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I first conceived of the idea of writing The Boys of Chattanooga while a graduate student at the University of Evansville. It was there that I first learned of the Army of the Cumberland’s charge up Missionary Ridge, and it was there that I first began to wonder why such an inexplicable charge with such tremendously successful results wasn’t better known, especially when I learned that more men charged at Chattanooga than at Gettysburg or Antietam, or Malvern Hill. It was the largest single massed assault of the war that caught the Confederates by surprise and was the only one made without orders from any commanding officer. I might add that the charge surprised Generals Grant and Thomas too, and yet no historian has ever been able to explain why the Army of the Cumberland made the assault.
Learning all of this, I resolved to research the battle further and to write a fictionalized account about why the men charged as they did. It was to be over twenty years before I got the first draft into my computers memory banks, but the desire to write the book never faded; I just never had the time. But when the girls were both off to college and it was only my wife and me, I wrote it, and then spent almost ten years revising it and sharpening it until I thought it was right.
My first book, Twelve Tingly Tales, I published under the pseudonym “Craig Hoskins.” I based most of my stories upon events I had been told or experiences in our lives as we raised our daughters with the help of two wonderful black Labs. In every one of my stories, except for “Snake,” there is at least a kernel of truth. My parents actually witnessed the supernatural brawl related in “The House” while my brothers and sister and I slept. “Katie,” was based upon a story that my Aunt told us when we were young while Eddie Burnhart was a character who came from my aunt too. The stories about the dogs were based upon different incidents through their lives, and yes, they did protect our girls on those different occasions.
As for the future, I’m trying to place a novel with a publisher about a genetically altered coyote who terrorizes a remote Nevada town. I am also polishing a novel about two brothers who attempt to communicate and heal the wounds of their childhood. In addition, I have another novel about an alien dog that is let loose in the Nevada desert to track fugitives from his home planet. Also, I have plans for another collection of short stories: “Women Who Love Men.” The stories aren’t pornographic, but rather a mixture of paranormal and horror. I have a lot to keep me busy, and I enjoy myself once I sit down and do it.
I can’t claim to have had any great financial success, but the sales of my books are picking up, and I like what I’m doing. I have no really great sage advice for aspiring writers except to stay focused and not try to accomplish too much in a single day. Faulkner would feel the overpowering urge to write and lock himself in his bedroom with a case of whiskey and go at it. He claimed that many of his novels were done in one draft, but Faulkner was a genius, and there aren’t a whole lot of geniuses around. Don’t overwork yourself, and don’t worry about it. Once you start, the story will tell itself; you’ll just be a medium between your computer and it.
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