Where can I read some writing samples from the novels? 

If you want to read some writing samples -- oh
you are sooooo nice -- just go to the "writing samples"
page on this website.



Where can I read a synopsis of the novels?

If you want to read a novel's synopsis, just go to
the "writing samples" page on this website.



What are the advantages of doing a series?

Well, let’s see. Series are rather popular these days, so I believe if the series “catches on” sales can be good and a writer can do well financially.



What are the disadvantages of doing a series?

There are several disadvantages, also. If the first book in the series doesn’t sell well, those that did buy and read the book might still expect future books in the series. So a writer is sort of committed to do more books in a series even if the first book doesn’t do well.
     Also, a writer has to be very careful and very aware of all the names and facts and such from the earlier books for proper continuity. Example, a character ( even a minor one ) has a certain name and description in the first book, you must continue that in the second book. For the April Curran Series, I’ve really tried to “get to know” my characters so I have proper “continuity” in the following books.



What was your major in college? 

I majored in business. Ohhhh, those courses in
economics. Ohhhhhhhh. Charts. Graphs. Charts. Graphs.
Of course, that was nothing compared to a course
in business calculus. Oh my freaking gosh! I should have
become a nurse! Or a chimney sweep!



What kind of writing do you do?

Novels. A memoir, poems and short stories. And I've written a few screenplays. None have sold or been produced yet,
but I'm trying. It's a competitive field, this 
screenwriting. My joke is when I sit down to continue
working on a screenplay, I say to myself, "Back to
the salt mines!"  



Tell me about one screenplay, please?

Oh, you are so sweet to ask. And thanks for the
plug! Hey, you never know a screenplay agent or a
Hollywood producer might be reading this, right?
Listen, I don't look beautiful enough in a sweater to
get discovered drinking a soda at a corner
drugstore's lunch counter, so I need all the breaks I
can get.
     Basically, one of my screenplays, my most recent one
in fact, follows a child actress (Raven) from her earliest
days at auditions to achieving the pinnacle of success in
Hollywood at age 18, that being fame so high and mighty
she can't escape it, but will it be her downfall or crowning
moment? She discovers too late there is something
about being too famous, but will she let it destroy her
or catapult her?
     It's dark humor / satire about the perils and prances
of too much fame too soon. And it's a humorous take on
Hollywood, with a cast of extras sure to be memorable.
Example: the female thief with the fit physique and
vascular arms that a college-aged Raven falls in love
with after she is robbed of her tacky appliances. Raven's
mom suffers from neurosis and is haunted by her jealousy
for her daughter's fame and wealth, while running from
her own memories of years of being a diner waitress.
The idiot in the parking lot who does a burnout and leaves a giant Z pattern in the dust and dirt. Raven's entitled boyfriend who can't escape his heroin excesses. Raven's aunt who does crime scene cleanup and has a work vehicle with the world's most usual interior dome light. And lots more characters with traits that might stick to the psyche. 
     Hint hint producers. It's finished and ready to be read.
It's a character driven, low-budget script, with not many, if
any, expensive special effects or exotic shooting locations
required.  



Can I read a few pages of this screenplay? 

A writing sample of the screenplay can be found on the
"writing samples" page. Enjoy! Hope ya laugh a little . . .
or a lot!



Do you like to write screenplays?

Heck ya. I love goofy, exaggerated dialogue. But make no
mistake. It's a lot of work to write a 90 page or 110 page

screenplay, and no less than twenty times a year people
contact me and ask if they can give me their idea and they
request I write their screenplay. But they refuse to pay, 
only offering to split profits 50/50 when / if the work
sells. I must decline these offers, writing a screenplay is
simply too much work to do it on speculation with a
partner. And besides, is it a fair arrangement? A person
gives me their idea, and then I do about 97% of the
work for a 50/50 split? Something just doesn't seem 
right with that equation.



Tell me some foods loaded with fiber?

Oh, come on! I mean I answer some joke questions, but
asking about fiber? Oh, come on! Quiz a nutritionist!

