How did growing up in poverty in Seattle shape your resilience and influence your storytelling voice?
It didn’t help at all and there was nobody to encourage my dreams or desires nor to nature any sort of hope.
In what ways did navigating a turbulent childhood alongside your brother prepare you for the challenges you would later face in life?
My older brother was my hope my inspiration and my model for what comes next.
What was it about George Plimpton’s spirit of adventure that inspired you to challenge life on its own terms?
Before I saw his show about climbing Mt. Everest with the Whittaker brothers episode I’d no thoughts toIchallenge myself, but that one episode sent a strong message deep inside me. Go my own way and reach for the summit. It wont be easy, I won’t succeed but I’ve got to try. It’s not about success of failure, those sort out as you work you way towards your goals.
How did your training in nuclear power and service in the U.S. Navy influence your discipline as a writer?
That time in my life challen3ged me to use my brain requiring mental discipline, something I lacked. That mental toughness and pushing co.fort boundaries have helped the rest of my life.
Serving as both an electrician and your ship’s artist, how did you balance technical precision with creative expression?
I use a mental magic wand with electronics troubleshootIng. I communicate at a level learning what is the issue then solve. Creating requires a mental image of your premise and goal the same way.
With over 700 mountain ascents, many of them winter solos, what have the mountains taught you about fear and perseverance?
I had a saying on those tough situation s alone on the side of a frozen mountain, this is nothing… it’s about pushing one’s comfort zone so your brain can remain focused and not go into fight or flight.
Have any near-death climbing experiences directly shaped the emotional depth of your fictional characters?
They lead to strange dreams and hallucinations. In every story I pull from that for a dream sequence where they gain a connection to help with their challenge.
How did earning an Emmy nomination for Get the Dirt on Washington State Wine shape your approach to cinematic storytelling in novels?
I was a video editor several years starring at monitors to tell stories. Now it’s the revers, use key words to shoe the cinematic for the readers.
When you say you write “scene by scene, breath by breath,” what does your actual writing process look stories?
I don’t go backwards with the first draft. I write an outline for the whole story then each chapter but then I use that outline as a guide for the chapter. Lots is discovered this way about the characters and their desires and what’s preventing them from becoming satisfied.
How did your late wife Kat’s encouragement transform your journey from screenwriter to novelist?
Because I lived a life like in the movies and I know things about the human condition that most never will and she thought those experiences would translate to the written page.
What drew you to reimagining Sherlock Holmes in his later years in Sherlock Holmes and the Tower of Fear?
Politics, I wanted to tell a story that ultimate authority goes unchecked in society and not even the great Sherlock Holmes can correct it. Look at the US today a dictator is running the show with zero accountability. I wrote it as a warning.
Your characters often dwell in moral gray areas—why are you drawn to complexity rather than clear-cut heroes and villains?
Less boring less predictable more authentic like the people that hunger to read unlike others that merely want spoon fed predictable resold crap.
How did working in the West Texas oil fields influence the tone or themes of your fiction?
It didn’t help at first. It was tough, they are not liberated to think for themselves and yet they fully supported my dreams and then some even read my books. Good people that amazed me. I used many of them to model my characters and am grateful for their honesty and candidness.
What challenges and opportunities come with writing a historical epic set in the Neocandidates?
Getting the archeology correct. New discovers keep changing my outline. I want to write about the origin of civilization and what must have compelled a few to say hey everyone let’s use this community grain silo then me and our priest will divvy up the grain giving each a portion. were you introduced to AllAuthor, and would you say that this website has been helpful? I have the app and use it often.
Thank you for this opportunity to dig deep into my obscure writings. The stories are good and have important messages written by someone that really l8ved much.
