Masterclass Instructor, USA Today Bestselling Author, and Chanticleer Keynote Kim Hornsby invites you to join her on the next adventure!
Realize your book-to-screen dreams in Greece this fall!
When your mission is to Discover Today’s Best Books, you come across good news regarding authors!
Kim Hornsby came to Chanticleer as a First Place Winner for the Paranormal Awards (now Shelley Awards) almost a decade ago for her book Dream Jumper, which has been optioned for film. She gave the Friday keynote at the last Chanticleer Authors Conference where she shared insights from her journey from bestselling novelist to produced screenwriter—and she’s ready to show authors how to follow in her footsteps.
Hornsby’s family adventure film Braving Rapids launched May 15th across streaming platforms, bringing her rafting screenplay to life with what she describes as “a darling puppy” and a heartwarming story about a grieving family’s healing journey. And the good news keeps coming as her Lifetime Thriller, Secret Life of My Other Wife recently premiered on LMN!
Authors can learn to write a screenplay while staring at the cerulean Aegean Sea, and already one Chanticleer author has signed up for the adventure. For authors dreaming of seeing their stories on screen, this is a rare opportunity to learn from someone who’s actually done it. From her island home off Seattle, Hornsby has transformed her Chanticleer-recognized paranormal fiction into a multimedia success spanning streaming platforms, cable networks, and film options.
Don’t miss out! Several Chanticleer International Book Award divisions have deadlines fast approaching. Kim’s journey from Shelley Award winner to produced screenwriter shows exactly what recognition can launch. Whether you’re crafting paranormal fiction for our Shelley Awards or working in any of our genre divisions, professional recognition opens doors to opportunities you might never have imagined.
In a time when we’re all thinking what it means to be an American, it is important to self-reflect on what these turbulent times mean, what change is happening, and what our values as Americans will be in the future.
Chanticleer Book Reviews wants to honor this moment by examining the work of an author we’ve had a relationship with for years. Janice S. Ellis, Ph.D. has been an author for more than thirty years, writing for newspaper columns and appearing on broadcast radio and streaming services regularly. Along with many other awards, her books have won the CIBA Grand Prize in the Nellie Bly Division for Investigative and Long Form Journalism Works and the CIBA Journey Book Awards for Overcoming Adversity. Her works address political, racial, educational, and socioeconomic news and issues.
At Chanticleer, we’ve had the honor of recognizing Dr. Ellis’s exceptional work. More importantly, her works have consistently earned five-star reviews from our editorial team for books including:
Dr. Ellis’ most recent contribution to the Missouri Independent is called “Longing for a State and Country I Can Believe In.” Her article has been distributed in publications across the country—and we want to share it with you as well! This column is a self-reflective piece that strikes a chord with what many of us are feeling today. Here’s an excerpt from the article:
This column is a major departure from how I have written columns for nearly four decades.
It is personal.
I have avoided using “I’ and have endeavored to remain objective and impersonal as I have addressed and analyzed myriad social, educational and political issues across race, age, gender and socioeconomic status.
That has been my practice, whether writing for radio, in print when I wrote for The Kansas City Star and other newspapers, or online writing for The Missouri Independent the last four years. Even in my own blog.
Maybe the “I” in this column is a “collective I” that tugs.
I have a hunch that many of my fellow Missourians and Americans may be feeling as I do as we live through unprecedented, tumultuous, and unsettling political times.
This is exactly why Chanticleer exists—to discover, celebrate, and amplify the voices that help us understand our world and ourselves. Dr. Ellis represents the kind of author we’re proud to champion: someone whose work combines rigorous journalism with deep humanity, whose perspective is informed by lived experience, and whose willingness to evolve keeps her relevant across decades.
As Dr. Ellis reminds us, “E pluribus unum”—out of many, one. It’s a motto that speaks not just to our national identity, but to the power of diverse voices coming together to create understanding.
