“Lovers and madmen have such seething brains,
Such shaping fantasies, that apprehend
More than cool logic ever comprehends.”
A Midsummer Night’s Dream
Act V Scene 1
The words we choose…
I’ve been fascinated by books since I was seven. A broken arm in traction kept me absolutely flat on my back for three weeks, in a mens’ ward with no other kids, no TV, no radio. Dr. Seuss saved me. Gerald McGrew, Bartholomew Cubbins, Horton the Elephant, they got me out of there. The one problem was that his books were too big to hold with one hand. A flexible child, I solved the problem by holding them with my toes, and turning pages with my free hand.
Born in Seattle, Washington, I started kindergarten in Sonoma, junior high school in Ann Arbor and did my high school time in Wayzata, Minnesota. After graduating from Michigan State University, I moved back to Seattle. I’ve been a teacher, a stained glass artist, lacrosse referee, and editor. I currently work for the University of Washington.
My seething brain shaped my fantasies into backyard productions of A Midsummer Night’s Dream, which then grew into my Shakespeare books. I’m a Shakespeare enthusiast, but certainly not a scholar. It’s just that I love live theatre, and I wanted to share the very best with my friends, and the kids in my life.
My first love is fiction. When Paul Simon sang “Breakdowns come and breakdowns go, what’re you going to do about it, that’s what I’d like to know,” he was describing my kind of story. I want to write a love story about a three-hundred pound poet and a woman with a wooden leg, or a little kid who steals a piece of silver jewelry, and forty years later has to give it back.
My novel Passage of the Kissing People was a quarter-finalist for the 2008 Amazon Penguin Breakout Novel Award. It will be released May 1, 2012.
I studied writing at the University of Washington with National Book Award winner Charles R. Johnson. I am a past president of the Pacific Northwest Writers Association, a member of Seattle Free Lances and a founder of the Collective Wheee! I live in the Greenwood district of Seattle with my wife and an imaginary monkey..
