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"I started writing The Revival in the late 1980s
as a serious short story" about small town life, Yoho said.
"I wrote a page at a time and then it just took off."
That
occurred when he let the wit that he so obviously possesses flow
onto the pages of his manuscript, and "I started having fun
with the writing."
"There is a tiny grain of truth in what I
wrote about myself, but mainly it is fiction," Yoho said.
After some legal entanglements with a publisher
fallen on hard times, Yoho and wife Carol--she's a hands-on central
cog in things--set up Dancing Goat Press and published the book
themselves.
The first printing of 500 copies sold out. The
Yohos brought second edition books with them to Samford's, which
will be an outlet for the book in Iola.
YOHO'S
FATHER, Lloyd, worked for the Santa Fe Railroad and the family lived
in Colony until he was 10. They moved to Atchison in 1944 and on
to Topeka five years later.
Yoho
stayed in Topeka--his grandparents, George and Minnie Yoho, are
buried in Iola Cemetery--and spent his working life as a machinist
for Goodyear. He retired nine years ago, about three years after
his first wife, Rosemary, died. Hands that had calibrated tools
to hundredths and thousandths of an inch found their way more often
to a keyboard.
Writing
wasn't a new experience.
Yoho
had written some while attending Washburn Unversity as a member
of the Washburn Review staff and had dabbled in the discipline through
the years.
The
year his wife died Yoho joined a Topeka writers' group, A Table
for Eight, and reports that several published books have come from
members of the goup.
"I
lived with a big gray cat then and I wrote a lot of cat poetry."
he said. "Some of my best writing is about that cat."
The
cat often is a focal point when Yoho goes to encourage the young
to read and write.
"I
talk about creative writing with kids in elementary schools,"
Yoho said, "I have strong feelings about kids reading and writing.
"I
enjoy it and I think they do, too. I get pretty animated when I
talk to kids. I bring the cat in quite a bit."
WHILE
The Revival is about a boy growing up in a small
town, Yoho's second novel, a current project, uses an old man to
tell stories about Comanche County.
"It, too, started as a short story that
I thought would be called 'Baseball in Comanche County,' but it's
evolved much like The Revival, the author said.
Yoho volunteered that even though the first printing
of his novel sold out there's "no monetary reward unless you're
Stephen King.
"But, and this may sound a little corny,
I've found a lot of love from old friends. That's been very gratifying
and worth a lot more than dollars and cents."
For those who didn't make it by Samford's Book
Nook those with access to a computer may renew friendships on the
Yoho's Web site, www.dancinggoatpress.com.
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