Engaging Readers and Our Love of Westerns

Post by Doris McCraw aka Angela Raines

Photo property of the author

The regularly scheduled post has been preempted by this short post. If I've done my job, it should be a 5-7 minute read.

How do we engage people to want to learn history, read history, and the stories we tell about the history of the West?

We have a short window of time to pique interest. We want to share our love, our passions, and our stories. Unless they are already a fan, the information dump is usually a turn-off. Leaving people wanting to know more, well, I think that is more of a win.

I liken this to the 'crisis' class I was semi-required to attend today. In a crisis, you narrow in on the event that is the issue. You tell the authorities what they need to know, leaving out the minute details that are not important at that time. Later, when the crisis is no longer threatening, you will have time to add the other details. If the media is involved, and they try to be first on the scene, you have to ignore their demands and focus on taking care of business. You talk to them later.

It may be better to be brief, leaving people wanting to know more so that they will engage. Once you have engagement, you are far more likely to build a long-term relationship with the reader of your blog, your essay, or your book. 

The other lesson from the class today? Dealing with situations is usually a team effort. As writers, we are used to going it alone. When I decided to pursue this 'next' career, I purposely sought out others who were writing what I was at the time. I connected to a group that was writing a series. By doing so, I was able to not only learn from them but also connected with a wider audience. Never a bad thing as an author.

Those are the thoughts for now. With luck, the regularly scheduled post will show up next month. For now, it back to the book "Under the Stone, Women Doctors in Evergreen Cemetery". It's due soon, so, until next time...

Mock-up of the book cover

Doris McCraw

'Zeke' Ziemann: A Love For the Old West

 It has taken me some time to get back into the swing of the interviews.  I apologize in advance to 'Zeke' for the delay. Much like the cowboys we all love, here is a man of few words. Instead, he uses them in the stories he tells. 

From the author's Amazon Author Page

* What decided you to start writing for publication? 

                My love of Old West History

* Do you like to write short or longer stories?

               I prefer short stories 

* Do you write for the market or yourself? 

                Market

* What life experiences influenced your writing?  

                I have loved Western Movies since my youth

Amazon

* Where did you get the idea for your latest release? 

                Doing research on the history of cattle drives. 

                Title:  Alex, Hank, and Hawk, Cowboys, Gunmen and Road Agents

* Is there a writing routine you follow or do you write when the muse strikes?  

                Most often I write in the evening after my wife is in bed and I am in my office with my dog Duke.

* Is there anything else you feel people would like to know or would be surprised to learn about you?  

                I am a retired mathematics teacher and basketball coach, then a financial planner, and finally the Compliance Supervisor for the Wall Street Firm of an Arizona Office

* Do you write in other genres? 

                Not yet, considering “Baseball history”

* Research, do you find it important? 

                Absolutely  I am fussy about the correct historical setting for my stories.

* What advice would you give to those who dream of writing, or what advice would you give your younger self? 

                Just START.  Start when you get “That Feeling that someone will enjoy your story,"                  Elmore Leonard. my favorite writer

* Have you considered writing a series, either by yourself or with a group?

                 Yes, I am now in the process. of writing a sequel to my book Alex, Hank, and Hawk, Cowboys Gunmen and Road Agents.

Thank you for the insight into your writing life. Wishing you the best with the new series.  For more information about 'Zeke', below are some additional links.

Amazon Author Page

A.L. Shane Books - Amazon

AH - THE WESTERN

 Post by Doris McCraw

writing as Angela Raines

Photo property of the Author

We love the Western Genre. I will say, although perhaps not as popular an idea, the Western, like Romance is a broad category. 

As some of you know I am hoping to post quarterly marketing tips on my personal blog. The thing about marketing, other than being time-consuming and a pain, is you need to know your audience.  Does your audience like action/adventure? Perhaps it's historical, or maybe weird? The thing is, what kind of Westerns do you read? What kind do you write?

I know most of my works have a redemption quality to them. There is also that sense of trying to make it fit into the history of the area and time I'm writing about. Plus, -insert growl here- I've been placed in the 'sweet romance' genre. I may not always get too violent in my work, but sweet? Oh well, it sells and keeps the royalty checks coming. 

