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1. How do you know you wanted to write?
At an early age—7 or 8—I enjoyed writing the alphabet with a pen or pencil; I don't know if that had anything to do with it. I drew floor plans for houses and buildings at age 10 or 11. I just enjoyed being graphically creative. I enjoy doing jumbles as an adult, and I love forming the letters. I designed power line layouts for road projects for a living. I always enjoy the creativity. Last semester of college I took a computer programming course and loved it. After college, I bought a small computer and designed some minor games.
At age 25 I got an idea for my first novel but only wrote one chapter of it. But I had most of the story in my head—The Legend of Buti Atella.
I then wrote the first version of The Well Of Atlan.
2. How do you handle criticism?
I take criticism as a "matter of fact". I don't like people not liking me, but I usually don't overreact. I've been around A LOT of people in my life from all walks of life, and for every person who doesn't like me, there are others that do. Usually, if someone puts me down I ignore it and then forget about it.
3. Who has been the biggest influence on you as an author?
As a kid, I liked Hardy Boys; as an adult, I loved Michael Crichton.
4. Let's discuss your book The Temple of Truth and Lies. Please give us a short summary for those that aren't familiar with the book.
The sickly scholar Deszarious believes he has only one choice left to stop his constant pain—he must make the long trip to Pangorn and brave the horrible temple pyramid to win the treasure that legend says will cure his illness- or die trying!
Along the way sailing on the Dragon Box, Deszarious meets some helpful friends, all with reasons for trying their luck at Iszo-thrain's temple.
When they get to the strange island, they are told by the legendary Dwarf war hero Harrowbrow that the pyramid is totally evil and only death awaits them inside. But when Harrowbrow's teenage son goes inside alone, Harrowbrow almost begs Deszarious and his fellow adventurers to join him on a rescue mission to save his son. With over 200 elves, dwarves, mercenaries and the army of the khan marching with him, the Dwarf hero marches along the promenade to the base of the pyramid where the magical elf prince Galadrious tracks the teen up the side of the temple and in through a side door where slaughtered orcs lay dead. After many dangerous monsters and booby traps, the party is split up into smaller groups, many of who are lost inside. Galadrious is about to be killed by Khazeem using black magic to control an Axarian Devil. Glendellion, Ogg and Lou Than are being attacked by goblins, and Deszarious is about to die next to Gil-thorn on top of the fabulous treasure pile they have found when Galdriuos' little six-year-old friend Mossy arrives to save the day. Mossy is a rare 'Astral-Mage' who is the only wizard powerful enough to defeat the dark magic of Iszo-thrain. With Mossy Bringlebright there, everything turns out for the best.
5. What's your writing process like? Do you outline? Do you start with an idea or a character?
I do not outline on paper, but I have a general concept in my head of what I want the story to be. This is a kind of mental outline. I do not feel I have to stay to it exactly. It is usually an idea or concept I have been thinking of for a long time. A story is like a sculpture someone makes. It has to have a central support structure, like a skeleton, that gets outer parts added to it. If you have a central "outline" for support, you can keep adding more details to it and "flesh" it out. When my stories are complete, they aren't really all the way complete because I can always add more to them. You just have to ask, when is it good enough to call it done? Probably when you get tired of writing it.
My main inspiration for Temple Of Truth And Lies, besides wanting to write an elf, dwarf and wizard story, was the layout of the temple itself.
I had designed a simple Dungeons and Dragons game layout after college so I could condense the game to only seven levels and I had the idea for the temple in my head for many years before I actually wrote the story.
6. Which character do you most identify with and why?
Deszarious is the main character that makes the story work. He's the one with the most to lose if he loses (until Harrowbrow's son goes into the pyramid), but in general, I look at each character as an individual (with uneven amounts to add to the story), and I try to take their perspective at the time I'm writing about them.
7. The book contains many mystical beings. How did you make them stand out from all the other dragons and fairies out there?
