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Starting Ghost Novel On Friday
Schedule now set. Finishing up a fantastically fun workshop here tomorrow, finishing up taxes on Sunday, finishing up two short stories that are due on Monday-Wednesday, meetings at WMG and Ella on Thursday, so starting the ghost novel when I crawl out of bed on Friday morning. Stay tuned.
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The Ghost Novel Writing Is On for Next Week
As I have said a few times over the last six months, I was hired to write a ghost novel for a major author. I will never tell anyone who the author is or even why I am writing this for this author. Not a word. Ever, so don’t ask. But I can tell you that when this comes out of New York, it will be a major bestseller because this author’s books always are. I have been paid the advance, so I plan on starting the novel next week as soon as this great workshop that is going on here at the coast is finished. Character Voice and Setting…
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A 1973 Picture for Fun
In the lecture on Heinlein’s Rules, I talk about my writing years between 1975 and 1982. But frighteningly enough, I had a couple of professions before I took up writing while in architecture and then law school. I was an avid skier and golfer, but in 1971 I quit skiing and teaching skiing and went fully to golf, turning professional in 1972. Yeah, I know, hard to imagine me as a golf professional looking at the pictures at the top and side of this blog. But I was pretty good in those days. (I got worse every year for decades after those years. They were my peak.) I was what…
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Some Star Trek Fun and History
Last week in the mail I got this huge packet of royalty statements from Pocket Books. Now understand, when I say huge, I mean huge. Maybe 200 pages. I’ve written shorter novels to be honest. These statements are only for the books I did with Pocket Books that are still in print in one form or another. And a bunch of them are Star Trek books of one sort or another. Looking through those statements, it reminded me that I got a letter recently from someone questioning my credits. This poor person could not believe that anyone could have written over a hundred novels and since I was lying about that,…
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Bill Trojan: Book Dealer
As most of you have heard, one of my best friends, book dealer Bill Trojan passed away on the last day of the World Science Fiction Convention in Reno. Kris and I had already left Reno, so we didn’t get the news until early on Monday morning. Shocked, yes. Surprised, no. For the last six years I had expected the day to come. Actually, so had Bill. For decades Bill was a book dealer at both mystery and science fiction conventions on weekends while working full-time as a computer programmer for Lane County in Eugene, Oregon. He retired in 2001 and was 63 years old when he died. (Thanks to…