Authors Electric

In a minute I'll get to the rotten bitch who inspired this true fable. For now, true to form, I'll stand the writin' rules on their little pointed heads and start off with the moral: Familiarity with writers may breed worse than contempt: neglect. This moral evolved from three hard-learned lessons. (And don't fret, the rotten bitch is on her way.) 1) Many readers believe the best writers are dead. 2) Most readers prefer living writers to be remote, unreachable, even a bit otherworldly. The less known about them the better, for a myth is as good as a mile. 3) Some readers who are thinking of planning to write enjoy putting down struggling writers they meet. Every put down adds more fuel to the fire of their conviction that they're better off not trying. All right, all right, already. It's time now for the rotten bitch. Setting: the Amtrak Empire Builder, a round-trip cross country excursion. In the dining car I was seated with an at...

At six-foot, I needed to become five-foot-five in a hurry. I had my work cut out for me, as you can probably guess, since I wouldn't hear of a chainsaw. Would I stop there, though? No, not on your life! My new WIP is a spinoff from the Boss MacTavin series.                                                                  The Pitch DB, Boss's partner, is sent to Seattle to helm a new Boss franchise: an adjunct of Gestalt Insurance. Overnight, our short tough-guy hero is neck deep in the corporate world, where his martial skills mean nothing. On three months' probation, forbidden to fight or even raise his voice, he feels smaller than everyone else. For his first case he picks one so easy it can't possibly get him in trouble. But soon enough he has reason to fear not a pink slip...but cement shoes.   ...