‘I want to do something for me’: How Michael Bains refound his love for writing

The muscles in his back tightened when the teacher stood in front of the class, reading the words that Michael Bains never thought his friends and peers would ever hear.

Bains, who attended Tamanawis High School in the mid-2000s, was largely known as a jock in grade school. He played basketball and captained the team every year from Grade 8 to 12, but his parents placed a big emphasis on education and storytelling. 

“My mom, sometimes if I wanted to go play outside, or if I wanted a video game, she would make me write an essay,” Bains said. “A 500-word, 1000-word essay about something random.” 

The mini assignments fostered his love for storytelling. But when the English teacher stood in front of the class, declaring that one person’s creative writing assignment stood out, nobody else knew that Bains spent hours writing essays or short stories before having fun. 

Nobody else knew he was a talented writer. 

When the teacher started reading his story aloud, Bains shrugged his shoulders and sank into his chair. The story, which largely traced what would eventually become his first debut novel, Hooped, in 2020, followed a boy that got involved with a gang and started selling drugs on the street as a way to earn quick cash. 

Students moved their heads from side to side. Bains felt his face get hot before the teacher finished the last sentence.

“And the story is by Michael Bains,” he remembers the teacher saying aloud. “I was like ‘Oh my God,’ but I could tell all the students enjoyed it.” 

For the first time in his life, Bains says, he was recognized publicly as “a creative.” 

It would take years for Bains to realize that he wanted to pursue a career in writing.

He studied kinesiology at Simon Fraser University, hoping to become a personal trainer one day. But he lost that passion for storytelling in university. After graduation, Bains briefly worked as a personal trailer. However, he later earned a job at a bank — which offered a steady paycheck, but little motivation to take on a creative project.

“Eventually, I got tired of it, it was just the same thing,” Bains said. “It’s my mid-twenties and I was like, ‘Man, I want to do something for me.’” 

So in 2019, Bains took a leave from the bank to work on a novel. He treated his creative passion like a full-time job, writing 1,000 words five days per week before finishing a first draft in three months. 

“I made a commitment to myself, doesn’t matter what I do, 1,000 words per day,” he said. 

The Surrey Citizen sat down with Bains to talk about self-publishing his first novel, how he rediscovered his love for writing and his latest book.

This interview has been edited for brevity and clarity.

Surrey Citizen: As a kid, what initially interested you in writing? 

Bains: My parents always put an emphasis on education. They had a lot of books in our household. So I remember as a kid, I would read a lot. My mom, sometimes if I wanted to go play outside, or if I wanted a video game, she would make me write an essay. A 500 or 1,000 word essay about something random. I’d pick a topic and write about it. So I was doing that as a kid: read a bunch of books, write these essays. 

In terms of building a story, my dad, when we were younger — I have two brothers and a sister — every evening, he got us in a room, cut his fruit, and told a story.

What derailed that passion?

Bains: I was drinking a lot, partying a lot. But I would still be in the gym, lifting a lot of weights. The people I’d hang out with were fine, but it was a different lifestyle that I was living. And eventually, I just got tired of it. Tired of the same thing. So then in my mid-twenties, I was like, ‘Man, I want to do something for me. I want to do something creative.’ 

Before I wrote Hooped I tried and failed to write three other novels. I’d start, stop it, start, stop, start, stop. 

Were all of those attempts the same version of Hooped? 

Bains: For sure it was, it was all about the same thing… I would just find time on the weekends or anytime. I’d take too much time off in between, I’d be writing, then take a couple days off, then I wouldn’t have the momentum of working towards the story. When I had time to write, I wrote 1,000 words every day, I had momentum, I was still in the story and got more investment in characters…

I think [writing multiple attempts] also kind of helped with Hooped because I knew what I wanted the character to be. Because I built the character so many times in my head and through words, I kind of knew what I wanted. Eventually I got it right.

How did you come to that realization? 

Bains: I wanted it to be about me, but not just me. I wanted it to be about everyone and all the people I was around. I hung out with a lot of people who were involved in drugs and drug dealing. And I loved basketball. I felt a certain way about how educational institutions are run, I felt a certain way about the police. So all of that stuff I felt, I wanted to build into a novel. I wanted the character to not be me — but everybody who I came into contact with during that time in my life.

How difficult was it to share that part of your life when you’re still in your adolescence and doing that self-discovery?

Bains: It was difficult but it was also very therapeutic, very cathartic — the fact that I could get it out on paper. Of course, there’s always a couple of scenes in the book when I’m writing it where I’m like, ‘ohh, I don’t know.’ But then it’s like, ‘you have to be vulnerable.’ I was still quite young when I wrote it, I was 28. So this novel I’m writing right now, I feel like it’s going to be an evolution as well. 

Why do you think basketball is the ideal medium to talk about yourself and Surrey in general?

Bains: Basketball and soccer are the two main sports in Surrey, mainly because you only need a ball… Basketball, you can go outside to a hoop, it’s the simplest of games. And it’s what I knew. I could talk about basketball in a much more intense way than I could with any other sport.

You’re writing a new book now. Bigger picture, what are you hoping to do with your writing? 

Bains: I would love to keep writing. I would love to write 10, 15 novels, funny novels. I tried poetry as well… I want to make an impact. Especially in this day and age, what I’ve noticed amongst my friends are how many issues other people have. 

I feel that for myself too. For a long time, I smoked weed every day as an escape from the mind. The mind runs and runs. And when you have this substance that can quiet your mind, it’s hard to say no. But there has to be another way. 

So through my writing I want to touch on that, touch on a realm that people can feel within — an alternative to substances.

Looking back now, do you think Hooped succeeded in doing that?

Bains: What’s interesting is that I realized with Hooped is that there were a lot of people who I knew intimately would read the book. But most men, 20 and older, don’t really read novels.  [Specifically] Punjabi men from Surrey. There were definitely a lot of people that read it, which I appreciated, but I feel like how you make a difference is much more than a novel.

A lot of my readers were females. Some Punjabi men read my book, but I don’t necessarily expect a lot of Punjabi men to spend two weeks reading a book… And this is from my experience. I feel like Punjabi men are very ambitious. They’re so ambitious in the sense that their goal is to make money, provide, support. So they almost feel like it’s a waste of time to sit and read a novel. They’re so focused on making money, which I know intimately as well…

So I feel like I have to be an example as myself, as a person, to show them. Through words, I think what would be more impactful is that they see that I wrote the novel, not that they actually read the novel.