Article by Gwen Jones, Department of Family Services
(Posted 2024 April)
When 92-year-old Ray Collins retired 20 years ago, he entered his next phase of life with the confidence of someone who had enjoyed many successes – a happy marriage, a loving family, and a rewarding career. He had no reason to doubt that he would be successful in achieving his dream of becoming a writer. He soon discovered that writing novels was harder than he ever imagined. Employing the same work ethic that has served him throughout life, he stuck with it, steadily improving year by year. He was also motivated by the support and encouragement he received from his family, especially his wife, Betty Ann. Eventually, Collins’ perseverance paid off. His first two novels, “The General’s Briefcase” and “Motive for Murder,” were published in 2023, and his third novel, “Setup” will come out in 2024.
Collins’ childhood was spent in the Midwest, moving between several states, but he grew up primarily in Kansas. He was an avid reader from an early age and has fond memories of visiting the public library across the street from his family’s home in Fort Scott, KS. The library was a point of pride in the small community, one of the nearly 1,700 libraries built in the U.S. by philanthropist Andrew Carnegie at the beginning of the 20th century.
An accomplished student, Collins attended Yale University on scholarship. His academic career was interrupted during his junior year when he was drafted. He still recalls the words of his dean, “You have the dubious distinction of being the only student in good standing at Yale to be drafted so far during the Korean War.” Collins attributes this to the draft board back home in Kansas prioritizing farmers over college kids. He attended boot camp in Fort Riley, KS, where he excelled despite the harsh conditioning, both physical and mental. Collins served 14 months in Korea before the war ended. He found the experience of transitioning from a wartime to a peacetime army fascinating, with soldiers spending their days training or painting instead of fighting.
After being discharged from the Army, Collins returned to Yale to complete his final year. He and his college sweetheart, Betty Ann, were married at the Harkness Tower Chapel on the Yale campus. Collins then attended Princeton University, earning a Master of Public Administration. During this time, the couple welcomed twins, Jim and Ann, to the family.
After graduating, Collins joined the State Department as a Foreign Service Officer and became a Japanese language and East Asia specialist. His first assignment was in Manila, Philippines, where their third child, Nori, was born. His second assignment was in Japan, where Collins served as a political officer at the Embassy in Tokyo. The family lived in Japan for five years and during this time, they had their youngest child, Susan. Collins describes the family’s experience of living in Japan as “total immersion.” Their twins attended a Japanese preschool, where they quickly picked up the language, and soon all four children primarily spoke Japanese among themselves.
After eight years living abroad, he and Betty Ann decided that they wanted to put down roots in the U.S., so the family moved to Vienna, VA in 1964. While Betty Ann began teaching at Louise Archer Elementary School in Vienna, Collins made a career change, joining the Poverty Program, working on Head Start. During his career, he spent a year at Princeton University as a resident Mid-Career Fellow and later earned his PhD, focusing on public policy concerning children. After 30 years of federal service, Collins retired. He didn’t remain retired for long, founding and leading Collins Management Consulting, a firm specializing in Head Start, childcare, and other family programs. In 2003, he sold the business and retired for good.
Collins planned to dedicate his retirement years to writing, with the goal of writing novels in his favorite genre – thrillers. Having written and published extensively throughout his career, he thought making the transition to fiction would come naturally but discovered that there was a big difference between fiction and nonfiction, saying, “When I started writing fiction, I realized how hard writing is. It never occurred to me that writing was hard because I was writing things that I knew about. Nonfiction is pretty straightforward. Fiction is very different.”
Despite discovering that writing was more difficult than he expected, Collins kept at it. “I have a fairly robust ego so I thought I could do really good stuff. I just had to keep refining at the margin, keep improving. Since I was fortunate to have a lot of time, I believed I could get there,” he says. Collins began attending writer’s conferences, getting advice and feedback from other authors. While gaining helpful advice, he also enjoyed the time he spent with other writers, saying, “They’re fun! Writers are, by and large, friendly and helpful people. I found very few exceptions.”
Collins shares that writers fall into two categories. The first is writers who create an outline and write their novel from it. The complexity of the outline varies from writer to writer. Some of his favorite authors, such as James Patterson, write from an outline. Collins falls into the second category, which he calls “pantsers.” Pantsers write from the seat of their pants, drafting a chapter at a time, letting the plot develop chapter by chapter. “I may have some general idea where I’m going and certain plot points that I think through in advance, but the book kind of evolves,” he says. Collins also draws on familiar places to craft his novels. For instance, Washington, D.C., Fairfax County and Japan are all settings in his books.
While “Motive for Murder” was his second novel published, it was the first novel he began writing. While it has retained his original concept, the novel went through many iterations, with the plot, writing style, and the title all changing multiple times. While refining his first novel, he began work on the second, which went a little easier than the first. He found that his third novel was even easier. Although friends and family read his work and provided feedback, Collins chose to hire a professional editor, which turned out to be a great learning experience and made a huge difference in his writing.
Collins’ first two novels were published by Koehler Publishing – “The General’s Briefcase” in June 2023 and “Motive for Murder” in December 2023. Both have been well received, winning NABE Pinnacle Book Achievement Awards and landing on the list of finalists for the Claymore Award from Killer Nashville Magazine. Collins’ third novel “Setup” will be published in 2024.
Like the writing process, Collins has learned a great deal about the publishing process – from cover design to distribution to marketing. To prepare for his recent author’s talk at Patrick Henry Library in Vienna, he attended another author’s talk so he could see how the events work. While his preparation was helpful, his nervousness was unnecessary since his children packed the room with their friends, ensuring a warm and receptive audience.
While he will continue to promote his three novels, Collins believes that his writing days are behind him. Instead, he will be devoting himself to spending time with family, reading, watching movies, and visiting Oakmont Rec Center with Betty Ann, where the couple enjoy weight training.
While his journey to becoming a published author was harder and took longer than he thought it would, Collins never gave up or lost hope. He attributes his eventual success to his drive to succeed, saying, “It got me through Yale, it got me through Princeton, and it got me through Korea. In combat there’s a lot involved in surviving. A lot is luck, some of it is skill, some of it is being part of the right team. But you have to believe in yourself.”
Collins offers this advice for others who may be thinking of learning a new skill, taking on a new hobby, or trying a new profession in retirement, “Focus on what you’re interested in, what excites you or stimulates your imagination. It could be anything. Otherwise, you aren’t going to muster the energy. These things take an enormous amount of time and energy. Maybe for some people they’re very easy, but I suspect they’re not for most, and certainly not for me.”
To learn more about Ray Collins and his writing, visit his website: raycollinsauthor.com.
This article is part of the Golden Gazette monthly newsletter which covers a variety of topics and community news concerning older adults and caregivers in Fairfax County. Are you new to the Golden Gazette? Don’t miss out on future newsletters! Subscribe to get the electronic or free printed version mailed to you. Have a suggestion for a topic? Share it in an email or call 703-324-GOLD (4653).