Cities Fell. Earth Opened. Planets Tilted. Stars

The Earliest Influence On Me Was The Movies Of The Thirties When I Was Growing Up. Those Were Stories. If You Look At Them Now, You See The Development Of Character And The Twists Of Plot; But Essentially They Told Stories. My Mother Didn't Go To The Movies Because Of A Religious Promise She Made Early In Her Life, And I Used To Go To Movies And Come Home And Tell Her The Plots Of Those Old Warner Brothers/james Cagney Movies, The Old Romantic Love Stories. Through These Movies That Had Real Characters, I Absorbed Drama, Sense Of Pacing, And Plot.

He Was Swept With A Sadness, A Sadness Deep And Penetrating, Leaving Him Desolate Like Someone Washed Up On A Beach, A Lone Survivor In A World Full Of Strangers.

I Read A Lot Of Detective Stories Because They Always Deliver. They Give You A Beginning, A Middle, And An End - A Resolution. The Modern Novels I Read Don't Always Deliver Because I'm Looking Essentially For A Story. As In Shakespeare, "the Play's The Thing." In Particular I Read Detective Stories For Pacing, Plot And Suspense.

I'm Weary Of The Battle. But A Tired Fighter Can Still Be A Fighter.

And He Did See--that Life Was Rotten, That There Were No Heroes, Really, And That You Couldn't Trust Anybody, Not Even Yourself.