Home Boy Disclaimer

For the record, I don't write about real places or real people in my novels. All the characters in my novels, as well as their names, are fictitious and the towns, townships and counties in which they live are fictional places in Pennsylvania and do not really exist.

In addition, there are no composite characters in my books, no "take-offs" on or "rip-offs" of people I have known, although I occasionally give certain "tics" and eccentricities to older characters for humorous effect and in gratitude for the source of childhood wonder they provided. However, in my novels I never write about Snow Shoe, my hometown, or Centre County, my home county, or any of the people who live there now or who ever lived there before. The only similarity between those places and the places I write about is the coal and lumber history, which is fairly commonplace in much of Pennsylvania's Allegheny Plateau Region.

In my novels, my focus is on a quadrangular, fictional part of Pennsylvania that would lie somewhere between the following real places: Smethport in McKean County and Wellsboro in Tioga County as the northern border and between Clearfield in Clearfield County and Lock Haven in Clinton County as the southern border. This is the fictional vicinity of the Pennsylvania I write about. I picked this part of the state for my fiction because this is the part I know the best and love the most.

The only exception to this rule is in Deeds of Destiny, my 5th novel. The first half of this story takes place in a fictional part of southeastern Pennsylvania that would lie somewhere between York and Philadelphia, if it were real. The second half of this story takes place in a fictional section of the above-mentioned area of Pennsylvania's Allegheny Plateau Region.

So, while my novels are fiction, they also pay homage to the rich history and the beautiful topography of Pennsylvania's Allegheny Plateau Region.

link to same post on Thinkers' Corner

Remembrance of Stings Past

I once asked poet Nikki Giovanni to autograph one of her books for me at an after-recital reception but she simply ignored my request. She wouldn't even look at me.

I looked around the room and saw that I was the only white person at the reception in the Walnut Building on Penn State University's main campus at University Park, PA. As I was about to leave and make everyone there happy (especially Nikki Giovanni), the man who was responsible for her appearance at this particular function took my book and pressed Ms. Giovanni to sign it. She reluctantly signed it and handed it back to him without looking at either one of us. I politely thanked both of them and left. When I got home I noticed that she had merely scribbled in the book. That stung, but only for a moment.

If I recall correctly, it was 1978 and I haven't read anything by her since. I can't even remember why I would read any of her stuff in the first place let alone traipse off to Schwab Auditorium to hear her "pissed-and-proud" brand of racist, feminist poetry and then skulk over to Walnut Building to make a fool out of myself seeking her autograph. But I know damn well why I did it. Back then I liked modern free-verse poetry and I didn't hate others because of their race or gender or whatever like a lot of other people. I still don't. But I have evolved. Thank heavens. Today, I wouldn't even give someone like Nikki Giovanni the time of day.

Science Fiction for Thinkers

I don't write comic book sci-fi. There are no capes and swords, no hooded ghouls or superheroes in my books. That's called Fantasy which is often confused with Science Fiction.

Someone once asked me if I write the kind of books Stephen King writes. I told him no, that I don't write Horror. Besides, when you unmask real life, what you see is a lot spookier and astonishing than anything purely imaginary, and that's what I do.

I take an average American town or an average day in the life of an average man or woman and I peek under that rock and expose the supernatural roller-coaster ride that runs beneath it all. And on that ride many battles are won and lost and many unlikely heroes emerge and all of it seems so real. And that’s because most of it really is. And that's because there's a lot more to life than what we see, hear, smell, taste or feel. And much, much more than we think.