Before making her arrival to Seward County Community College, one of the newest English instructors, Sherry Moentmann became a published author. Drawing on Trust, written under the pen name, Jyndy Tayn, is the first book of the Heat in the Cold series.

What is the book about and what was the inspiration?
“The book is about the friendship between two boys. It’s a young adult novel in the category of magic realism. I’m a daydreamer. I’ve always had stories running through my head for as long as I can remember. I’ve just gotten better at writing [the stories] down and sharing them.”

About how long did the entire writing process take?
“Rounding at probably three years. I started in October and I finished around this summer. There were some periods of times I had to set it aside in order to focus on my teaching. But from start to end, I usually round to about three years.”

What were your experiences during the writing process?
“I went through three stages. The first stage is trying to get the ideas down and the second stage has to do with, okay now that I know what my story is, how do I wanna tell it? Getting the story down took about a year and how I told the story took about another year. It was more of, how do I do this or that? That stage took some time to figure out. The last stage is polishing up those things that you missed in spots.”

How did you go about getting your book published?
“I didn’t acquire for a publisher, I knew I wanted to self publish from the beginning. If I would have done what is called traditional publishing, it would have been another two years before you would have seen [the book] in print. You take about a year to find an agent and then you another year for that agent to find a publisher. I would have had to take another two years before anyone would have even read it! I said no, I want people to read it now.”

How long has the book been out for the public to read?
“Since July 2, 2018. It hasn’t been out for too long. It’s out on Amazon, I have a Goodreads page, and Facebook. On my Facebook page, Jyndy Tayn, [readers] can see if I have any other books in progress and I can report how it’s going.”

Do you have more books in progress?
“I have three more started at the moment. They are all in the first draft stage, one farther than the other and all in the same series. One of them is a sequel and one is a spin-off prequel. The spin-off prequel uses one of the characters you meet in the first book but it’s an earlier time and so it’s kind of its own story but it’s in it’s own world.”