By Marcel Evans

I recently worked on an e-book for a client (check out what I learned in my last post, How to Write an E-book, a speech for a politician and labored over copy for a web page. But this has to be the most difficult task—writing about myself.

My passion for writing grew out of my love for hip-hop. The verbal landscapes rappers would paint, over infectious beats, captivated me. In college, my initial plan was to become a computer system analyst but, after two years, my passion to craft stories as mesmerizing as the hip-hop lyrics I listened to led me to the journalism program.

For three semesters I chased any promising leads. I wrote stories about cafeteria corruption and the lack of campus security; shaping the stories into tidy, inverted triangles leading with the five w’s (who, what, where, when and why). After some time working in the newsroom, I joined the Student Government Association and relaunched their newsletter as a campus lifestyle magazine.

Post-graduation, I moved to New York to earn a degree in public relations. The shrinking job market for traditional, newspaper journalists convinced me that PR was where storytellers were getting opportunities to shine.

Now, after a couple internships and jobs at PR agencies, I am once again drawn to write in, of all places, Central Pennsylvania… but that story is a whole other blog post or e-book—which might not be a bad idea now that I’ve had practice!