Luck?! I knew I needed some extra monsters no one had ever heard of before to make this story interesting. I already had the idea of the Kudu-men from a few years earlier. The Axarian Devil came from The Legend Of Buri Atella but in a less magical form, and I think that came from the Cyclops in The Seventh Voyage of Sinbad movie. The "Oolie-Goolies" was a spur-of-the-moment creation. Galadrious and Khazeem were walking on the Promenade, and I needed a monster for Khazeem to taunt Galadrious with. I had an earlier idea about aliens from my Alien Harvest Night Story I had written a few years earlier, and I simply changed a few features to make the Oolies.
Giant spiders? Certainly The Hobbit and maybe Harry Potter. Other giants, lizards, ogres, living statues, etc. from lots of reading of mythology, paranormal, ancient legends, etc.
8. What part of the writing/publishing process was the most difficult for you and why?
Writing was hard at first until I finally got a computer with MSWord on it. I used to write in notebooks and then re-type the story into an off-beat word processor. When I got Word, I started just typing the story in Word. Then I would go back and reread, delete what I didn't like, and add in new ideas and conversation. Over time, adjusting things this way works out pretty well.
I've tried a few times to have this story accepted by literary agents, but that is a large hit-or-miss situation. If you knew exactly who to send it to, it would be no problem, but finding the right person is like a needle in a haystack.
I finally just needed to know what some reviewer thought about my story, so I sent it to Online Book Club. I would have never guessed it would get this good of a review.
9. What's next for you? Is there another book in the works?
YES. I'm not sure of the timing yet, but I hope soon. I have a jungle chase adventure. In my story, the CIA has an old diary locked up in a special safe at the Smithsonian Institute, from a famous Egyptologist from 1923. Part of the diary is written in an odd form of hieroglyphics no one can translate. The CIA finds a need to translate the diary and hires Maria Degas, one of the world's leading experts on ancient languages. What she discovers in the diary are clues to the location of an ancient cave system where the ancient Egyptian Hall of Records is, where the original Egyptian gods lived, and where the Sumerian goddess Ereschkigal reigned, "In the Underworld".
Not wanting the CIA to know where this place was located, Maria steals the diary, teams up with an old professor friend who used to consult for the CIA, joins up with a jungle guide and Pilate and chases off through the Congo Rain forest to try to reach the ancient caves before the CIA, a troop of Green Berets and a band of dangerous criminals catch up.
I like to end with fun questions.
10. Do you play music while you write — and, if so, what's your favorite?
No, when I write I often have the TV on but with sound turned off. If I get bored of writing for a few minutes, I may look at the TV for a few, but often it is just a distraction. Once I get an idea I want to write, I want to get it written down before I lose the concept. I don't like distractions. The ideas come from me contemplating ideas inside my head.
Sometimes when I've been at it a long time, it takes a little while to get back into what's going on in the world around me. It's like I had been somewhere else inside my mind.
But I love lots of music. I like rock, pop, folk, early 60's, classical, WWII big band, Frank Sinatra, musicals, anything but "redneck" country.
One of my most favorite is Eddy Holeman's Lonely Girl; my favorite group is The Hollies, but I like Led Zepplin's When The Levi Breaks also. My first album bought was Moody Blues -Tuesday Afternoon. I like ELO, Alice Cooper, YES, Dion Warwick, Stylistics, BeeGees, White Snake, Elvis, SealsandCroft, Turtles, and many many more. I also like Motown and R&B, but I don't like hip-hop or rap. I like Dianna Ross, Jon Legend, Roberta Flack, Temptations, Smokey Robinson, etc.
11. If you could be a character in one of your favorite books, who would you be?
I don't think I have ever contemplated that idea. I don't really imagine myself as other people. I'm trying to think of someone smart from a book who might be cool to be. That's a good stumper. Maybe Lancelot from The Knights of the Round Table. Or Kerbuchard from Lamour's The Walking Drum—smart, strong, brave, talented, good looking. . . I mean, if we're going to be some fictional hero, why not?
12. If you could use magic to do one mundane task for the rest of your life, what would it be?
Snap my fingers to make traffic lights turn green.
