The Internet asks us to feel about everything, for global warming, police brutality, assholes who fly giant Confederate flags from their pickup trucks, AIDS in Africa, and poachers who'll soon make elephants extinct. We are expected to be outraged when a parent disowns a gay teen, and to rally when a dentist kills a famous lion.... Continue Reading →

So, I am in my office, pretending to do my job at Country Pizza & Italian Grill, and my computer screen is blinking at me with a list of casualties. No, I am not planning a terrorist attack. I am trying to decide who will survive the naval battle in my next book, and that's... Continue Reading →

Inspiration artwork courtesy of artist (?) The procession carried on, under a black and swirling sky, where beauty lay in still repose upon heavy shoulders and heavier souls.  They gathered from every hovel and tier and tower. Sisters saw sisters, mothers daughters and children mothers. From house to house and street to street, whomever was loved... Continue Reading →

SelineThe fires were not meant to summon me, as I had thought, but the result of bandits, who came to rape and pillage. Even as I arrived, women were being dragged from their homes by the hair, mothers and daughters alike, as fathers and husbands were forced to watch. Truly, this was the work of... Continue Reading →

He was a big man, a stranger, a nomad from a distant country. But as powerful as he looked, he was tired, beaten, defeated. He entered the taverna to sit quietly and catch his breath, and right away I could tell he was not of the desert. His face was a burnt red, his lips... Continue Reading →

Dynotus art, from 26 years ago, done on my Amiga computerWe all remember our first loves. No matter what we experience later in life, we keep a place in our hearts for what came along when we were most impressionable, when the world was still wondrous and open to infinite possibilities. So much of how... Continue Reading →

The only cover that makes sense.I've been getting burned by books lately. Most of what I have been reading has been disappointing, and I am extremely particular. However, I strongly believe that great fiction can come from any place: a movie, video game, comic book or novel. So when I am at my Barnes &... Continue Reading →

The ending of this book reminded me of the time I finished The Scarlet Letter. I was in high school English class at the time, and I angrily chucked the book across the room. My teacher, as well as some of the students, seeing what I had just finished, was not at all puzzled. They... Continue Reading →

A lot of you may not know this, but I pretty much created The Mighty Morphin' Power Rangers, except that I called them The Panthers. It was a team of martial-arts superheroes that sometimes drove around in giant mech/robots. The leader was all in red, while his allies wore other primary colors, like blue and... Continue Reading →