Celebrating Juneteenth and the Stories That Unite Us
This Juneteenth, we encourage reflection on the stories that have shaped us and the voices that continue to guide us forward. Dr. Ellis’s journey from objective journalist to someone willing to say “I” in service of a larger “we” reminds us that the most powerful writing often comes when we’re brave enough to be both professional and personal.
Want to learn more about Dr. Janice Ellis and the books she’s written? Here are links to our interview with Dr. Ellis and a Chanticleer review of her book—
Janice S. Ellis, M.A., M.A., Ph.D., a native daughter of Mississippi, grew up and came of age during the height of the Civil Rights Movement and the Women’s Liberation Movement.
Dr. Ellis has been an executive throughout her career, first in government, then in a large pharmaceutical company, and later as a president and CEO of a marketing firm and a bi-state non-profit child advocacy agency. In addition to those positions, she has been writing columns for more than four decades on race, politics, education, and other social issues for newspapers, radio, and online. Her commentary can be found atjanicesellis.com. You can follow her onhere on Facebook.
CHANTICLEER 10 QUESTION AUTHOR INTERVIEW SERIES with Award-Winning Author, Kathryn Caraway
Hello friends, we have another fabulous interview for you today, with author Kathryn Caraway! Her book Unfollow Me took home the Chanticleer 2024 CIBA Grand Prize Award in the Journey Division and we were excited to learn more about what inspired her to write her true crime novel and what she’s planning next. Take a minute or two and get familiar with Kathryn and her incredible journey to becoming award-winning author!
Chanti: Hi Kathryn, and thank you for making the time for this. Let’s start with the basics. How would you describe the genre you write in, and what drew you to it in the first place?
Caraway: I write exclusively in the thriller genre. My dad loved reading Stephen King novels, but I wasn’t allowed. Instead, I snuck them off the bookshelf once he finished the book and read it at night under the covers with a flashlight. I became addicted to the pulse pounding, page turning, can’t-wait-to-read-the-next-chapter hallmarks of the thriller genre that drew me in as a reader and now, challenges me as a writer.
Chanti: Something feels so right about the image of sneakily reading Stephen King under the covers. Like King, your writing is deeply compelling. Can you talk about where you draw inspiration from for you ideas?
Caraway: Aside from the nonfiction and its companion fictional sequel, I create stories rooted in experience. After writing the first two books, I was so emotionally taxed that I wasn’t sure I would write again. But ideas came at random. For example, while driving down the interstate, a sign captured my attention and planted the seeds for my third book. Five months later, the first draft was written.
Chanti: Inspiration really can strike anywhere! When it comes to actually sitting down to write, how structured is your approach?
Caraway: Not structured at all, especially if I’m writing a first draft. If I need to think through a particular scene, I’ll do laundry. If I’m trying to figure out a plot point, I’ll clean the bathroom or do the dishes. I’m also easily distracted by my pup. I don’t pay attention to the technical elements of writing (character arc, story arc, etc.) during a first draft. I bounce between different parts of my manuscript so much that I once broke the wheel on my mouse!
Chanti: Ha! You definitely give your mouse and computer quite a workout! Speaking of influences, every writer has their literary heroes. Which authors do you turn to for inspiration, and how have they shaped your work?
Caraway:
Stephen King: You never forget the first book that wowed you and I always turn back to how I felt reading his books. This has been a big influence on me because I work hard to create those pulse pounding scenes that makes readers want to inhale the words and turn the page.
Karin Slaughter: I binged a series she wrote many years before I started writing. I fell in love with the way she framed scenes that felt real, like I was living in the book with her characters. And that’s what I strive for in my writing.
John Steinbeck:Of Mice and Men was required reading when I was in school. We had to annotate each chapter as we read. I still have the original book which, for many years, was my go-to on the nightstand when I couldn’t sleep. His use of short chapters makes time spent reading feel irrelevant and the story moving forward at a quick pace. This is something I keep in mind when I’m organizing chapters, harnessing that tempo that will appeal to readers.
