer space*.

* “Sharks, Baseball, and Outer Space” = name for a future book.