WILBRAHAM – Holding a copy of his 621-page novel “Run for Rwanda” – his first published literary work – Bill Wells admitted this was never the plan.

“It was a screenplay,” he said with a smile. “I had this story kicking around in me for a few years. I started it once, stopped, and then it was just always milling around."

The story, a work of historical fiction, is inspired by events that transpired during and in the wake of the Rwandan Genocide of 1994 as well as events and themes from Wells’ own life.

“This book is about three things and they are three things I am passionate about – being a family man, running, and history,” said the married father of two adult children, self-proclaimed “history geek,” and participant of 19 marathons.

The book follows concurrent stories of Semi, a 12-year-old Tutsi who escaped the Hutu after his family was killed as part of the genocide, and Christian, an American family man and runner whose family was lost in a plane crash. Learning of the war, Christian travels to Rwanda, where he meets and adopts Semi. The book then jumps 10 years ahead to Semi’s pursuit of competing in the Olympic Games in Greece where he must face the greatest runner in the world, a Hutu.

Wells, a Wilbraham resident, explained to Reminder Publishing that he was motivated to write “Run for Rwanda” after his own attempt to adopt a child from Rwanda. “It didn’t work out, but that triggered something in me,” he said.

Wells, the director of student promotion at Wilbraham & Monson Academy, said his interest in Rwanda was sparked by presentations given by a guest speaker at the Academy on the Rwandan Genocide. “I really didn’t know anything about the Rwandan Genocide when it happened, or even later in my life, but it grabbed me,” Wells said. “I don’t know if I found it fascinating because it happened not that long ago, or if for whatever reason I was able to picture things that happened, but I read a couple books on the Rwandan Genocide and I was just drawn to it. That sparked me to try to adopt someone from Rwanda and when that didn’t work out, it has kind of fueled me in this direction.”

While the idea for the story had lingered in Wells’ mind for years, it wasn’t until this past March during the Academy’s spring break that it became a reality. For the first time, Wells had the time and the motivation to sit down and write the story. In less than two weeks, he had a script. It was 48,000 words. Wells knows his way around the keyboard as a former longtime local sports writer, but admitted he knew little about penning a screenplay.

“I finished the majority of the screenplay in 10 days, not knowing anything about anything, just writing the story,” he said. “After some research, I realized I had a ‘Godfather’-length movie and no one in Hollywood is going to take a screenplay from a first-time writer the length of the ‘Godfather.’ So I had nothing. I had 48,000 and nothing. So I decided, ‘What the heck? Keep going.’”

Cautious of stretching scenes too far, Wells instead added scenes and developed new characters while diving deeper into others and finished with approximately 76,000 words. He said a pair of works of historical non-fiction – “Left to Tell” and “Hotel Rwanda” – and a great deal of internet research were imperative in ensuring he understood the facts, figures, lay of the land, and key figures involved in a tragedy that took place half a world away.

“I did my absolute best to be respectful of the genocide. I made sure I wasn’t careless,” he said.

He also took part in a school trip to South Africa during which they visited a refugee camp where he said he “took a lot of mental notes” when meeting with elementary school-age children.

“There’s a saying in South Africa that there’s South Africa and then there’s the rest of Africa,” he said. “People flock to South Africa because there are jobs and opportunity, whereas a lot of the rest of Africa’s situation is not good. Working with those refugee kids gave me a little bit of insight.”

Wells also noted a friend’s death in a small plane crash served as inspiration for Christian’s story arc.

Wells initially looked for a publisher for the book, but ultimately decided to self-publish his work, which is now available for sale as a paperback and e-book on Amazon.com. “If you’re going to go through a publisher, you have to impress a literary agent. You have to. And that’s not why I wrote this story. I wrote it for me,” he said. “I feel so fortunate to live in the time period we do because if this were a generation ago, unless you were sitting at the copy machine for a really long time, you would have nothing. I think about all of the people who had a story in prior generations who didn’t have this opportunity and it makes me even more appreciative of the fact that I had the ability to do this.”

Wells added that he didn’t even see a copy of the book before it went up for sale on Amazon. “When I first put it up there, I totally forgot about it. Then when I went to Amazon, there it was, and that’s when it hit me like, ‘This is cool!’ But then a week later when I finally got to hold a copy of my book for the first time, that’s when I really felt like a published author for the first time.”

The screenplay still exists, he noted, explaining he has submitted it to a producer and it is also on The Black List, an online script database often utilized by Hollywood executives. Films inspired by screenplays on the website have received 262 Academy Award nominations and 53 Oscars, including four of the last 10 Best Picture Oscars and 10 of the last 22 Best Screenplay Oscars, according to the site.

For Wells, writing “Run for Rwanda” was a cathartic experience. It’s also one he encourages everyone to do. All it takes is the time and conviction to do it.

“Everyone has a story in them. ‘Run for Rwanda’ is mine,” he said.