Photo property of the author

As I move into 2022 I hope to define not only my sub-genres but the sub-genres each of you write in. It is amazing how knowing where you fit in and who your audience is can help. 

In the meantime, it's writing, editing, and reading as many books by Western Fictioneers members as I can. Supporting others is a big part of who I've always been. The more the word gets out, the better it can be. 

Here's to the Western and all the sub-genres it is composed of. Long live the stories of our history, even those that are fiction.

Doris McCraw

Interview- Author Jeffrey J. Mariotte

This month the interview is with Jeffrey J. Mariotte. An author, like most of us, writes across genres. He co-wrote a story about Joaquin Murrieta and has a new series he has started. I do hope you enjoy Jeff's interview, I know I did.

Amazon

*. What decided you to start writing for publication?

I’ve aspired to writing for publication since early, early days. I was rejected a couple of times in high school. In college I took third place in a San Francisco Bay Area short-story competition, earning my first money—a big $30—for writing. I also had some journalism published, which only whetted my appetite. My first actual fiction sale didn’t come until I was in my thirties, though, to a science fiction anthology. After that, I wrote some comic books and graphic novels, and my first novel was published when I was 44. Since then, I’ve stayed busy.

Amazon

*. Do you like to write short or longer stories?

I lean toward novel length. I’ve written a handful of novellas and maybe a couple dozen short stories, but more than fifty novels. I like to have the space to stretch out and tell a big story that a reader can get lost in for a while. My longest book was published last year by Sundown Press. Blood and Gold: The Legend of Joaquin Murrieta, which I wrote with Peter Murrieta, a direct descendant of the Gold Rush-era bandit, clocked in at nearly 600 pages. I don’t anticipate going that long again any time soon, but anything’s possible.

*. Where did you get the idea for your latest release? What is the elevator pitch for it?

Inside a Confederate prison camp, a dying man tells a young Union soldier is told where a cache of stolen Confederate gold is and asks him to deliver it to the man’s beloved after the war. He finds the gold and—12 years later—finally finds the woman. But in doing so, he walks into a town at war with itself and discovers that the woman has taken up with the mysterious figure at the heart of that war. If he’s going to do his dead friend’s bidding and deliver the gold, he’s got to bring the war to an end—if he can survive it.

I don’t remember where the initial impulse came from. All I had was the young man in the camp and the promise to a friend. I was on a long car ride with Bob Boze Bell, the publisher of True West Magazine, and I told him that part. He said, “What happens next?” I didn’t know. So I had to sit down and figure that out, and that became O’Meara’s Gold, the first book in the Cody Cavanaugh series from Wolfpack Publishing.

Amazon

*. Are you a plotter or a pantser?

I’m definitely a plotter. I’ve written a lot of tie-in fiction, in which you’re writing in an established fictional universe owned by somebody else, and you have to have an outline approved by the license-holder before you can write. Then you have to stick pretty close to that outline. I have written a few books without an outline, but it’s harder going for me. I’m much more comfortable with a roadmap that tells me where I start, where I’m going, and the main points of interest along the way.

*. Do you ‘interview’ your characters before or at any time while telling their story and what do you do if they don’t cooperate with your story idea?

I have done that. I first learned about it in a writing book by my friend David Morrell, and it’s helped me out of a number of tight spots. That said, I don’t do it as a regular practice, just when I can’t figure out what comes next and need my characters to tell me.

*. Do you write in other genres?

I love many different genres—mystery, thriller, horror, western, fantasy, science fiction--and have written in all of them, as well as having written for different media, including comics and graphic novels, games, newspapers, magazines, and the backs of trading cards. I’ve been a member of writer’s organizations for just about all of those genres, but I’ve let some of those memberships lapse. I’m currently a member of Western Fictioneers, the Western Writers of America, the Horror Writers Association, Sisters in Crime, the International Thriller Writers, and the International Association of Media Tie-in Writers because I still occasionally write in all those genres. At the moment, I’m working on a series called Major Crimes Squad: Phoenix, a police-procedural series for Wolfpack Publishing. I don’t know that I could ever pin myself down to just one genre.

*. Research, do you find it important?