Marie Still: This is a newer author on the market that I had the good fortune to meet at a conference. She gifted me her book, We’re All Lying, and I devoured it. What captivated me was the way I connected with her main character because of my own life experiences. Since I was new at writing, I spent hours breaking down this character to understand the construction behind it. This is the experience I want to provide readers of Unfollow Me. While Marie’s character is fictional, I am the main character in Unfollow Me, so this meant I also had to get comfortable with revealing uncomfortable stuff to my readers.
Chanti: What a diverse group of influences! Every writer has their strengths. What aspect of writing do you feel most confident about, and what advice would you give to someone struggling in that same area?
Caraway: I feel the most confident in writing characters. I don’t really develop them until the second draft—once I have a big picture idea of their place in the story. One of the tricks I use is signs of the Zodiac. There’s so much information on each sign and the related personality that I give my characters birthdays. Before I write about them, I’ll read their horoscope and sometimes even get ideas from there. This method is especially helpful when I have multiple works in progress. If you’re struggling with a character, give them a birthday and read their horoscope!
Chanti: That’s a great idea! Do you have any other ways to work on your writing? How do you grow your author chops?
Caraway: Read, read, read! I read mostly in the thriller genre, but sometimes I need a break and will read something totally different. But it’s not just books you have to read, it’s reviews. To grow as an author, you have to understand your audience—what they want, what they’re looking for, what they’re turned off by. I’m not suggesting authors read their reviews, but I read the reviews of bestsellers in my genre to study the competition.
Chanti: Smart strategy for understanding your market! When you think about your ideal reader—the person who would absolutely love Unfollow Me—who comes to mind?
Caraway: Fans of true crime, as well as suspense/thriller fiction readers would be the best fit for my book. It is creative nonfiction which means it’s a true story written to read like fiction.
Chanti: The combination of true crime and thriller elements is certainly a natural one. What’s next on the horizon for you? What can your readers look forward to?
Caraway: Getting the Unfollow Me Duet out has been the sole focus on my daily activities. I have two other books fully written in draft form that I will eventually turn back to. Stay tuned!
Chanti: Exciting! Changing gears a little bit back to the mechanics of getting the work done—do you ever hit those dreaded writer’s block moments? And if so, what’s your secret for getting unstuck?
Caraway: Funny you should ask! The same question recently came up with a group of young writers in the Hey, Young Writers group.
Several years ago, when I first started writing, a friend of mine sent me an avatar that I named Pat/Patrick/Patricia. It’s framed and sits on my desk to represent my readers. When I get stuck, I think of what Pat/Patrick/Patricia might want to happen next and sometimes I even talk it out with the frame (yes, with an inanimate object). It doesn’t matter if it’s a silly idea because those often lead to the BEST ideas. The important thing I have to remind myself is not to force an idea to come. It always seems like when I push it from my mind, that’s when ideas on how to get unstuck hit me. Like, wham!
Chanti: I love the idea of having a reader avatar! Finally, writing can be emotionally intense work, especially given the nature of your stories. How do you unwind and recharge when you’re not writing?
Caraway: I am an avid scuba diver with quite a few dive certifications. I love to travel, dive, and experience new ecosystems. I love that when I’m underwater, nothing else in the world matters. And, of course, reading—especially on a rainy day.
If you would like to support Kathryn’s work, and get a pre-release copy of Unfollow Me and its sequel He Follows Me, her Kickstarter project is running through the end of June. Unfollow Me Duet Kickstarter
Kathryn Caraway has lived the life she now writes about. Targeted by a stalker, she’s traveled through the justice system seeking help, protection, and the conviction of the man who turned her world upside down. After he received only a short sentence for three separate charges, and added two probation violations to his record, Caraway chose to erase her presence from public view. She quit her job, changed her name, relocated, and deleted all her social media profiles, only to find out that he continued to violate the protective order by attempting to locate her.
To deal with the stress of the situation, Caraway turned to her education, a Bachelor of Arts in the English degree family, and began to write about her experience. She’s always been an avid reader and has been writing stories as a hobby since she was fourteen. With a new name, in a strange place and no job, writing her story quickly became her passion. In 2022, she wrote her true crime memoir, Unfollow Me, and later that year she followed it up with a fictional alternate ending to the same story. The thrill of writing plot twists with characters developed from her imagination became a thrill, and, after writing the first book, she created the pseudonym “Kathryn Caraway” and decided to venture down the dark, scary path of publishing.
