Thank you for visiting my writing website, which is divided into selected memoirs and fiction.
You are most welcome to read, ponder, reflect, and above all, enjoy the material. I would appreciate knowing that you have honored me with a visit. To do so, click on "Guest Book" on the main menu at the top of each page. Guest book messages will not appear on the website.
My writing began with brief memoirs for my children in the late 1980s. My mother needed to go into an assisted living facility, and the one she chose asked for her biography so they would know what she was like before she became debilitated. Retrieving her story at that point was difficult because the details of her life were beginning to elude her. I thought it would be good to get my memories down on paper before they, too, began to disappear. I wanted my children to know who I am, not just the snippets collected by their personal interactions with me.
My initial memoirs were all written in prose. But I love the sounds of good poems and how they can awaken lost memories and forgotten emotions. Accordingly, some of my memoirs are structured as poems. I consider all of my memoirs to be only essentially true. Memory fades, and gaps must be filled. A rendition of "facts" can be boring, and some need embellishment. And, after all, a memoir needs to be a good story that will grab and maintain the reader's interest. So, many of my memoirs contain material I hadn’t remembered. When there are gaps in my memory related to a memoir I’m writing, I might ask someone for help, or I might search the web. If neither of those works, I make it up. The selected memoirs, written as poetry and prose, can be accessed by clicking on "Memoirs."
Most of my fictional pieces on this website are entirely fabricated, but some are also based on real-life experiences, not only mine but also those of family and friends. However, they differ from those events in very fanciful ways. Most of the stories written in prose are very short, each a thousand words or less, generally referred to as flash fiction. To access these writings, click on "Fiction."
Since September 2021, I have independently published three books in a literary vein. Links to purchase any of them can be found on the right side of relevant pages and at the bottom of this page.
The first book is entitled Brief Memoirs: Slightly less than I want to tell, and slightly more than you want to know. It consists of forty-five brief memoirs reviewing my struggles with weight, illness, school, career, spirituality, and family life. It details my failures as well as my achievements.
The second book is The Fanciful and the Mostly True: Flash Fiction and More Brief Memoirs, adding twenty more memoirs to the continuing collection of mostly truthful accounts of some of my most memorable experiences. This book also contains nineteen pieces of flash fiction about human nature, flawed and otherwise.
The third book, published between the first two, is a collaboration with three other authors. It is entitled Travel Light and Other Explorations. in which the four of us each explored our travel experiences, both literally and figuratively. The result is an eclectic and delightful selection of poetry, essays, memoirs, and fiction that can lead to surprising insights. I contributed five brief memoirs to the book, which were later reproduced in The Fanciful and the Mostly True.