Research is definitely important to everything I write. When possible, I like to stand where my characters will, so I can see what they’d be able to see, smell what they’d smell, etc. When writing in a historical era, I need to know what the technology was like, what the prices of things were, what the characters would wear, and so on. Some writers who’ve written lots of western fiction might know those things cold by now, but I’ve fooled around in so many genres that I have to do a lot of reading and a lot of digging, and traveling when I can, to get it right. Or close enough to right that I can tweak it as the story demands.

*. What books or authors you grew up with that inspired you to take pen to paper?

I’ve always been surrounded by books, from Dr. Seuss and the Hardy Boys to today. I’ve managed and owned bookstores and been a publishing executive. I have a massive collection of thousands of books, mostly first edition hardcovers, many of which are inscribed to me thanks to my decades in the book biz. The single book that was most influential in my youth was Mystery of the Haunted Mine, a juvenile novel by Gordon D. Shirreffs. That’s the book that introduced me to Western fiction (though I had been a fan of western TV, movies, and comics since my earliest days), and steered the direction of my life and career.

Jeffrey Mariotte

www.jeffmariotte.com

Amazon Author Page

EXPRIENCE & ENVIRONMENT - MICHAEL R. RITT

For this interview, I get the chance to share Michael R. Ritt's story. Although some may consider him a late starter, his stories have made a big impression. Since interviewing Michael, he has gone on to win the 2021 Will Rogers Medallion First Place Award in Western Fiction for his novel "The Son's of Philo Gaines".  

It's hard to believe it has been a year since these interviews began. 

Michael R. Ritt
photo provided by Mr. Ritt

 When did you realize you wanted to be a writer?

As best as I can remember, I started writing when I was a freshman in high school. I wasn’t a “popular” person in school. I wasn’t involved in sports at all. I was more academic, and, being socially awkward, I did a lot of reading. Reading was a way for me to escape to faraway places and have adventures that my own life would never provide me with. Writing was a natural extension of reading. I think anyone who spends all of their time with their nose in a book is either a writer or secretly desires to be a writer. While in school I wrote some short stories, but I mostly wrote poetry and essays.

Amazon

Did you choose the genre you write in or did it choose you?

This is about as easy to answer as the debate between free will and determinism. I think that my experiences and my environment both collaborated to make me who I am. They helped me to develop a set of values and ideas that are important to me and which inform the writing that I do. Values and ideas such as second chances, family, hard work, independence, personal responsibility, and justice. So, in one sense, I guess that I choose to write Westerns because these are all popular themes in the Western genre. But in another sense, who I am and what’s important to me is a big determining factor in what I write.

I think that it’s interesting that I have a brother who is also an author. He writes under the name of Dean M. King. Although we had the same basic childhood experiences and environment, and we’ve developed almost the same identical set of values, he writes in the horror genre. Maybe that indicates that personal choice is a bigger part of the equation.

What was the nudge that gave you faith that you could and wanted to be published?

I was very fortunate to have made some good friends in the Western writing community who were all very encouraging and very helpful to me when I was trying to get my first short story published. Not the least of these was Brett Cogburn, who is one of my top three favorite contemporary Western authors. Back in 2013, I shared a link with Brett to a story that I had posted online. He read it and saw some potential in me. At the time, he was working on editing a collection of stories for High Hill Press and he worked with me to get a story in shape to be included in the anthology. So, my first story was titled The Conversion of Boze Carter and was included in the anthology Rough Country.

Amazon

Where did you get the idea for your latest release and tell a bit about the story?

My latest release is my first novel, The Sons of Philo Gaines. It was a finalist for two Peacemaker awards in 2020 – Best First Western Novel, and Best Western Novel. It has also been nominated for a Will Rogers Medallion Award.

It’s the story of three brothers who are the sons of a legendary figure named Philo Gaines. Each brother is as different from the other as can be, but each of them is trying to escape their father’s shadow and become their own man. The eldest is a soft-spoken, socially awkward school teacher. The middle brother is a carefree, easy-going gambler, and the youngest one is a gunman with a highly developed sense of justice but a deep distrust of lawmen. The book is rather uniquely formatted as three interconnected novellas with each brother having his own story. Then, at the end of the book, the three brothers all come together to confront the book's main antagonist.

I got the idea for the book one night as I started to think about what my own three sons would be like if they had lived in the old west. So, each of the brothers in the book is actually based on the qualities and characteristics of my own sons.

