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BEGINNINGS I’m a writer. Among others, I’ve written books, articles, television shows and movies. This is about that writing, a little behind-the-scenes on my career that you won’t find on Google. Writing is a solitary business. Despite much meaningful instruction about it, you basically have to write a lot to become good. But maybe something you read here will help. ?>I
started my career as a cub reporter for The Miami
News, a great
newspaper
that eventually folded.
In those days, you learned
from hardened
rewrite
guys
yelling at you. "How many shooters! Where was he born! Go
back and get it!” It was intimidating. These guys
were gods - word
magicians who
made sense and drama
out of anything.They didn’t
tolerate
fools or
errors. I
covered crime, general assignment, whatever the editors
dictated. One day after giving them enough
information to write three
front page stories, they
invited me to lunch. I was accepted. Eventually,
I
began to write my own
stories - floaters, jumpers, organized crime - I
wrote about it all. We were an afternoon daily sold
on the streets. You
needed a
headline to entice
passersby.
After awhile however you want to write something needing more thought. Our little-old-lady religion editor died and I shocked some by asking for her job. I felt history and religion were great sweeping subjects not just bulletin-board items as the newspaper was treating them. A year into the job - and to my surprise because my editor entered my writing - I was judged the best religion editor in the nation by my peers. Believe me, I didn’t have a clue. But I wrote with passion and I think that’s what tipped it. FIRST BOOKThe Supple Memorial Award gave me a big head. I
decided real writers write books. I'd looked for a
story that might be my
ticket.
I’d run into one
about the Shroud of Turin. You
might know of it
today but
back then - in the 1970s - few outside of
?>Turin,
By
this time I’d become a stringer for the New
York
Times, which gave me some
clout. I went to
I was a book writer! WHAT’S
NEXT? After the high, comes the low. What’s next? It’s the
writer’s dilemma. Wishes don’t pay bills. Fittingly,
newspapers gave me my
next
book. There, blaring out
from all of them that
summer of 1975 was a
story
about perhaps 100 patients being murdered in the
When I arrived in It
didn’t happen. Shroud did well, but
Mysterious Deaths died
mysteriously. One day,
Popular Library had the big tout on my book.
The next day it was dumping
it. I never knew what
happened. Nobody had the
courtesy to tell me. It got
good reviews but something went wrong. Like
the
movies, if it doesn’t
click quickly, its see you later kid. I always
thought the What are you going to do
next? FIRST
NOVEL I
always wanted to write a novel. That was the true
test! Because of
Shroud, I had some money in
the bank. I could afford a risk. I’d
been writing
for Tropic
Magazine, the Sunday supplement of The
Miami
Herald. I’d done a story for Tropic
about
a psychic who
saw crimes. He was a commercial
artist. While drawing, he’d occasionally
have
debilitating visions of a
murder taking place. He didn’t know who it
was but
he could see the violence in his mind’s eye.
His
impulse was to
tell the police, but they’d
invariably decide that he knew so much that he
must
be the killer. He was
never arrested but often suspected.
Now there’s a novel. I changed him into a her, gave
her a background of coming from
Don’t worry. I’m going to lose it.
My
wife is a Basque. They are the people of the
But back to reality.
After the Basque excursion, I was nearly out of
money. What next – and fast! I’m a World War II
buff. I happened to read a
story in the New York
Times about
In
1983, we made a big decision. My wife and I
and our
two children moved
from
See you later
Charlie. A
few weeks later, I was offered a script assignment
by Simon and
Simon, a
really great detective
show. From there, it got
easier. After
several
script
assignments, I became a story editor on The Famous Teddy
Z and The New WKRP in
But I’m getting ahead of myself.
WAR AND FIGHTER PILOTS
As
I tried to make it in
Now there’s a
story. Scream of Eagles was launched on Good Morning America. It did
quite well. It was a main selection of the Military
Book Club and
Pocket
Books bought the
paperback rights. It got some
terrific
reviews. I
was proud
of it. I still am. Several producers tried to make it
into a movie but they couldn’t. Someday someone
will. I’m ready with the
scenario.
With the success of Scream, I sold another
fighter book. In this one, I would find the nation’s
best fighter pilots
and tell
their stories.Wings
of Fury basically picks
up after the
Vietnam War
and
follows certain fighter pilots through the 1980s and into
the First Gulf War. I had a great time writing this
one too. I went to
fighter
bases, like Nellis
outside of
After Wings, I had a drought. Things got so
bad I had to take a second job which I’ve done from
time to time. Mostly,
I’ve
been a salesman. I do
well at sales but it’s always
just to pay the
bills
and keep
the family together until I’ve got the next writing
project. When the Kosovo War started, I had my next
ticket. I’d always
wanted to
do a book about a
fighter squadron at war. Lots of
drama there.
And I
wanted it
to be on a carrier. I’d heard that the navy liked
Scream of Eagles. I asked them if I could go
on a carrier during
the Kosovo
festivities. They let
me do it. I was lucky to get
to spend
some time with
the
VF-41 Black Aces, an F-14 Tomcat squadron, while they
fought. Black Aces High was published in 2002
and is still selling.
BUTCH VORIS
My
fighter experience won me the privilege of
writing
my next book, First
Blue, a biography of
Butch
Voris, who started the Blue Angels. Butch
was
a man amongst men, a big, strong, dedicated World
War II ace who was
in his 80s when I met him. What a
guy! Imagine
flying upside down at 600
miles per hour barely 100
feet
from the asphalt. Even breathe too hard and
you’re history. Butch did that
in starting the
Blues. Or imagine being a
young man right out of
flight
school, shipped to the South Pacific and
knowing you’ve got to shoot
down experienced
Japanese pilots or your
carrier will be sunk. Forget
the fear and death. It’s your duty to stop
the
hordes and he and others
like him did – three thousand miles from
home,
nobody else to help them. Win or die. Butch is
an
example of the
Greatest Generation and it was
wonderful interviewing him, a perfect
gentleman with
a steel-trap
mind that remembered almost everything. First
Blue
is still selling and should be an inspiration
to
anyone who strives
to be the best.
PATTON
My
latest book – number nine - is Target
Patton,
an investigation into
the mysterious death of Gen.
George S. Patton, Jr., our greatest fighting
general. I believe he was
assassinated. You be the
judge.
In the meantime, I’m looking for my next book. Let me know if you have a suggestion. P.S. I rewrote this three times.
Writing isn’t easy. You can always do
better.
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