Welcome,
While life takes us down varied paths, the creative voice, unknown and indefinable for many years was always behind me, like a shadow, whispering into my ear. With A Walking Parody that whisper became a shout.
Don Henley once introduced the song Heart of the Matter by saying it took him thirty minutes to write and thirty years to live. It took twenty years to live A Walking Parody and nine months to write; the whispers were many over the years but I needed to hear the shout. As they say the years pass by in the blink of an eye.
It’s been an interesting journey; like most people there have been good and bad days with most falling in between. I was twenty-five when I decided to backpack through Europe—I visited thirteen countries and thirty-nine cities and many were used as settings in my story. It was as if my lead character, Boyd Adamson, accompanied me on the adventure—though with a different motivation. I was in search of knowledge and a good time while Boyd was trying to piece together a life shattered by apathy—he was unaware that his life was falling apart until it fell.
The Greater Fool evolved out of a quote by William Blake—If the fool would persist in his folly, he would become wise. It’s about professional ambition, fraying friendships, unrequited love and a broken marriage. Provocative leads and colourful secondary characters steer the intertwining stories through the enduring chasm between politics and the media and deep into the heart of modern urban life.
The Corridor began as a straight-ahead detective story, but the more I delved into the life of John Carlo Padolini the more layers I discovered. I had Fargo and Chinatown in my head as I wrote the story; Fargo for the lighter side of violent crime and Chinatown for the interconnected plot lines all told from the perspective of the protagonist. John Carlo’s investigation into his father’s murder leads him down dark tunnels and into drugs, extortion, vengeance and murder. He tries to find comfort with a love that is both blind and lethal. Deceived by those he thought he could trust he runs afoul of both sides of the law and is faced with a more urgent need than discovery—survival.
I don’t write sports often anymore—except when I want to rant on twitter @mhobson12. I use social media to mostly comment on current events. We live in troubled times but I believe we can overcome. We the people are in charge of democratic nations, not those in government, and we need to use our voices to enlighten and unite against those who wish to control us. Authoritarian regimes create dystopian societies; they seek the destruction of truth and the common good. We need to stand up to bullies. We can’t afford the time wasted by having corrupt and incompetent leaders, the world is in danger. The climate crisis is the single greatest threat to mankind and we must vote for those who accept it and are determined to change it. We must vote—it is how the civilized world overthrows governments and sets the agenda. Millions die across the planet attempting to gain the right to vote; don’t abuse it, don’t take it for granted and don’t be deceived by those who want to take you away from following your heart. Wherever your heart leads you know that it is your own path.
Most ideas stay in my head but once I am able to formulate an outline it usually takes about nine months to finally give birth to the story. That means working through the many crises in confidence when I feel that the work isn’t good enough. I am a firm believer that success is ten percent inspiration and ninety percent perspiration, so I press forward each day hoping my latest idea will mesh with the style in perfect prose. It is my continuing hope to create the perfect story.