Hello friends, we have another fabulous interview for you today. Author Tim Facciola took home the Chanticleer 2023 Overall Grand Prize for A Vengeful Realm, and the 2024 Grand Prize in the Series division for the first book in his The Scales of Balance Trilogy. We recently spoke with Tim to discuss his writing journey, his research methods, and the great success his series is seeing! Take a minute or two and get familiar with Tim—you won’t be sorry!
Chanti: Your A Vengeful Realm series creates this fascinating blend of fantasy and historical elements. I’m curious—what originally drew you to fantasy as a genre, and what made you decide to weave those historical themes throughout your story?
Facciola: Fantasy has always been my go-to. More specifically, sword and sorcery fantasy with a bend towards political intrigue that explores real-life social issues, interpersonal relationships, and the depth and nuance of the human condition. There is something special about the speculative genre that lowers a reader’s inhibitions and allows them to leave their preconceived notions, prejudices, biases, and sense of self outside the covers of the book. Divorced of the real-world for a time, they’re more likely to formulate new ideas, opinions, and understandings that aren’t swayed by our real-life culture. My hope is that my stories don’t necessarily provide answers, but rather they invite readers to ask better questions of themselves and how they see the world. I don’t think there is a better medium than fantasy to accomplish just that.
Chanti: Fantasy does give writers incredible freedom to create their own rules and style. When you’re crafting your stories, do you find yourself sticking to traditional fantasy conventions, or are you more of a rule-breaker?
Facciola: I spent a lot of time learning the rules, studying story structure and the psychology associated with story and how it impacts us. There’s an infinite amount of rules out there, and I do believe the people that came up with them are onto something; but as much as it’s important to know the rules, my favorite rule is the last rule at the bottom of all the best “rules of writing”: Do what serves your story best. I think you have to know the rules to break the rules, and even in breaking the rules, it’s important to know which rules and why. But I wouldn’t say I make up my own rules.
Chanti: I love that philosophy! Speaking of your process, you sound like someone who puts a lot of thought into structure. How organized are you when it comes to your actual writing routine?
Facciola: I am what people might call a plotter or an architect. I spend a lot of time in the pre-drafting phase building out my world, the history, cultures, religions, myths & legends, how accurate the perceptions of those things actually are, how the magic system works, etc. Then once I feel like I’ve established a world that could possibly feel lived in, I build out my cast of characters and the role functions they’ll serve within the story. Depending on how fleshed out my initial concept is, I might go into their internal arcs or the thematic development I want their arc to convey. Sometimes that is something learned along the drafting/revision journey. Once I have my characters and the world they’ll be challenging the status quo of, I start plotting. For plotting, I start out with a two to three sentence elevator pitch, then expand it into a 7-10 sentence synopsis, then a chapter by chapter outline. And if all goes well, then I might actually start writing the story!
Chanti: That’s incredibly thorough! With all that detailed planning, I have to ask—do you ever hit those dreaded writer’s block moments? And if so, what’s your strategy for getting past them?
Facciola: A complicated answer, but I don’t believe in it. Sure, there might be times in which a particular scene isn’t going the way you want, or you’re not quite sold on how the blocking is set up or how a particular plot point lines up. But just like any puzzle, there’s an answer. Whenever I feel stuck, I go through a series of questions to find out how I got to this point of “stuckness.” The writers I work with know me as the “Why-guy” because I ask them “Why?” about a dozen times. You have all the answers, you just need to ask yourself the right question, so Who, What, When, Where, Why, and How are my favorite places to start. I think that writer’s block only comes from an unwillingness to adapt, make changes, kill darlings, etc. So, when in doubt, get up, stretch, go for a walk, make sure you’ve drunk plenty of water, had a healthy snack—all those things can help too.