Can you write my blog or business brochure?

I've sort of moved further away from freelance business
writing because I encountered an unfortunate oversupply
of people, including some quite affluent ones, who
requested I deliver to them professional quality, fully-
edited, SEO enhanced copy for the same price as people
overseas had delivered to them. Oh, the rudeness I 
encountered when I explained to people that I simply 
could not match the price of a writer living in a nation
where one dollar a day could feed a family and the
average worker's wage is about 2 dollars a day. One man in
California offered 5 dollars and requested I write a nine
page business brochure. For 5 dollars? That would have
been several days of work for a paycheck that could
barely buy a cheeseburger and fries.
     If you have a business writing proposal / request, feel
free to send me an e-mail and we can discuss it.  



Can you ghostwrite my novel?

Again, see the above question and answer. More than a
dozen times a year people contact me and request I
ghostwrite their work. But so far the pay offers have
been insulting, to say the least. One man, who offered me
$150 dollars to ghostwrite a 120,000 words mystery, I can
only say it's a mystery why he thinks that was an
acceptable offer. A measly $150 dollars to write an entire
novel from scratch? Oh, frère! That's French for oh, brother.



Can you edit my novel? 

See above. A dozen times a year people ask this question. 
My official response? Maybe.
     However -- and unfortunately -- most people who ask
me to edit their novel offer pay rates that are, well, how
can I say it gingerly? Their offers make me sick to my
stomach! One individual offered a whopping $5.00 to edit
a 96,000 word science fiction novel. Yes, five dollars!

When I declined his offer, he was baffled.



Was your mom or dad talented in writing?

My father was an excellent story teller. He never wrote a
novel, but oh was he a funny man. He died when I was very
young, I believe I was in third grade when he suddenly
passed away after a lengthy and complicated operation
for a large brain tumor. I was so young when he passed
away, I only have a few dozen memories of him. But I 
do remember my older sisters and I gathering around as
my dad told humorous stories, both true and made up. He
could make up material on the spot, and it was hilarious.











     One humorous true story was about when he was
courting my mom in the early 1960's. After graduating
college, my mom had moved from her native Chicago to Tarrytown, New York, a small, historical bedroom community about 45 minutes' drive north of New York City. My mom rented a room in an old home on one of the steepest roads
in the town, and she lived about a 5 minute drive away from the cemetery where famous author Washington Irving (of the headless horseman fame) was buried.
     My father had dropped my mom off at her rooming

place at about 9 p.m. and he started the drive back to
Staten Island, a borough of New York City. Well, it was
dark and he hadn't driven the route much, so he got
detoured into a rather seedy and dilapidated section of
the Bronx after exiting at the wrong highway exit. After
five minutes of driving around dark streets completely 
lost, he was so happy to see the highway's on ramp again.
As he was nearing it, out of the dark shadows, a very
large and very scary man walked into the middle of the
pothole-lined road and stopped dead-center with hands
on hips and legs apart. He held a large butcher knife.
     My dad slammed on the brakes.
     "Listen, Mister," the stranger screamed in the cool
night air, "I want this car! I want this car!"    
     The stranger stood blocking the narrow road, holding 

the knife tightly.
     My father said he shoved the car in reverse, but had to
stop when another vehicle drove up behind. So my dad
shoved it in drive, drove onto the empty sidewalk, rounded
a fire hydrant and sped away, leaving the knife-holding
stranger in the dust. 
     My mother was also very creative, and she could tell
some funny stories as well. She did some writing, doing

some creative, opera parodies and many poems. One poem
she wrote was accepted into a magazine with a sizable
readership and nationwide distribution. She passed away
at age 85 in February, 2019, but I will always remember her
humorous stories.