Are you a plotter or a pantser?

I am very much a pantser. Whether I am writing a book or a short story, I usually only have a vague idea of where the plot will go. I like the idea of discovering what my characters are up to as they move the story forward. However, I find this is a very slow process for me and I am trying to be at least a little more organized when I start a new project.

Amazon

If you had a choice, which is your favorite to write, short stories, novellas, or full-length novels?

Writing a novel is very demanding, and there is a lot of work that goes into it. Before you even start writing, there is research to do. Even if you are writing fiction, you want to be historically accurate with details of clothing, mannerisms, language, and weapons that are mentioned in your book. If you describe places, cities, towns, mountains, rivers; all of these have to be described accurately. If I mention a flower on a cactus in my book, you can be assured that it existed in the location I am writing about, and it was blooming at the time I’m writing about. I even checked astrological calendars to make sure that the moon phase was correct for the day and year that I wrote about.

After the research is the writing and the endless edits. And then, when the book is finally finished and published and, on the shelf, you still have to spend a lot of time in marketing and promoting it.

All of this is to say that I do not have the time to write short stories like I used to, but I will always be a short story writer at heart. I enjoy the challenge of telling a complete story in five thousand to fifteen thousand words, and of creating characters that the reader will connect with when you don’t have the time or space to fully develop them.

Do you write in other genres?

I’m primarily a Western writer, but I will occasionally write in other genres, such as frontier fiction and faith-based fiction (both contemporary and historical). I also write for two blogs that are Western and general historical non-fiction and one faith-based blog.

Are there authors you grew up with or inspired you to take pen to paper?

As far as writing Westerns goes, like many in my generation, I grew up reading Louis L’Amour and Zane Grey. Larry McMurtry and Robert B. Parker were also big influences on me.

Amazon link: https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/143287103X/ref=dbs_a_def_rwt_bibl_vppi_i8

Personal website link: https://michaelrritt.com/home/

Stories Seek Their Own Length - John D. Nesbitt

Spur Award winner John Nesbitt is on tap to share his writer's journey. It's always interesting how early life or just that one someone can set you on a path. As we head into the new year, yes, it's not that far away, take a lesson from John and follow that path.

John D Nesbitt

 When did you realize you wanted to be a writer? 

I am not sure when I realized I wanted to be a writer, but I think it was at a pretty early age. I was good at all subjects in school, so I had concurrent aspirations such as writing for publication and making mathematical discoveries. I made a career decision of wanting to study literature and the practice of writing when I was in my first year of college.

Did you choose the genre you write in or did it choose you?

I think the genre chose me, in that I grew up in the western way of life. My father was a farmer and rancher before he went broke and we took to working in the fields. I write contemporary, retro, and Old West fiction, but it is all about life in the American West as I know it. 

Amazon

What was the nudge that gave you faith that you could and wanted to be published?

When I was in the eighth grade, our class produced a mimeographed collection of poems by the class. When I was in the tenth grade, the English teacher used to post what she selected as the best work on a bulletin board for others to read, and I had a couple of pieces posted there. Both of these experiences gave me the feeling that my work had been read by others and was, in a way, published.

Do your life experiences influence or hinder your writing?

My life experiences influence my writing in a constructive way, as I write about things I know about. For example, I worked in the fields when I was younger, and I have written some successful pieces set in the world of field labor. Also, my experience in farm work, ranch work, hunting, camping, and living in the country have helped me write contemporary and Old West stories.

Amazon - Hardcover

Where did you get the idea for your latest release and tell a bit about the story?

I have two works coming out close together, a novel and a novella. I will talk about the novella here because the idea for it came in a more definite way than with some works. The novella is entitled “Double Deceit,” and it is a frontier mystery featuring my series character named Dunbar. In this story, Dunbar comes to a locale and exposes a quack doctor who was a priest many years earlier and was suspected of murdering a young woman after hearing her confession and then raping her. For several years, I had notes in a folder about a case in Texas in about 1960 in which a young priest had done as mentioned above but had been protected by the church and by local law enforcement. Fifty years later, the man was sarcastic with interviewers, but I am glad to say that he was finally brought to justice. After casting around for a long time for a storyline in which to use some of this material, I landed on the Dunbar story, as Dunbar pursues crimes of this nature. In my story, the perpetrator not only gets away with his earlier crime for many years but goes on to masquerade as a doctor before he is exposed. This aspect of the story comes out of my interest in frauds in general, as I have known a few professional frauds and have known of others. 

