1. Hello, and welcome to my blog! To start off, what inspired you to take the plunge into the world of publishing?
Finding out I didn't have to sacrifice any more of my
creations to the slushpiles of the gatekeepers. I could self-publish
and let readers have a choice to read or not read.
2. Tell me about your book.
Well, it's more of a series... I'm up to nine books in it now, two years
in, and ramping up production. Baically, "Stone Soldiers" is set in a
world like ours, but with (more?) magic and psychics and whatnot.
Supersoldiers in a small military unit respond to supernatural threats
and take on monsters to keep America, and the free world, safe.
The first book in the series is "Mythical" about a
prehistoric shapeshifter who tears out and eats the hearts of victims to
steal their identity, memories and power.
The latest book in the series is #9, "Pale Horseman" is
about a serial-killing centaur loose in Los Angeles, beheading victims
and reaping their souls.
3. What inspired you to write this book?
I was binge-watching Supernatural on Netflix and was reminded how most
scifi depicts the military as badguys, incompetant or last minute deus
ex machinas that ride in to save the day when writers can think of
nothing else. Being a vet, I wanted a book series that portrayed the
military as the monster-smashing heroes they would be.
4. Are there any books/authors that have had a profound impact on your life?
Warren Murphy and Richard Sapir's The Destroyer series made me want to
write. Piers Anthony, Roger Zelazny and Keith Laumer made me love
science fiction and fantasy. Jack London captured my attention--"Call of
the Wild" was the first novel I read as a child, and I was hooked on
reading. Edgar Rice Burroughs, Lester Dent and Robert E. Howard made me a
bookaholic in my teens with all their awesome pulp tales.
5. What was your favorite part to write (without spoilers, of course)?
I like the over-the-top, super-buttkicking fights in my novels.
Where good guys put a serious smackdown on monsters that in most fiction
are unstoppable until they're outwitted. I love beating evil to death
on the written page.
6. What do you most hope to achieve with this novel?
I hope to help bring back the alpha male, he-man swashbucklers and
bare knuckle bruisers of yesteryear. Huge, Viking-like heroes of old who
are literally larger-than-life. And I hope to offer military heroes who
serve as fictional role models rather than the hated baby-killers so
many works of fiction like to create lately.
7. What do you do when you're not writing?
I recently retired from a 17 year career as a criminal investigator. It
was simply too stressful and depressing. I now work part-time for a law
firm as a paralegal and devote more free time to writing and my family.
Off-Beat Questions
1. I see you write thrillers. What is the most thrilling thing that you have ever done?
Good-thrilling, or oh-crap-thrilling? Good thrilling would have to be
attending the birth of my daughters. Exciting and a little scary. Bad
thrilling? I'd have to say it was the time when I was stationed at
McClellan AFB in California, back in 1993 and did a high-speed vehicle
chase down a taxiway at night. Totally against regulation. Terrified I
was going to hit an airplane, but more terrified the drunk driver who'd
crashed through a fence and was driving on our runway was going to hit
an airplane. My maniac driving got me to the scene first, and with help
fom the local Sheriff's helicopter, I bagged the badguy and no one ever
found out I'd broken regs racing along a taxiway. Best of all, the only
damage done was to a section of fence, bad guy's truck, and a pair of my
boots--but that's a whole nuther story.
2. As a writer, it can be easy to get lost in other worlds. If you could visit any fictional world, what would it be?
1930s Earth, as depicted in the Doc Savage pulp novels. I
would share advanced (future) technology with Doc and ask for gold to
take back with me to my own era/world to improve my family's life. I'd
be getting to meet some of my favorite characters, improve their lives
and score a nice payday doing it.
Pale Horseman,
http://amzn.com/B00LLEN6QY
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