Sharyn McCrumb

Serve jail time or teach local ministers to drive?

Sharyn McCrumb's first co-authored novel, written with NASCAR driver Adam Edwards, was published in April 2010 by the Ingalls Publishing Group. Adam, who was the model for the character Tony Lafon in Once Around the Track, has driven in the ARCA/REMAX national racing series, managed and spotted for a NASCAR Nationwide racing team, and worked as an race car driving instructor at the Fast Track School of Racing. When he gave her technical advice during the writing of Once Around the Track, Sharyn suggested that they try to write a novel together, loosely based on Adam's experiences teaching race car driving.

Together they devised the plot for the novel:

Camber Berkley, a young stock car driver, wrecks his car on a winding mountain road, landing right in the midst of the funeral of an elderly NASCAR fan. As punishment for his spectacular car wreck, the local authorities of the small Tennessee town of Judas Grove give him a choice: serve three months in jail for reckless driving, or spend two weeks teaching the local ministers to drive stock cars, so that they can compete in race whose prize is the $2 million legacy left by that deceased NASCAR fan.

Sharyn says, "When we started the project, I was thinking We'll never pull this off. I know race car drivers. They have the attention span of a ferret on crack. They can't write books. But Adam is not your average NASCAR guy. I told him, I'll write the first thousand words, and send it to you via e-mail, and we'll just go back and forth. I thought, If he doesn't do his thousand words, we'll just forget the whole thing. But he did. A thousand words came back, well-written and promptly sent. Warily now, I sent him another thousand words. Again, he sent another thousand back. We kept going and in a year's time we had finished Faster Pastor, found a publisher, and now the real adventure begins."

"Faster Pastor is a warm and witty collision between an also-ran NASCAR driver and the clergy of Judas Grove, TN, who need to learn the catechism of stock car racing. Blessed are those who teach, for they shall learn the most." - Jane Hicks, Award-winning poet, author of "Blood and Bone Remember"

"If McCrumb and Edwards could put together a race team as well as they did this novel, they could win the Daytona 500 ! It has all the ingredients to be a fast read as well as a winner." - Jamie Bishop, NASCAR gas man to Cale Yarborough

"The book, based on the 'what if' premise of a group of ministers racing for a $2-million prize, is a hoot. Several hoots, actually. The book is full of numerous laugh-out-loud moments." - Becky Mushko, The Peevish Pen