Are you a plotter or a pantser?

I am a plotter. I work up a pretty good set of notes, but I am always open to changing things as the story takes its course. 

Is there a writing routine you follow or do you write when the muse strikes?

I work on a storyline at all sorts of times, in and around other tasks and projects. When I work on the manuscript itself, I try to get started by 8:00 in the morning, and I try to get in four or five hours of writing. I write in longhand. In the afternoon or evening, I type what I have written. Sometimes I write more on the same day and get caught up on the typing before long. So my first typed draft is more like a second draft. When I go back through the whole thing, then, I am working on my third draft. 

Amazon

If you had a choice, which is your favorite to write, short stories, novellas or full-length novels?

I like to write at every length, and I like to keep up at all of them. Story ideas seek their own length, so when I have time to work on a story of a certain length, I do that.

Do you ‘interview’ your characters before or at any time while telling their story and what do you do it they don’t cooperate with your story idea?

I try to let my characters fulfill their roles in the story. At the same time, they live in the story, and so their existence is defined by that.

Is there a process where you find your next story or does the idea just hit you?

As I mentioned in topic 5, I keep notes for story ideas. Some ideas accumulate for quite a while. When I am working on a storyline, sometimes I have to ask questions on paper and answer them. All of this communication with myself gets scrapped when I type up the storyline itself.

Is there anything else you feel people would like to know or would be surprised to learn about you?

I once took second place in a “Dare To Be Dull” contest.

Amazon

Do you write in other genres?

As mentioned above, I write Old West, retro, and contemporary fiction, and I write crossover western/mystery. I also write nonfiction of a few different kinds. I have written quite a few autobiographical pieces, some of which have placed in contests, and I hope to do more in this area. I have written several pieces about hunting, and I may bring them together in a collection. I have written textbook/course manuals for my college courses, and I have written one book on fiction writing for writers in general. I have also written about other authors and their works. I have written quite a few poems and have won some nice awards there, and I have written song lyrics. One of my songs is on a CD by Carol Markstrom, and W.C. Jameson arranged and recorded a CD of twelve songs for which I wrote the lyrics.

What are your favorite areas of research and why they are important to you?

I like to research Wyoming history because much of it (such as the abuses of power) is still pertinent today. I like to research other authors and primary works because it is good for me to know about the genres I hope to work in and about literature in general. 

When do you start to ‘market’ your new released?

I am a bit superstitious, so I do not like to talk about something until it is pretty definite. For me, that point occurs when the cover is out and available to be seen by the public. Even then, there have been a couple of significant delays which have made the promotion seem dragged out.

What advice would you give to those who dream of writing, or what advice would you give your younger self?

One piece of advice I would give to aspiring writers is to learn as much as possible and to learn in person when it is possible. This means to read and to discuss ideas with other people, including people who know a great deal about writing. Another piece of advice I would give is to be persistent and to be willing to take advice, whether it is on the sentence level, on the level of narrative technique, or on the level of career management. 

Are there authors you grew up with or inspired you to take pen to paper?

In addition to having a traditional public school education in which we were encouraged to read and write, I have had a good education in literature and languages. My sources of inspiration are broad and diverse.

If it were possible would you choose to go forward in time or back?

I think it would get me in trouble.

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How do you or did you balance work and writing?

For many years when I was a college instructor, I always tended to my salaried work, which meant that I often had to read for class or grade papers in the evenings or on weekends. I worked on my writing in the evenings, on weekends, and during breaks. Sometimes I would write a novel during the school year, but more often, I would work on shorter things, such as stories, poems, articles, and personal essays, as well as story ideas for longer works. I would often write a novel during summer break. I just punched my ticket at my academic position, after forty years at Eastern Wyoming College and several years of part-time and limited-term positions before that, so I am just now getting a sense of what this new era is like. So far, it is like a longer summer break. I start out every day working on writing tasks and projects.

