The first two chapters of my novel that was a finalist for the Bellwether Prize, created by Barbara Kingsolver, “in support of a literature for social Change. Published Summer 2014.

“A Story Teller’s Story.” The author’s journey as a writer – through personal darkness and back into the light, guided in part by Taoist principles. Given at the Unitarian Universalist Church, Kennebunk, Maine; Sunday, January 26th, 2014.

Déjà vu.
Wrongly imprisoned and then exonerated for a murder he didn’t commit, Jake Cain now works with law enforcement agencies all over the country to find kidnapped and missing persons, and to solve homicides. When the daughter of a friend is murdered, he takes on the challenge of finding her killer. To be published in 2015.

Book of Light.
Set in the 4th century A.D., Mikos, a young scribe at the great Alexandria library, steals a trove of banned, heretical Gnostic texts to prevent their destruction by the church. He buries them in the desert, and then flees to Jerusalem with one he can’t part with, the Book of Light, attributed to Mary Magdalene, telling of a Jesus and his teachings radically different from the New Testament. Mikos is pursued by an avenging priest.

Dani’s Gift.
Three kids swear an oath of “friends forever – no matter what” the summer they’re thirteen. Life darkly thwarts the honoring of their oath. Twenty years later, two of them – Luke Preston and Dani Cahill – attempt to reconcile what happened and its ruinous fallout – and together to find redemption.

Hour of the Dragon.
Aaron Wainwright, a young Cal Berkeley physicist, is plagued throughout life by disturbing dreams about two visages he knows only as “the Seer” and the “the Knower.” His life is upended when his mentor dies, a supposed suicide. He “knows” that his friend did not kill himself, and begins to follow his psychic premonitions and dreams to determine what really happened and why.

“The Life and Times of a River Man.” A personal reflection on a friendship between an elderly black man on Daufuskie Island, South Carolina, and the author, when the author spent a year living and teaching on the island.

“Filming of the Great Santini.” On location in Beaufort, South Carolina, during the filming of Pat Conroy’s novel based on his life growing up the son of Marine Corp fighter pilot. A story about how fiction mirrors art on both the page and screen – and also between Conroy and his father on location together during the filming of the movie.

“If Thou Wilt Be Perfect.” The story of a monk’s life of faith in a Trappist monastery in rural Georgia.

“Travels with Lonesome Walt.” The travels and travails of one man who lives and travels about in the intermountain West, hopping freight trains when the spirit moves him.

Black River Dreams, by Maximilan Werner. A poignant, often lyrical collection of essays on fly-fishing and life.
http://www.pressherald.com/2010/11/14/fishermans-tales-rich-with-the-flow-of-life_2010-11-14/

The Words I Chose: A Memoir of Family and Poetry, by Wesley McNair. Former poet laureate of Maine, McNair’s memoir is hauntingly beautiful and keenly insightful about how life informs and infuses his life’s work as a poet.
http://www.pressherald.com/2013/03/24/poets-work-shares-how-torn-family-shaped-him_2013-03-24/

Uncle Tom’s Cabin and the Reading Revolution, by Barbara Hochman. A brilliant, illuminating look at a book that was first ignored, then embraced, then bitterly criticized by blacks. White readers after the Civil War loved it, making it America’s first bestseller, sweeping away lingering Puritan notions of reading for pleasure as the devil’s handiwork.
http://www.pressherald.com/2011/10/09/how-uncle-toms-cabin-changed-what-and-why-we-read_2011-10-09/

Author profile: award-winning novelist Elizabeth Hand. Hand is renowned as a novelist of broad interests and immense talent, winning literary honors in fantasy, horror, mystery, and psychological thrillers.
http://www.pressherald.com/2012/06/17/magic-works-for-all-ages_2012-06-17/

1/22/63, by Stephen King.
A time traveler seeks to prevent the assassination of JFK – without changing everything else in history. Ultimately, the book is a love story.
http://www.pressherald.com/2011/11/06/king-explores-time-travel-with-11_22_63_2011-11-06/

Everything Beautiful Began After, by Simon Van Booy.
A love triangle between three acquaintances in Greece, all with fractured, buried pasts. One of the most beautifully written, moving, and haunting novels I’ve ever read.
http://www.pressherald.com/2011/07/24/missing-pieces-hold-a-story-worth-digging-into_2011-07-24/

Life Among Giants, by Bill Roorbach.
Roorbach remarked at a public event that the publicist for his latest novel “hated it. He couldn’t boil it down.” It is indeed difficult to pigeon-holed, but tells a hugely satisfying tale.
http://www.pressherald.com/2013/04/21/giant-challenge-woven-into-a-memorable-tale_2013-04-21/

Mourning Dove, by Meg Wilson.
Based on real events in Maine. A deer hunter accidentally kills a young boy swinging in his back yard. The hunter and his wife and young son move away; then return years later – the hunter seeking redemption. The hunter’s son and the dead boy’s sister fall in love before they discover the tragic link that ties them.
http://www.pressherald.com/2013/12/01/book_review__novel_spins_tale_of_grief_and_love_out_of_hunting_death_/

Railroad to the Moon, by Jean Flahive.
Based in part on real events in the late 1800s. It is the story of a special friendship between a former slave and a young boy who’s brother helped him gain his freedom.
http://www.pressherald.com/2013/10/27/book_review__jean_flahive_s__railroad_to_the_moon__/

Red Ruby Heart in a Cold Blue Sea, by Morgan Callan Rogers.
This is a finely-nuanced coming-of-age story of a young girl who struggles with life after her mother inexplicably “disappears.” Filled with wonderful, fully drawn characters.
http://www.pressherald.com/2012/03/04/a-rich-coming-of-age-tale-colored-by-loss_2012-03-04/

The Bone Orchard, by Paul Doiron.
Fifth in a mystery series featuring a young, impulsive Maine Game Warden. One of the best yet by the former editor of “Down East Magazine.”
http://www.pressherald.com/2014/07/05/a-satisfying-shift-in-bone-orchard-as-warden-mike-bowditch-evolves/

The Illusions of Separateness, by Simon Van Booy.
Van Booy is an uncommon writer who tells stories of the heart that are achingly poignant and brilliantly crafted. Illusions tells of a handful of character whose lives are interconnected, often without them knowing it. Spellbinding.
http://www.pressherald.com/2013/12/22/book_review___the_illusion_of_separateness__an_arresting_work_by_simon_van_booy_/

The Sweet Relief of Missing Children, by Sarah Braunstein.
“Sweet Relief” is an unflinching probe into the frailty of children’s dreams and desires. Even though grown-ups figure prominently, most remain emotionally crippled by childhood wounds.
http://www.pressherald.com/2011/06/11/power-in-the-pieces-and-in-the-whole_2011-06-12/

Sonny Days
At once harrowing and tender, unflinching and honest, “Sonny Days” is the compelling story of William B. McClaran’s long and varied career in law enforcement. It covers his dark side journey as a federal undercover narcotics agent into the light of community policing as the youngest chief of police in three very different American cities during turbulent times. Published July 2014.

The Road to Manufacturing Success
A business memoir that chronicles the life of a Dick Lilly, a serial entrepreneur in the high tech industry, from his early days at IBM to the computing revolution sparked by PCs and the Windows operating system. Published 2001.