Warren Adler's Blog, page 15
March 8, 2017
Okey Ndibe
From a rather young age—beginning the moment I discovered the magic of reading in elementary school—I found myself enchanted by stories, especially fiction, but also autobiographies. I’d describe myself as a passionate lifelong reader. Yet, the turn to writing arose from two serendipitous encounters with a Nigerian-British writer (Dilibe Onyeama) and, more decisively, the mesmeric American prose stylist, John Edgar Wideman. In separate encounters, both writers asked a variant of the question, “You’re writing a novel, right?”
When I fibbed to Wideman that I was, he asked to see some pages from the manuscript, offering to help get me a fellowship to start my MFA studies at the University of Massachusetts Amherst, where he was teaching. I got back to my apartment that night and, with feverish trepidation, began to write. Over the weekend I produced 20+ pages that Wideman found fascinating. It was the seed of my first novel, Arrows of Rain.
For me, writing is powerful precisely because it is a form of seduction. I am helplessly seduced by the next idea for a novel, hence mustering the energy to work at it, to persevere until the idea is realized. And then I feel my labor requited when readers find the book and confess to being transported by it. But the deeper emotional payoff is when my book enchants the reader and enlarges her moral universe.
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March 1, 2017
Which character from ‘American Sextet’ are you?
Find out which character you are most like from American Sextet, Warren Adler’s acclaimed Fiona Fitzgerald Mystery Series.
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James Moushon
I am a mystery writer about 40-percent of the time and a book industry blogger 60-percent. My day job is long gone but I am busier now than ever.
Early on, I enjoyed reading Hemingway who wrote about life’s experiences and Christie who put together detective novels that were great reads.
Then in college, I was fortunate enough to take a writing lecture course with an expert of F. Scott Fitzgerald. For years The Great Gatsby and The Snows of Kilimanjaro rattled around in my head until I finally had time enough to sit down and start writing fiction.
I started the blogging part after I saw the difficulties authors were having gaining exposure and dealing with the technical part of the process. After years of being on the technical side of the digital world, helping authors is my way of giving back.
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February 22, 2017
D.M. Pulley
I write to commune with the ghosts buried inside my head. They were always there, waking me up at all hours with nightmares, lurking in my favorite books, luring me into spooky old houses. An over-active imagination can be a wonderfully maddening thing. Growing up, I slept in my closet for a year for fear of the tiny aliens living under my bed. I would sit and stare at my neighbor’s doll collection for hours, not moving. I was a strange child.
As an adult, I spent ten years wandering abandoned office buildings and historic landmarks as a forensic engineer and preservationist. The footsteps of the thousands of people that had walked there seemed to follow me down the hallways. The stories trapped between the walls of each old building were whispers in my ear. Perhaps I conjured ghosts out of loneliness or quiet desperation as I searched for meaning in my own life, but I stopped and listened for them. Hushed voices muddled together with echoes of clacking typewriters and the swish of cheap stockings. Urgent tales of loss, betrayal, murder, and love hung in shadows all around me, just out of reach.
It wasn’t until I sat down at a computer to write that I could finally untangle them—the lonely secretary on the eleventh floor, the homeless squatter in the empty building, my missing grandmother. These imagined characters want to tell me something. I write so I can hear them.
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February 20, 2017
President’s Day with Warren Adler
I spent an extensive amount of time in Washington D.C. rubbing elbows with some of the nation’s most political elite. The stage in my life has given way…
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February 15, 2017
Marie Sutro
My love of writing developed from a deep-rooted love of language. From an early age, I was drawn to words and their meanings. I cannot count the times I would pause while reading a book to savor the sound of a new word in my mouth. Determining definition through context clues brought equally profound joy. As if I’d just torn open a long-awaited gift from beneath the Christmas tree, my first impulse would be to run to share my discovery with those around me.
I quickly learned my passion was not universal. Most people accepted words as tools and could not understand why I elevated them to magic status. Over time I learned that while my love of words did not always have a place in spoken communication, they had a welcome home in writing.
Whether fiction or nonfiction, the very act of stringing together words and phrases to convey meaning will forever be my magic. For me, reading will always be like sitting spellbound at the feet of a magician, and writing will always be my chance to pick up the wand.
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February 10, 2017
Mother Nile
A dazzling triumph from the bestselling author of ‘The War of the Roses’ – a sweeping and ambitious novel spanning across two eras and the city at the center of it all.
‘Mother Nile’ is the story of Si, the American-born son of an Irish father and Egyptian mother, who goes on a journey through the winding streets of the City of the Dead to solve a half-century-old mystery. When his mother makes an urgent plea on her deathbed, Si knows that he must make the journey to Egypt to find out the truth about his long-lost half-sister, conceived during his mother’s affair with King Farouk. Hunted by those who would do anything to keep the past in the past, Si finds help from a young woman who captures his heart. He leaves the City of the Dead a changed man. This work of historical fiction takes readers on an adventure brimming with suspense, intrigue, and romance.
This book is meant for readers who are 18+ due to mature content.
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Never too Late for Love
It’s never too late for love.
More stories from Warren Adler’s acclaimed short stories collection “The Sunset Gang.” “Never Too Late for Love” combines additional stories written after “The Sunset Gang” was published, dealing with the same intrepid crew who inhabit Sunset Village. Anyone who is aging—meaning all of us—will revel in these stories of joy, love, sex, and energy that give a deeper meaning to the aging process, especially in what the young might call “the twilight years.” In these stories, there is no sense of oncoming doom and life goes on in a perpetual sunset. Anyone who has an “older” friend or parent will marvel at this wonderful, inspiring collection and enjoy reading and re-reading these stories for years to come.
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Red Herring
FIONA FITZGERALD MYSTERY SERIES BOOK #9
A high-caliber police procedural mystery from the acclaimed author Warren Adler, well-known for the iconic novel turned international box-office hit “The War of the Roses”
Detective Fiona Fitzgerald’s privileged upbringing in the nation’s capital and her intimate knowledge of its inner workings come in handy when Fran Miller, a top lobbyist and legal expert, turns up dead on Independence Day. It looks like suicide, but when the clues lead back to Mark Chancellor, the husband of Fiona’s best friend, things gets complicated.
Chancellor runs a complex, global conglomerate, and along with his Russian partner, is involved in the pharmaceutical and defense industries. Chancellor is at the top of his game, well-connected in Washington and known to believe that money is the planet’s most powerful weapon.
But uncovered secrets reveal that terrorist affiliates may have something more powerful: biological weapons. While the high-stakes players behind the scenes are trying to avoid a potential worldwide catastrophe, the race to find an antidote is complicated by deception and corruption, and now maybe by death.
Rumors swirl about the dead lobbyist: a mysterious lover, millions of dollars hidden in small-town Virginia, and what looks like a recent vaccination on her upper right arm. But did someone target Fran? After all, she knew more about biological and chemical weapons than almost anyone. Was she caught up in the convoluted web of international biological warfare?
Coincidence, luck, and a little passion give Fiona a labyrinth of leads to follow. But sometimes the simple truth is harder to see
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