For more on John and his work, check out the links below:

https://johndnesbitt.com/

Amazon Author Page - John D Nesbitt

The Teacher is Usually Right - Richard Prosch Interview

Richard Prosch is multi-talented and recently released a Western trilogy. So what brought him to this genre and place? What sparked the new stories? Read on to learn more about author Richard Prosch's journey. 

Richard Prosch - from his website

1. When did you realize you wanted to be a writer?

My fifth-grade teacher, Mrs. Neuharth, predicted I’d someday be a full-time writer. I liked the idea, and held on to it through an early career in cartooning and graphic design, always writing stories and nonfiction essays in my spare time.

2. Did you choose the genre you write in or did it choose you?

I first chose to write mystery and crime stories, but they always ended up in a rural or Western setting. My grandpa loved Westerns, so around ten years ago I deliberately focused on the genre.

3. What was the nudge that gave you faith that you could and wanted to be published?

I’m gonna go back to my fifth-grade teacher. She’s a smart cookie, and I had no reason to disbelieve her then, nor now.

4. Do your life experiences influence or hinder your writing?

Absolutely influence. Everything I write finds some origin point, no matter how small, in my own life.

Amazon

5. Where did you get the idea for your latest release and tell a bit about the story?

The three-book Hellbenders series from Wolfpack offers readers traditional western action interwoven with historical events and characters occurring in the months prior to the Civil War. So much happened from 1858 to 1860, and I wanted to write a narrative tying some of the events together.

6. Are you a plotter or a pantser?

Pantser –absolutely. If I don’t know how it ends, then the reader won’t either.

7. Is there a writing routine you follow or do you write when the muse strikes?

I always start in the morning re-reading what I wrote the day before, incorporating notes that struck me overnight, fleshing out details, or fixing mistakes. After an hour or so, I’m ready to add the day’s entry which sometimes comes at light speed and other times takes more effort.

Amazon

8.  If you had a choice, which is your favorite to write, short stories, novellas, or full-length novels?

My first love will always be short stories.

9. Do you ‘interview’ your characters before or at any time while telling their story and what do you do if they don’t cooperate with your story idea?

No, I trust the characters to reveal themselves through their dialog and actions. When they don’t cooperate with where the story needs to go, it’s usually a sign I’m tired and need to start fresh.

10. Is there a process where you find your next story or does the idea just hit you?

The ideas come from all over—usually when least expected, but one thing I like to do to deliberately kickstart a bunch of ideas is to sit down with, say, ten different anthologies—preferably from different genres—and look at the table of contents. Then mix and mash titles. Take the first part of a western story and slam it onto the back of a crime story or SF story to create something new and intriguing. Then write the story the new title suggests.

11. Is there anything else you feel people would like to know or would be surprised to learn about you?

My collection of vinyl jazz records is closing in on 1000.

Amazon

12. Do you write in other genres?

I write the Dan Spalding mystery-thriller series and am currently writing number eight. The first six have been collected by Wolfpack in a two-volume set and the seventh, Needle Drop, is also available.

13. When and why did you start the Six-Gun Justice podcast?

Credit for the podcast goes to my partner Paul Bishop who called me up at the end of 2019 and suggested the idea. We kicked it around a bit before diving in headfirst in January of 2020. Our idea was to share our love of the Western genre through its representation in books, TV, movies, comics, and other media—but along the way shine the light on little-known trivia and real-life history. After the first month, we added our Wednesday Conversation segment where we visit with friends who work in the Western genre, and it quickly became a favorite for hundreds of listeners.

For more about Richard: 

https://www.richardprosch.com/

Amazon Author Page

https://wolfpackpublishing.com/richard-prosch/

 

"This is it!" - Interview with Robert J. Randisi

 What is it to be lucky? Getting to 'interview' some amazing writers. Robert J. Randisi is one of those. Who knew back when I started reading some of his work that I would one day be sharing his insights into this career of writing. Reading the answers can inspire others to want to follow in his footsteps, as best they can.

Enjoy, I know I did.

Photo provided by RJR

1. When did you realize you wanted to be a writer?

I was fifteen years old when I decided “This is it! I had gone to the movies to see Paul Newman in HARPER. When I came out I was hooked on the private eye genre. I bought the Ross Macdonald book the movie was based on, THE MOVING TARGET, and I said “This is what I’m going to do for a living by the time I turn thirty.” And I did.

