Wrestling with my characters’ demons helps me defeat my own. The Warrior, a character who’s fighting programming, shadows and guilt—struggles and clings to life so that he might live to see another day and be drawn closer to someone he’s just sure was in his life.

I actually like this new medium’s “not-quite-rights” now and then. Hats off to generative AI video production and story-telling.

I’m finding this really fuels my curiosity and creativity. Reflecting on learning, revisiting epiphanies, observing all that in others…worth a blog post now and then.

Almost any night, I can take the ephemeral reigns of my dreams and guide the coursers where I wish. Thus, I am my own production studio. I don't need CGI, for I have, again, imagination.

The truly scary thing is, it’s a very credible, very possible future. I don’t drive by a power station or a transformer without thinking about this crippling potential end of (our comfy) days.

When I was a kid, I would get a buzz out of the Jetson's and all those gadgets in the opening credits that got George around for the day ahead.

I’m sharing this to reinforce the idea that—despite what my wife says—there is good reason to keep on reading. Keep the faith. Turn the page. Believe in the author.

“They never fail them—these story-people. They live, and we, the readers, live in completeness with them.”

I could eat exactly the same kibble every day for the rest of my life, for to me, food is just sustenance.

My son watches Tik-Tok’s that are satisfying (playdough being sliced, combing long straight hair, etc.) and I would offer that this novel is ever-more satisfying than that!

• directed traffic

• have applauded at over 50 concerts

• have made beautiful music

• have made armpit farts

• are never idle

This book club guide for Lightning’s Hand might start something!

Face it, life can be pretty mundane. Burdens can stack up until they’re soul-crushingly heavy. Souls can be so lonely, so burdened, so overwrought that sometimes getting away from it all is better therapy than a literary bender.

I was coming to appreciate why my son spends hours digging with the enthusiasm of an archeologist all over our property, unearthing rusty bolts and (nearly) unidentifiable car parts.

When I read it recently, I lost sleep, ignored friends and family, skipped a meal…because I was so into it.

This was my first college object lesson, actually running my finger down the spines of those million books like they were a picket fence, from the top to the bottom floor. Prior to that, I had only a vague idea of what a million might really be.

Why should I read that? In my quest for something I’d like, I revisited my first novel and drummed up a few reasons readers might take a shine to it.

He says variously that he's a bad guy, a rascal, a mean old man, destined to a special hell...but in my books, Malcolm Reynolds is the imperfect hero we all need.

They say your first novel is always garbage. They refer to them as vomit drafts and worse. I really did not know what to do with it, so I took their advice and gave it the ol’ heave-ho.

So, I am a wordsmith, but I realize that is going the way of the blacksmith.