One of the hosts for my The Dead of Summer blog tour emailed me five questions to answer. Then something happened and he couldn’t make the post. Well … I figure I might as well post it here. If you could give “Past You” one…

I probably could have written two chapters in the time it took me to finalize what I wanted on the back cover of The Dead of Summer. I devoured posts about creating sell copy, tips for what to include and what not to include, and…

Everyone wants to be a success, right? Succeeding is important. As a writer, I hope to produce a successful book (trying to finish the third Piper Blackwell adventure right now). In general, I want to succeed at life. But as a foster dog-mom, I am…

I subscribe to Tim Waggoner’s newsletter. He’s a great writer, and there are always some grains of wisdom I glean by reading his missives. He tackled writer’s block in one of his recent issues. Great advice, he offered. If you’re a writer or a fan…

Bruce and I celebrated our anniversary at the end of February with a trip to Peoria, Illinois. Nothing exotic, eh? No tropical breezes. I sooooooo would have liked a tropical breeze to chase away this hanging-on winter. But we had a great time. There was…

Just try to catch me I swim in a sea of short story submissions. I’m reading the slush pile for Galaxy’s Edge Magazine. It’s a wonderful publication edited by my friend Mike Resnick. I love reading slush. It provides a nice break from writing or…

So a friend says, “Summer is winding down.” I scowl at her, and she doesn’t understand. She prefers fall. I like to hold onto summer with both hands, digging my feet in and begging it not to leave. I adore the heat on my back…

I’ve read all of Donald J. Bingle’s novels, and a great many of his short stories. He keeps getting better … and the explosions and threats get bigger. Wet Work grabbed me from the first page. Contemporary, and exciting. And Dick Thornby intrigues me. I…

I really do … count my life in dog years. The number of years I share with dogs. I only briefly did not have a dog, and that was when I graduated college and moved to Quincy, Illinois, and rented a wholly dumpy apartment (which…

Witchbane reads fast, the story moves, and the writing is smooth. A master of urban fantasy, Gail Z. Martin and her other-persona Morgan Brice stopped by on the Witchbane blog tour for a Q&A. Here’s the quick recap for Witchbane: Seth Tanner and his brother…

I received a copy of the Dominican Sisters of Racine, WI, newsletter today. It made me think of Sister Mary…she’s probably the one who put me on the mailing list for it. She’s a 92-year-old Dominican nun who I met at funeral of a buddy’s…

I turn my blog over to Laurence St. John today. He has a nifty novel coming out the middle of the month, and you should hear about it. Terror on the East Coast – Two Million Dead!             TOLEDO, OHIO, March 15, 2018 – Yesterday,…

I do the Snoopy Dance when I have a new book coming out. Always have. There’s something exciting about it, the culmination of a lot of effort. And it gives me the opportunity to put a new Beanie Baby on display in my office. Yeah,…

Writing is mental, and so when your mind is tugged between various concerns, working on that novel becomes difficult. My 90-year-old father-in-law has a serious case of the flu … birthed, he claims, because he got cold when he rode the bus to Champaign to…

I fell in love with Faith Hunter’s words when I discovered my first Jane Yellowrock. Then I bought the next one and the next … I hadn’t considered myself a fan of urban fantasy. Ha! I’d written plenty of fantasy novels, and even penned an…

When The Dead of Night was getting ready to release, I wrote some guest blogs for various sites. One was a Q&A session, and it never ran. BUT, since I took the time to answer all the questions, I figured it should run somewhere, right?…

NANO NANO Yesterday a friend asked me why I participate in Nanowrimo. “You don’t need it,” he said. I have thirty-eight published novels, and I stopped counting the short stories when I hit one hundred. “I need it,” I replied. Because I want to have…

My Cacophonous Mess So they asked what my office looks like. Depends which office. Late spring through early fall my office is my screened-in back porch. I have a big table I found on sale at Wal-Mart, and a comfy desk chair (also on sale).…

When I lived in Kenosha, Wisconsin, I took pottery classes from an amazing instructor who taught out of an equally amazing museum. I made amazingly bad pottery there. Seriously. I crafted a “hand-built” teapot that was crooked and couldn’t pour. And some other ugly dishes.…

In a handful of days my next Piper Blackwell mystery comes out: The Dead of Night. It opens with a character called Mark the Shark. I met all three of him in Quincy, Illinois. My father-in-law lives in a senior apartment complex in Quincy. On…

MUSE: a person or force providing inspiration for a creative artist Synonyms: inspiration, creative influence, stimulus, DOG I started out as a fantasy and science fiction writer. Well, actually I started out as a newspaper reporter covering courts, cops, and crime. But when I dove…