Terry Lister Interview Published on: 01, Dec 2021

l was born and raised in Bermuda but have strong times to the Caribbean. While my mother’s family has been in Bermuda since the early 1800's, my father’s family emigrated to Bermuda in 1909 from St. Kitts. Traveling has allowed me to explore the world, and often rediscover my family lineage in unusual ways. Most remarkably, when I travel to the Panama Canal in 2013, I looked at their computerized staffing board and found my great-grandfather’s name.

Growing up, I was close to my paternal aunt, my father’s only sister, as she was only five years older than me. When we were youngsters on rainy days we would lie across her bed and read. So, to some extent, those moments were the building blocks of my love of reading.

When I am traveling, I don’t keep a journal, but instead I write posts on my personal Facebook page daily. This allows me to share my adventures with others and led to me deciding to write a book about my travels based on people’s responses to my posts.

My favorite books as a child were the Enid Blyton series and “Black Beauty”. I could get lost in the pages and imagine places I had never been to. I was a very active child, playing outside during daylight hours. But at night l read constantly. I was one of those people who read under the covers with a flashlight after lights out! To this day, I still read a lot. While I prefer history, biographies, and mysteries; I often find myself reading travel books as I do considerable research and planning before any of my trips. The research helps me decide where to go next and gets me excited about my next adventure.

The biggest challenge l faced in writing my first book “Immersed in West Africa” was that once l sent the document to the publisher, l promptly went on my next trip to Africa. The time difference made follow-up difficult at times, but I preserved, and the book was published in August 2019. Looking back on my writing journey, I do regret that no one sat me down and explained how the book business works. I actually thought that when I wrote " the end", my job was finished. Now l know that once the book is finished, the much harder job of marketing comes into play. Knowing this would not have stopped me writing but would have made me better prepared.

When I write, clarity is the most important thing. I try my best to write in such a way that my reader has no confusion about what l might have said or experienced during my travels. I have found my travels in Africa fascinating, and I hope to have a seven-book series on Africa, then the series will move to Asia. I write my books for the reader to “come along on the adventure with me.”

When I think of my writing career, I get motivated by the unexpected positive things that keep happening. For instance, Book Authority rated my book “Immersed in West Africa” among the best travel guides for four of the five countries that l travelled in. I was completely surprised by this, and l feel very proud of this achievement. I am sure that when l retire from being a traveler, l will sit in my easy chair, read a chapter, than put the book down and think back to those experiences. Reading and traveling have been my lifelong passions, and I am so grateful that writing “Immersed in West Africa” has allowed my passions and adventures to be shared with the world.

When l retired at age 60, l started travelling in Central America. I experimented with how long l should stay on the trips with the length varying from six to twelve weeks. Six weeks saw me not getting enough time to really see the sights, while a twelve-week trip made me tired. By the time l finished travelling through South America l had it worked out that eight weeks was best, so all my trips to Africa have been eight weeks. Fortunately, you do meet people on the road and sometimes there may be some overlap on your trip. But most of the time l am content to be by myself and have been a primarily solo traveler. No arguments over what l will do tomorrow, where l will eat, and no fuss over sudden changes of plans!

While I have always enjoyed traveling, it is difficult for me to pick a favorite country as there are always aspects that cause a country to stand out. Because l like the wild animals, safari countries are favorites in a way. The most surprising country was Namibia. I knew very little about it when l decided to add it to my third trip. As l researched l found that l needed more time in that country. By the time l got there, l spent a month and could have easily stayed two more weeks. I would highly recommend an in-depth trip to this beautiful country.

I was an author on Allauthors for almost a year before I got to see the full value of being a member. I found an article online written by a fellow author who had taken advantage of everything Allauthor had to offer, and I immediately started utilizing the site differently. Today, it has become one of my favourite sites and I would strongly recommend Allauthors to any author.