FAQs
When is the next Middle Falls book coming out?
First, a little backstory. When I wrote The Unusual Second Life of Thomas Weaver, I believed it to be a standalone story - one and done. About three-quarters of the way through that manuscript a voice started echoing in the back of my head. That was disconcerting, as it was the voice of Michael Hollister, the evil antagonist from the book. I wanted nothing to do with Michael. I had his fate planned, and I was happy to be done with him.
He was not done with me. He would not quit talking to me, telling me there was more to his story than I had already told. Finally, I relented. When I finished the Thomas Weaver manuscript I added these fateful words: Coming Soon - The Redemption of Michael Hollister.
The Middle Falls series grew from there. I thought it was complete when it was a trilogy. I announced I was completely done with it after six books. The next thing I knew, there were twelve Middle Falls books out. How did that happen?
I have now given up on declaring the Middle Falls series dead and over. Like my protagonists, it keeps starting again and again.
At the same time, I have a number of stories I want to tell that aren’t in the Middle Falls Universe. So, I will write those stories, but will always come back to Middle Falls. It is my favorite town in the world and I love spending time there.
Where do your ideas come from?
They come from my life. Every single book in the Middle Falls series started with an event from my real life. Veronica McAllister is my oldest sister Terri. Cassandra Collins is my middle sister Lana. They have both passed on and these stories were my way of honoring them and spending time with their memory.
The trip that Nathaniel Moon’s mother makes across America in his book echoes a trip I have made on several occasions.
I don’t actually know anyone who has stepped through a shimmering door in their basement like Alex Hawk did, but after I devoured Edgar Rice Burroughs and Jules Vernes’ books as a young reader, it felt like they became a part of my life, too.
I think as writers, we need to live a life full of experiences. I think I’ve done that. Now I just let those experiences filter through my own perspective and flow out my fingers and onto the page.
Are you and Dawn still married? Still in love?
This is part and parcel of writing three books about your love life. A lot of people become invested in how we are doing.
We are ten years into our happily ever after now. Still married. Still in love. She is still putting up with me.
After a thirty-year wait, we are finally living the life together we dreamed of when we first fell in love.
How do you write your books so fast?
This question always makes me smile. Yes, I publish five or six books every year, where many authors only publish one. I smile, though, because I know if I really buckled down and focused, I could publish at least three or four more.
I write at least 2,000 words every day, seven days a week while I’m writing a book. Then, I take a few days or a week off and start the next one. That may sound like a lot, but I write about 1,200 words per hour or a little better, so that’s really only two hours of writing each day.
The rest of my time is dedicated to letting the next sections of my book arrive in my brain, and fiddling around with all the business aspects that come with being an indie author in this part of the twenty-first century.
Do you plot your books in advance?
Ha ha ha ha ha ha! Short answer: No.
Slightly longer answer: I am what people call a pantser (because I write by the seat of my pants) or an organic writer. That means that I usually have an opening image in mind when I sit down to write a book and not much more. I knew Alex Hawk saw a door in his basement, and I kind of knew I wanted him to run into primitive, instead of more advanced people, but everything else was in shadow. The curtain only gets pulled back as I write the scenes. I call it writing to the end of my headlights. I write what I see, then take a break until more ideas pour in. By the end of the book, I’ve only ever seen a few thousand words ahead of me, but I’ve still arrived at a satisfying destination.