Chanti: That’s a very practical approach. Pivoting a little bit, every writer has their influences, and I’m curious about yours. Can you share five authors who’ve really shaped your work and tell us a little about how they’ve impacted your writing?
Facciola: George RR Martin got me back into reading with A Song of Ice and Fire. He also convinced me to finish my series before releasing it which was why I wrote all three books of the A Vengeful Realm trilogy before I published the first book. I never wanted to leave readers hung out to dry waiting from 14+ years for the next book to come. But in all seriousness, I am fascinated by his worldbuilding and how Martin incorporated history into fantasy.
Some of my favorite books of the last decade were by Brandon Sanderson. I love the interconnected world he has built and all the easter eggs he’s laid for his most devoted readers, but simultaneously, I love how accessible a lot of his stories are. As a businessman, I’m awestruck by the way he has built his author brand on stories that always point to hope.
Joe Abercrombie’s character work is extremely well done. While I share a completely different stance on how I view humanity, there is no denying the man knows how to craft characters.
I didn’t fully understand a character’s “voice” until I read Pierce Brown’s Red Rising series. That “you know it when you see it,” type of command that brings words on the page to life—I try to channel that element from him to find my own narrative voice.
Theme is the point with Nathan Makaryk’s work. For me it’s the be all, end all, and proving that theme through the main characters’ journey throughout the plot—that’s where the magic happens. Makaryk’s Nottingham, did exactly that with supreme depth and from so many different angles. Truly a masterpiece that I try to emulate.
Chanti: It’s clear you’ve dived in and truly studied this craft and genre. What would you say are your strongest areas as a writer? And if someone is struggling in those same areas, what advice would you offer them?
Facciola: I run a Discord writing group through my Patreon, coaching writers on all sorts of areas. One area I particularly excel at is my combat scenes, but that’s not part of all stories. But what is part of all stories (at least the readers of those stories) is humans. So if we’re writing for humans, we as authors better be able to relate to those humans. Having a foundational understanding of psychology, moral reasoning, and relationships is imperative. I use psychologist Lawrence Kohlberg’s theories of moral development to better understand how my characters see themselves, each other, and the world. Understanding and communicating the “whys” behind the “whats” that our characters do is something I often see missing from most new writers’ work.
Chanti: Using psychology to inform your character development is brilliant! We often ask about promoting a community of literacy and supporting other writers, and you mentioned your Discord group. Can you tell us more about that?
Facciola: On my Discord server, I help fantasy writers through a combination of community building, education, and networking. It’s difficult being an indie author, and it’s so easy to suffer in silence all by your lonesome. Having struggled with this myself, I’ve made it my mission to create a place for fantasy writers to develop their craft, build their community, and connect with industry professionals through guest lectures and workshops.
Chanti: That work in community building is essential! As we start to wrap up, I’m curious about what’s coming next. With the trilogy complete, what exciting projects are you working on? What can your fans look forward to?
Facciola: With the A Vengeful Realm trilogy complete and the prequel novel released back on January 21st, 2025, I’m currently writing a new series within the same world. I’m pitching it as Mulan enters the Hunger Games to solve the murder of her betrothed. The working title is Boon Blessed in which aspirants compete in a series of trials to appeal to the gods and receive their favor in the form of magical abilities, but for every boon comes a bane, and not everyone is entitled to receive it.
Chanti: I’m already adding it to my TBR. When you think about your ideal reader for A Vengeful Realm or this upcoming Boon Blessed what kind of person comes to mind?
Facciola: Not to give a complicated answer, but here is my complicated answer: I believe there are a few tiers to what fantasy readers want out of a story. Some readers just want distraction—escapism from their day to day. It’s a pretty low bar, but for some, that’s all they ask for in a story. For some, it is entertainment they are looking for—not only do they want to be distracted, but they want to be entertained! A third group of readers want connection—they want to feel something beyond simple distraction and entertainment. And lastly, some readers want to be challenged—mentally and/or emotionally.
