Chicken Liver Blues is Live

Today is the day. My e-book, Chicken Liver Blues, is now live on Amazon. Please stop over and check it out.  Also, the paperback version will be released Friday, December 28.

As always, a big thank you goes out to those who have followed and supported me along the way. If you’ve ever purchased my books or stories, read, liked, shared, mentioned my books and stories to someone, anyone, you are awesome. Thank you!

If you happen to read this book, I hope that it entertains you in some form or fashion. I always try to create stories with hopes of entertaining a few readers. Happy reading.

Release Date for Chicken Liver Blues

After some delay, I’m happy to announce that my book CHICKEN LIVER BLUES will finally be released Friday, December 21 on Amazon. It will be added to other e-book retailing sites thereafter. I hope you check it out.

Here’s the back cover description:
Chicken Liver Blues is an inimitable collection of twelve stories that at times barrels and swerves down rural backroads kicking up gravel and dust in its wake, and other moments it’s a calm late night country cruise that soaks up the stars, the moon, and the heavens while contemplating the meaning of life.
Ride shotgun on this memorable journey that looks in on the struggling working-class, the old moonshiners, the backwoods guitar pickers, the demented Jesus freaks, the alcoholic spouses, the hard luck writers, and other notable characters who try to make it through life the only way they know how…for good or ill.

Featured Stories:
Twenty Dollars
Money
Chicken Liver Blues
The Natural Order of Things
Bluesman of the Woods
The Letter
Jubal Grimes
King of the County
Forsaken Land
The Monsters
One Step Closer to Heaven
The Man in the Meadow

This Old Notebook

In 1993, I was a sixteen-year-old kid trying to fulfill this domineering illusion of becoming a small town’s basketball hero. It was also at this time I was journaling into notebooks, scrawling away about my dreams of becoming the top high school basketball player in the land. Nothing else mattered. No money, clothes, cars, stereo equipment, not even girls could lure me away from the basketball courts and my deep passion for the game.

Sometime thereafter, I’d discovered books and poetry. I found my passion for basketball fading and being replaced with my new obsession with the written word. I began writing my thoughts and feelings and ideas into the notebook pictured above, which ultimately gave me the strength to carry on and face personal demons that had already reared their ugly heads into my young life. Poetry and notetaking also presented me the courage to walk away from the game that I once loved. Many narrow-minded people looked down on me for quitting basketball, but the words captured in this notebook said to follow your heart.

Now, almost 26 years later, I’m still writing and scrawling away in notebooks. Along the way, I’ve written a few books and many short stories, some of which have sold copies all over the U.S. and other far off places. I feel extremely fortunate for that.

I love this old notebook. I look at it and read what’s inside, on the yellow-stained pages with faded ink and smeared pencil, and think back to a young bedroom poet who had dreams of becoming a famous writer. I’m not famous, but I am a writer, and I'm glad that young man from long ago took a chance and followed his heart.

From Brothers of the Mountain: Heart of the Frontier

Running Fox had a row of deep, creased lines that stacked upon a cinnamon colored brow. His hair was the color of cotton and fell to the middle of his back. To look into his sunken eyes, one would see the determination of a prideful man, one who had never given up on his Shawnee heritage. He had overcome countless hindrances throughout his many years on earth and, if one looked deeper into his eyes, they would see the strife that life had dealt him, the strife that hardened his soul.

The old man leaned on his oak walking staff while he penetrated the abdomen of a cottontail with his hunting knife. He slit the animal to the top of its ribcage and removed the entrails by sinking his hand inside and ripping them clean. He cut away the feet and head and threw them over into some bushes. Next, he slipped the blade between the fur and flesh and cut away the meat he intended to roast for his morning meal.
After skinning the animal, he clutched the oak staff with his frail-looking hand and squatted next to a creek bank. He dipped the bloody carcass and knife into the stream to rinse them both. On ancient legs, he struggled to stand. His form was not properly straight as it once had been many years ago. Now, his back remained as arched as the rolling hills just beyond the creek by which he stood.

-- Excerpt from the book Brothers of the Mountain: Heart of the Frontier.

Seven Years

The other day marked seven years since I became an indie author. Just another day, really. But here’s to hoping and wishing for many more years of sound mind and body and the ability to make shit up and write it down. And to those who’ve followed me along the way, supported me, and stuck by me, I thank you very much.

Chicken Liver Blues has a Cover

Happy to reveal my new cover for my upcoming book. Thanks to Maxcovers over at Fiverr for a job well done. Also, I hope to have a release date pinned down for this sucker very soon. Stay tuned.

Description for Chicken Liver Blues:

Chicken Liver Blues is an inimitable collection of twelve stories that at times barrels and swerves down rural backroads kicking up gravel and dust in its wake, and other moments it’s a calm late night country cruise that soaks up the stars, the moon, and the heavens while contemplating the meaning of life.

In “Twenty Dollars” a working-class man whose marriage is on the brink of unraveling is convinced to go out for another night of drinking, but this time his night out with the guys changes his life in more ways than one.

In “Bluesman of the Woods” a young guitar rambler has the desire to make it to the big time and thinks an old family friend can help him get there, but the old friend is feeling the effects of a family tragedy and needs a jumpstart of his own.

In “The Letter” a regretful, aging writer comes down from the hills to make his yearly pilgrimage to town to hand-deliver a birthday letter to his estranged daughter.

In the country noir story “Forsaken Land” Sheriff Randall King is feeling the repercussions of losing his younger sister and of a deadly shootout, both of which happened one year before.

In “One Step Closer to Heaven” a young couple is convinced that eliminating all the free-roaming sexual predators of the world will give them full access through the Pearly Gates.

In the horror-flavored “The Man in the Meadow” a young boy seeks an inhumane course in order to deal with a school bully, but finds out his chosen tactic is a messy one for all involved.

Ride shotgun on this memorable journey that looks in on the struggling working-class, the old moonshiners, the backwoods guitar pickers, the demented Jesus freaks, the alcoholic spouses, the hard luck writers, and other notable characters who try to make it through life the only way they know how…for good or ill.

Featured Stories:

Twenty Dollars

Money

Chicken Liver Blues

The Natural Order of Things

Bluesman of the Woods

The Letter

Jubal Grimes

King of the County

Forsaken Land

The Monsters

One Step Closer to Heaven

The Man in the Meadow

New Short Story Published at Plumb Journal

I'm pleased to announce that my short story "Bluesman of the Woods" was recently accepted and published over at Plumb Journal. I couldn't be more proud. This story will also be included in my forthcoming book, CHICKEN LIVER BLUES: Stories. So, if you have a moment, click over and give it a read, and while you're there check out the great stories and literary insights by Sheldon Lee Compton, Chris Offutt, Rusty Barnes, and others. You won't be disappointed. I guarantee it.