2. Did you choose the genre or did the genre choose you?

The Western genre chose me when a publisher came to me and said, “Can you write Westerns?” I had never thought about it because I was writing mysteries, but I said, “Of course I can!” That’s how The Gunsmith was born. I wrote the first one and the editor said, “It’s good, but we have to break you of this hardboiled style. I said, “In westerns, it’s not hardboiled, it’s hardcase!” I’ve been producing a Gunsmith book every month since January of 1982

3. What was the nudge that gave you the faith that you could and wanted to be published?

There was no “nudge,” there was just never a question of doing anything else. I was committed to this and didn’t allow any room for failure. I made sure I had no other profession to fall back on.

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4. Is there a writing routine you follow or do you write when the muse strikes?

When you’re on a schedule like mine—for the most part, sixteen books a year—there’s no “muse” and there’s no “waiting.” There’s no time between books, there’s just always a book-or two. I usually start to write after breakfast and stop to have dinner.  After that, I’ll take a nap to get the day book out of my head. I head back to the office around nine p.m. and start working on the night book, stop at around midnight (when we have a coffee/tea break) then go back and work from 1 a.m. to 5 a.m.  I go to bed around 5:30 a.m. and sleep til noon.  It only changes if I’m working on three projects at once.  Then there’s the day project, the 9-to-midnight project, and the 1-5 a.m. project. 

5. If you had a choice what is your favorite to write, short stories, novellas, or full-length novels.

My favorite has always been novels. I am just naturally a long-winded sonofagun. Even when I try to write short stories, they usually come out to about ten thousand words. And I ever think in terms of a novella.

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6. Is there a process where you find your next story, or does it just come to you?

As I said about, the process is that there’s always a book, always stories to tell. I don’t understand a life where you don’t wake up in the morning with an idea and go to bed at night with another one.

7. Do you write in other genres?

I’ve written in just about every genre except Romance—but my career has been Mystery and Western. I started out writing mysteries when my first book, THE DISAPPEARANCE OF PENNY, came out in 1980.  It was that same publisher who came to me and asked me to write Westerns.  From that point on, I did both.  While I’ve written about 500 Westerns, I believe I might be better known in the mystery genre,, where I’ve written many private eye books, edited about 30 anthologies. While being one of the founding members of Western Fictioneers I’ve also founded The Private Eye Writers of America, created the Shamus Award, founded the American Crime Writer’s League, and co-created Mystery Scene Magazine (with my late friend and colleague, Ed Gorman)

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Of late I’ve been concentrating on my Rat Pack mysteries series, of which there are 12 books. I’m working on #13. They are now being reprinted and published by Speaking Volumes. I’ve also recently had two books in my Nashville P.I. series appear from Wolfpack Publishing, and two books in by Headstone P.i. series from Down & Out Books.

And of late, as well as the Gunsmith, I’ve been writing Ralph Compton books for Berkley, four of which are now available on Amazon and in Walmart.

RALPH COMPTON SERIES

BIG JAKE’S LAST DRIVE (2021)

FRONTIER MEDICINE (2021)

RIDE FOR JUSTICE (2021)

THE WRONG SIDE OF THE LAW

RAT PACK SERIES

Everybody Kills Somebody Sometime (2006)

2. Luck Be a Lady, Don't Die (2007)

3. Hey There (You with the Gun in Your Hand) (2008)

4. You're Nobody 'Til Somebody Kills You (2009)

5. I'm a Fool to Kill You (2010)

6. Fly Me to The Morgue (2011)

7. It Was a Very Bad Year (2012)

8. You Make Me Feel So Dead (2013)

9. The Way You Die Tonight (2013)

10. When Somebody Kills You (2015)

11. I Only Have Lies for You (2018)

12. That Old Dead Magic (2020)

HEADSTONE SERIES

1. The Headstone Detective Agency (2019)

   2. Headstone's Folly (2020)

NASHVILLE SERIES

1. The Honky Tonk Big Hoss Boogie (2013)

   2. The Last Sweet Song of Hammer Dylan (2019)

For a complete list, check out the link below.

https://www.fantasticfiction.com/r/robert-j-randisi/

Amazon Author Page

Thank you, Robert, for being so generous with your time and knowledge. I know I appreciate your years of experience and all those wonderful stories you've written over the years.