It all started with a book, my last non-fiction to date. As I traveled around the country, writing about NASCAR, I started doing interviews with favorite musicians on the side. Robert Earl Keen in Newberry, S.C.; Tom Russell in Berkeley, Calif.; Pat Green in New Braunfels, Texas; James McMurtry, and Slaid Cleaves in Austin, Texas; …
Tag: writing
Up with Furman
Clinton, South Carolina, Sunday, November 12, 2017, 10:29 a.m. It’s not often I feel the joy I felt Saturday. Waylon Jennings once sang that, down in Alabama, “they call me the man of joy.” He wasn’t singing about me. Writing breeds satisfaction, not joy. Life is a struggle as I write and write and write, …
The Roars of Various and Sundry Crowds
Clinton, South Carolina, Sunday, September 24, 2017, 12:30 p.m. Everyone is winning. Victory radiates out from my psyche. I can’t do this on demand. If I could, I’d be a human crummy movie. Clinton overwhelmed Chesnee, 35-6. Furman clobbered Colgate, 45-14. Presbyterian withstood Cumberland, 27-20. The Red Sox blanked the Reds, 5-0. These are the …
Another Weekend that Was
Clinton, South Carolina, Sunday, September 17, 2017, 10:55 a.m. Every weekend has its ups and downs. This one isn’t over. NASCAR begins its playoffs today. Formula One’s Singapore Night Race was on when I got up this morning. The National “Buh-buh-buh-BUH!” Football League is on all day and night. The Red Sox are in St. …
A Long Trip Down a Rocky Road
Clinton, South Carolina, Thursday, September 14, 2017, 1:32 p.m. Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell* is going to be my most carefully composed, diligently examined, and thoroughly questioned novel to date. At the moment, I’m taking a break from the long slog of rewriting and reconsidering what will be my eighth novel. Twice I interrupted the process …
Apparently the Eclipse Zapped Me
Clinton, South Carolina, Friday, August 25, 2017, 11:23 a.m. This week has been a strange one. I think I may have been zapped by the eclipse. My new novel – and first sequel – is out. I have a book signing in Spartanburg on September 2 at Hub City Bookshop (3 p.m.). The week has …
Oh, a New Novel … Jerry Lewis … a Total Eclipse … Just Another Week
Clinton, South Carolina, Sunday, August 20, 2017, 5:40 p.m. What a week. My new novel, Life Gets Complicated, is out, weeks ahead of expectations. The 2016 western, Cowboys Come Home, joins Lightning in a Bottle in audio production, meaning that you will soon be able to listen to those two novels while driving your car, …
Continue reading Oh, a New Novel … Jerry Lewis … a Total Eclipse … Just Another Week
Daddy Downhill
I haven't had time to write short stories recently. With a seventh novel on the way to publication, and an eighth in an ongoing state of repair, I've been excising episodes from the latter manuscript. It's hard to remove items that are amusing but unnecessary. It occurred to me that I could turn them into short …
A Sheer Microcosm
I haven't had time to write short stories recently. With a seventh novel on the way to publication, and an eighth in an ongoing state of repair, I've been excising episodes from the latter manuscript. It's hard to remove items that are amusing but unnecessary. It occurred to me that I could turn them into …
Cowboys Cheap as French Fries
Clinton, South Carolina, Tuesday, August 1, 2017, 12:36 p.m. Hey, there. Hi, there. Ho, there. I wrote a western last fall. It’s not just any western. It’s a modern western, set at the end of World War II, when a couple Marines return home to Texas, looking for peace, love, and understanding even though they’d …
Nightrider's Lament 