Rusty McClure's Blog, page 4

What is the Society of the Cincinnati?

If you browse around the Society of the Cincinnati website, you might become less convinced that they are a secret society worth writing about. The society hosts tours of their mansion, they give away scholarships and you can even have your wedding at their headquarters.

None of that is very exciting.

However, the Society of the Cincinnati is an organization built on ideas like patriotism, preserving history and honoring our forefathers who fought for independence.

Those ideas have been inspiring stories for generations.

 Cincinnatus: The Secret Plot to Save America is a work of fiction , but it’s based around  real places, real people and a real secret society.

The Society of the Cincinnati you’ll find in Cincinnatus might be more exciting than the real thing, but who knows what goes on behind closed doors?

If you’re looking to unearth the secrets of a real secret society, good luck.

If you want to solve mysteries, save America and crack fictional secret societies tonight, read on.

Read Local?

In the past few years it seems like the “local” movement has grown stronger than ever. We’re encouraged to eat local, shop local and support local endeavors in any way we can.

To be honest, I’m not convinced you should buy something just because it was made in your state, or even your hometown. However, being an Ohioan and an author I was very interested to stumble on a “Read Local” campaign.

The idea is simple.

For every “Read Local” T-shirt sold by Outfit Good, a Columbus, OH based T-shirt company, part of the proceeds goes to support Columbus Creative Cooperative, a local resource for writers.

According to their website, Columbus Creative Cooperative holds writers’ workshops, publishes anthologies and hosts other writer oriented events.

What I find interesting is that there is no branding at all on these T-shirts. There’s no self-promotion, no logo and no website. The shirts simply bear the message– “Read Local.”

Check it out for yourself here.

I think that’s what caught my eye about this campaign. While most people use the “Local” idea to sell a product, Columbus Creative Cooperative is trying to use a product to support an idea–“Read Local.”

I still don’t expect someone from Cincinnati to buy one of my books just because I grew up there, but I am grateful for every local reader I have.

What do you think about “Reading Local”?

Unlikely Heroes

What would you do if you stumbled onto a plot that jeopardized the future of America? Would you turn it over to the FBI? Would you look the other way and not get involved?

We read books, watch movies and TV shows that feature awe inspiring, sometimes death defying feats of bravery and heroism. It’s fun to imagine living a life of adventure, but if we were faced with these situations in real life, would we have the guts, the brains and the know-how to actually survive?

Maybe that’s why we enjoy tales of intrigue so much. We sit back with a snack, and without breaking a sweat we participate in the defeat of zombies, political plots, hit men and all other bad guys and gals.

The characters in Cincinnatus don’t start out as heroes, but when they uncover a plot that threatens existence as we know it, they choose to try and save America. Although they are fictional characters in a made-up situation, I like to think there are plenty of underdogs out there just waiting to fulfill their potential.

If your day job involves unraveling political plots, solving murders and delving into secret societies, Cincinnatus: The Secret Plot to Save America might not seem that exciting. However, if you’re an average Joe like me who wants to experience adventure alongside other unlikely heroes, click here.

Inspiration

Where do you find inspiration?

It can be hard to come up with a steady stream of ideas. Some days you just don’t feel like writing, or nothing seems interesting enough to write about.

All writers experience slumps at one time or another, but the truth is story ideas are everywhere. Snippets of overheard conversations can inspire characters. With some work and an imagination, weird dreams and passing thoughts can become plots or storylines.

Sometimes it’s as simple as paying attention to what’s going on around you.

The idea for my book Coral Castle originated from a travel brochure and a lot of conspiracy theories. Material for Crosley came from the family history my grandfather and great uncle left behind. Cincinnatus was in part inspired by a real life secret organization called The Society of the Cincinnati. All of these subjects were things I found interesting.

Find the things that interest you and write about them. Chances are someone else will think they are interesting too. Just be sure to write everything down. The best story idea in the world can vanish with one spilled cup of scalding coffee.

What is Coral Castle?

The unexplained is intriguing. Curiosity compels us to continue searching for explanations, even when there might not be any.

The mystery surrounding Coral Castle has made it a tourist attraction in Homestead, Florida. Gigantic blocks of coral rock make-up the castle and other stone sculptures outside. The heaviest of these blocks weighs more than the rocks at Stonehenge.

The structures themselves are interesting enough, but the story behind their creation is what really stirs the imagination.

Edward Leedskalnin, a Latvian immigrant, spent his life building the Coral Castle in the early twentieth century.

How did one man raise 57,000 pound blocks of stone from the ground?

If you ask the Internet, Ed had the help of aliens, the supernatural and a multitude of other conspiracy theories. We tend to let our imagination fill in the gaps when we’re faced with situations we can’t immediately explain. The more outlandish explanations I read, the more I wanted to do my own research.

