Johnny Quentin

My writing process always begin with characters. This next book will be easier because I already have the main character: Johnny Quentin from "The House of Thee Murders." Several of the new characters who will be involved with him are beginning to appear and interact with him.

I am beginning to see Johnny as he returns to Smoke Tree from his eight years as an Army Ranger and two tours of Vietnam, one as an advisor and one as a member of the First Cavalry. I see him mourning the death of his good friend Charley Merriman, killed during the battle of Ia Drang. I hear in my head the song he hears over and over in his, a song written by a member of the Cav. "It was the thirteenth of November, had a real bad day, when we first met the Cong at Landing Zone X-ray." See his struggles to fit into the civilian world. His failure to make the transition. His alienation and retreat into the vast Mojave Desert as a means of self-discovery and reconciliation with his past.

As scenes from his outcast state appear in my dreams and during walks in the hills near my home, I find myself beginning to inhabit this young man's skin. He is haunted by demons from his past.