     Oh, so many great true stories. My mom was a real
talent! Where to begin?
     When she was fresh out of college with a master's degree
in counseling in the early 1960's, she worked as a counselor to help blind people. She was based in Westchester County, but
sometimes had to visit clients further up in some very
rural areas south of the Albany area. And she had polio and
walked with crutches, so I give her kudos for driving in some
harsh winter conditions and having to climb many stairs to
see home bound people. She visited an elderly blind man who
lived alone in a huge country farm house built in the late
1890's. It was creepy, she told me, and huge! No less than 
5 bedrooms with a huge porch with many rocking chairs
under the overhang. My mom was puzzled why the blind man
lived alone in such a huge home and he mentioned he was
having financial troubles. 
     "Have you thought of taking in a boarder?" my mom asked
the elderly man. "Maybe two? You have so many extra rooms."
     "Oh," the man replied, "I've tried that several times.
Nobody will stay here. They leave after one night. This house
is just too haunted." 
     The man explained footsteps were heard. The rocking
chairs moved on their own. Lights flickered.
     When my mom returned to the office and told of her
client's rather strange tale, one burly man in her office (her
supervisor, I think) laughed and mentioned he was a huge
fan of ghost stories, but doubted the old man's story. He
thought it was the old man's imagination, and he was 
actually looking for a new place to live. So he called the man
and asked if he could spend the night.  
     The next day at the office, when he arrived for work
everyone asked how did things go? The man responded that
yes, indeed, the rocking chairs did move on their own and he
witnessed things from staying just one night that
convinced him, yes, that house was really haunted. He 

refused to go into detail what he had seen, but my mom
said he never returned to that farmhouse. 
     Another funny true story happened in the 1980's. My 

mom was working as a counselor to help blind people
get financial assistance and/or rehabilitation and/or 
medical services and/or a job. She was driving one client to
a job interview in the early afternoon on a nice, sunny 
Florida day. Her client was completely blind and sat
in the passenger seat. As my mom drove down the road,
they passed a man who was jogging (yes jogging)
completely nude. Yes, the man did not have one scrap
of clothing on. Completely nude in the middle of the day,
just jogging down a sidewalk completely oblivious to the
dozens of cars passing by and the six people standing
further up the sidewalk waiting for a transit bus.
     "Oh my gosh!" my mom exclaimed, after passing by
a pair of buns.
     "What? What?" the blind man asked.
     So flabbergasted, my mom forgot the man was blind. 
     "Didn't you see that?"
     "Uh," the man said, "no, can't say I did."
     "A man stark naked just jogged by," my mom said. 
     "At this time of day?" the blind man gasped as well.



Are you married or single?

Presently single.



Single and looking?

Not looking from the highest mountain with binoculars, no.
Like most people, I'm looking to fall in love and meet the
right partner. I just let fate decide things at my age. I've never been married, just never met the right woman. And, to be honest, I've always been quite poor and I wasn't a great candidate for marriage for this reason. Raising a family is expensive. Many women want a financially stable man.



Have any children?

No. And that's my biggest regret in life, that I never 
married and had a family. And now at my age, I think the 

era of raising a family has gone by. I never say never, but
the odds of me marrying a woman are much better than
the odds of my having a family.



Where did you grow up?

Florida. And I didn't know it at the time, but my gosh what a
fertile ground for quirky and unusual news' stories and people
the Sunshine State can be. You see it all here, and I'm not
just talking lighthouses and palm trees.











And let's not forget many authors, myself included, get inspiration and ideas of what to write about from what we
see, hear and read each day.



It's been quite a few years since you published your last
book. Why the long delay?

Just been so busy. Okay, first I've been working multiple jobs for more than a decade. Working as a substitute school
teacher. Business writing. Novels. Writing some screenplays.
Plus, I've taken care of my mom, who was elderly and in a
wheelchair after being left handicapped by polio when she
was a small child. And one of my sisters has a chronic
illness, so I've been taking care of her and my mom, running
errands and helping in many other ways. So between working
multiple jobs, writing screenplays, and taking care of two
people in my family, I've just been so busy. My mother, age
85, passed away in February 2019, and she is greatly missed. I
do have several books that have been completed and I hope
to publish them in the spring of 2020. And I'm writing often
and planning more books, too. I'm hoping 2020 will be an
exciting and productive year in my life regarding my works
of fiction and non-fiction.