And so, Jack Heffron and I began to investigate this strange place. Our findings became Coral Castle.

I’ve sorted through facts, speculation and tall tales to bring you an objective look at a subject that is often approached imaginatively, but rarely taken seriously.  I don’t claim to have solved the mystery behind Edward Leedskalnin’s creations, but Coral Castle at least explores all sides of a very interesting story.

 

Stranger Than Fiction

When I wrote Crosley: Two Brothers and a Business Empire that Transformed the Nation, I was writing about a time period I had never experienced. In order to accurately bring my readers the Crosley brothers, I also had to bring them the Depression, The Great War and The Roaring Twenties.

This took a lot of research. I spent hours sorting through other people’s memories in books and articles to better document my own family history. The more I learned about my grandfather and great uncle, the more my readers would learn about the Crosley brothers through my writing.

After writing Crosley, another bout of curiosity led me to research the unexplained Coral Castle. Questions led to more questions, but the mystery surrounding Edward Leedskalnin and his American Stonehenge inspired my book: Coral Castle

Even the fictional events in Cincinnatus: The Secret Plot to Save America are based around a present day patriotic society that operates in secrecy.

Real life can be strange, exciting and just as entertaining as fiction. The stories are already out there. It’s up to you to find them.

Grab an Autographed Copy of Cincinnatus

I’m giving away three autographed copies of Cincinnatus on Goodreads.

Get into the Goodreads giveaway here.  The giveaway closes at the end of this week, so get your hat in the ring soon.

Goodreads Book Giveaway

Cincinnatus
by Rusty McClure

Giveaway ends March 01, 2014.

See the giveaway details

at Goodreads.

Enter to win

 

Who Was Cincinnatus?

I talk a lot about The Society of the Cincinnati, and this guy named Cincinnatus.  So who was this guy?

A couple of weeks ago, I posted some pretty good links to find more information about him.  Find those here.

Those links can do a better job than I can, but here’s the short version:

Cincinnatus (full name of Lucius Quinctius Cincinnatus) was a Roman General in the 5th century B.C.

In his later years, Cincinnatus was living out his time as a farmer, minding his own business.  At the time, the Roman empire was expanding and the Roman armies were scattered to the wind.  So when the so-called barbarians invaded Rome by surprise, there was no one left to stop them.

The Roman Senate called upon Cincinnatus and gave him full dictatorial control to defeat the invaders.  Cincinnatus took control, rallied the army and defeated the invaders.  But that’s not the cool part.

After the invaders were defeated, instead of maintaining control as the dictator, Cincinnatus immediately gave the power back to the senate, and returned to his farm.

He did this again almost 20 years later, and, once again, gave the power back as soon as the conflict was resolved.

This became a model for our founding fathers.  Good leaders use power wisely, and then give it back to the people.  It’s in the nature of humans to hang onto power once they have it, but our founding fathers knew that Cincinnatus set a better model for the way that society and a good government should work.

Do You Read E-books?

I have a simple question for you, do you read e-books?

E-book sales have soared in the past two years.  Some independent publishers are now reporting that up to 50% of their sales are in e-books.

I can see why.  The e-reader technology has gotten a lot cheaper (a simple Kindle is now $69), and Americans are more used to staring at screens for long periods of time than ever before.

For myself, I’m not sure.  I know that there will always be certain books that I want to hold in my hands, it’s part of the experience.  But for a lot of books that I would pick up as a cheap trade paperback, why not give it a try?  You can sometimes save a couple bucks, and the Kindle’s a lot lighter than a stack of books.

Do you read e-books?  Why or why not?  If not, do you plan to?  What would it take to convert you to e-books?

Let me know what you think.

What’s Cincinnatus About?

Call me old-fashioned, but when I decided to write Cincinnatus, I tried to write a book about things that I like.

There are appearances from the Crosley brothers (who I obviously have a great affinity for), Cat Cay (one of my favorite golf courses in the world), the PGA (I’ve been an official golf scorer for years), and this crazy guy I learned about named Ed Leedskalnin (Coral Castle).

Growing up in and around Cincinnati, the book is also about something else I find very interesting, The Society of the Cincinnati.  They’re a secret organization founded by many of the United States’ founding fathers.

But what is Cincinnatus about?  It’s a fast-paced action thriller about a very cool female US Department of Justice attorney who teams up with a washed-up PGA golfer to solve a mystery.  The ball of yarn begins unraveling when they find evidence of a conspiracy to fix golf tournaments, which leads them to a secret plot with millions of lives at stake.

David Stern and I set out to write a really fun book, and that’s what we did.  It’s an amazing adventure that you won’t be able to put down.

Check it out on Amazon.com now.