I’ve never been a student of classical literature, but I know what I like when I read it.
I write what I would enjoy reading.
I guess you would say that my personal library would be a fairly decent cross-section of a real library. It would range from fiction to non-fiction, history to science fiction, and romantic/comedy to action/adventure. As a young adult I hardly ever read for entertainment. I guess that was because, being a software engineer by trade, I had to read so many technical manuals and instructional documents that reading anything else was the last thing on my mind. However I have always enjoyed a good story and greatly admired the work of many talented authors. My favorites have always been the works of Arthur Conan Doyle, Tom Clancy, Patricia Cornwall, J. K. Rowling, Tony Hillerman, Jules Verne, Robert Ludlum, George Orwell, Stephen King, Arthur C. Clarke, John Grisham, Edgar Allan Poe, Douglas Adams, John LeCarre, Ray Bradbury, J.R.R. Tolkien, C. S. Lewis, Ellery Queen, Michael Crichton, Agatha Christie, Edgar Rice Burroughs, H.G. Wells, and especially Dan Brown. To say where in that laundry list of authors and stories my inspiration draws from would be difficult. I guess, just as I like to read what I like to read, I write what I like to write.
When I was a kid I wrote tons of short stories with science fiction and mystery always being my favorite to write. My problem then, as it is now, is that I am a bit of a perfectionist – okay – I am a major league perfectionist. I always hated reading a story, if it wasn’t fantasy, where something happened that simply couldn’t happen. Stories that weren’t technologically sound, defied logic, or where the sleuth knew information that had never been shared with the audience, always irritated me. So when I wrote my stories back in the day, I slugged through the work as best I could, given the difficulty of doing quality research. That burden was lifted with the creation of the Internet. Now my biggest worry, given the bizarre research I do for my books, is that someone will check my browser history.
Why do I write? Well, a few years ago I realized that everyone seemed to have some sort of hobby; everyone except me that is. Don’t get me wrong, I wasn’t completely without a life. I’ve tried just about everything from SCUBA to skydiving, motorcycles to bicycling, deep sea fishing to golf. In fact, I’ve marked just about everything off my bucket list with the exception of running with the bulls in Spain. Want to go? Anyway, I’ve done a lot of stuff, but for one reason or another, everything has fallen away over the years. Since it seemed that almost everyone I knew had some sort of pastime that they loved, I felt that I was missing out. My love of writing had always been in the back of my mind, so I decided it was time to dust off my creative side and get back to life.
So I hope you will take time to read my work, but if you don’t, I hope you find something that you love out there. If you like my work – great, but if you find that it is not your cup of tea or just flat out hate it, well – I didn’t write this just for you. I write because I love to write and I write to entertain myself. It would just make me happy if I could bring you some entertainment as well.
