Behind: “First Rodeo”

If you were around a century or so ago, and you knew him well, you might call him Bill. On a legal document, William Sidney Porter. If you read any of his 300+ published stories, you knew him by his pen name: O. Henry. The name now commands a prestigious short story award, but more than anything, his work effectively trademarked…… Continue reading Behind: “First Rodeo”

Behind: “Two Bad Hamiltons and a Hirsute Jackson”

Violet Celucci is a better angel and an inner demon. A frigging genius is how Vi might describe herself, a bastion of sanity in a disorderly world, a process improvement-seeking missile. An over-obsessed stickler for efficiency is how she’d never describe herself. Sorry, Vi. The truth hurts, and so can life. Tough as you are, I see the breaks in your armor. I…… Continue reading Behind: “Two Bad Hamiltons and a Hirsute Jackson”

Behind: “Death or Taxes”

Behind the Writing Scenes of “Death or Taxes,” published in the July ’14 issue of Mysterical-E. Summer 2011: it was that purplish state of dawn. My eyes flew open. My breath caught in my throat. Inspiration had come. It was ready to bubble out, like it or not. And I liked it. In short order I had finished 1800…… Continue reading Behind: “Death or Taxes”

Behind: “Uprisings at Cap d’Antibes”

There’s nothing like a good, old-school revolution to get a story going. Great or small, a lightning coup or decades in the making, needed change or epic tragedy. Revolution, for better or worse, is essentially human. The idea of a revolution wriggled into my brain some time back. In my fiction usually a form of natural order wins…… Continue reading Behind: “Uprisings at Cap d’Antibes”

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