My perfect reader is in that third to fourth category. Yes, there is certainly escapism, and undoubtedly my goal is to entertain, but if that’s all you’re after, there are probably more accessible reads that you’ll enjoy more. But for readers who are looking to feel something or they’re open to being challenged about how they think or feel about particular topics—I write for readers like you.
Chanti: That thoughtful consideration of audience is so important to connecting with readers. Here’s my final question, and it’s one I think every author should hear: What’s the most important thing a reader can do to support an author they love?
Facciola: Word of mouth is always the best form of advertising. If you read a book and you love it, tell someone about it. Better yet, gift them a copy. Then, write a review on Amazon or Goodreads, or post about it on social media—whatever you’re into. But most importantly, reach out to the author and tell them that their creation meant something to you. Art was meant to be shared, so spread the love.
Chanti: Yes! Authors and readers walk hand-in-hand, and their support for their favorite authors is very much appreciated! Thank you, Tim, for this peek into the world of Tim Facciola and his Vengeful Realm!
Tim Facciola is an author, virtual fitness professional, and former punk rock musician based in Arizona. His debut novel, The Scales of Balance from the series A Vengeful Realm, combines his love for epic fantasy with insights from his fitness training. Alongside his writing, Tim offers Gladiator Training and author coaching.
You can read more about Tim Facciola and his A Vengeful Realm series here.
Chanti: Your books go deep into international intrigue. How did you come to write such high stakes thrillers?
Steinke: I started writing when I was passed over for a senior US government service position that I coveted and thought I’d be a good fit for. Shortly thereafter, I began to write, and it was like pushing through an open door for me. I felt spiritually led in that direction and realized that I very much enjoyed writing!
Chanti: The thriller genre seems to fit right into your professional history, but they include so much more. Tell us about your military background and how you are able craft such authentic environments in your novels.
Steinke: Political and political-military, high stakes global thrillers best describe my genre and work to date. I also love to write suspense stories in general. My almost 42 years of combined service in the US Army and US Department of Defense, as well as 28 years of overseas service, led me to write in the global thriller and suspense genres. While writing is obviously about fiction, I try to keep my work as authentic as possible. As my stories also have US-European settings to them, I also like to write about local culture. Thus far, that has meant a lot of French and Italian culture.
Chanti: How do you come up with the trouble your character, Jake Fortina, faces in your novels?
Steinke: For now, I like the “ripped from the headlines approach,” focused on real world scenarios, particularly when they involve major US national and international security issues or interests. But I’ve also written about national security issues that I’ve come across in my professional experiences. I also try to feature certain professional groups that I’ve served with or interacted with during my public service, including the military, law enforcement, diplomatic, and intelligence communities, as well as US military noncommissioned officers (sergeants) and military families.
Chanti: With your background in the military, are you able to apply the same high discipline to your writing time?
Steinke: A full “writing day” is often a luxury, but I do my best to remain consistent, given the many family and travel opportunities throughout any given year. When traveling, I try to fit my writing into “downtime” as much as possible. I tend to always travel with my laptop, so most days – but not all days – allow for at least one and some days even two hours of writing. If I’m home, I try to get an early start, often rising around 5 a.m. and sometimes as early as 4 a.m., with the goal of getting in 3-4 hours or so of focused writing or editing. If I do much more than that in a day, I feel like I’m less effective.
Chanti: What do you do to grow your author chops? Do you have any authors you turn to learn from?
Steinke: For starters, I keep learning. I believe learning should be a proactive daily and lifelong process. I still occasionally let the passive voice creep into my writing, but thankfully I have an excellent editor who is attuned to it. My best writing investments were in three Master Classes, taught by James Patterson, Dan Brown, and Ken Follett. I would say my writing style tends more to James Patterson’s style than the latter two. I strive to keep my chapters relatively short (3-5 pages, on average) and crisp.
Chanti: What craft books have helped you the most?
Steinke: Without a doubt, Stephen King’s On Writing was the most consequential and revelational “craft book” for me. As Mr. King says, “Don’t write b—s—t.” That concisely sums up his style and wisdom!
Chanti: How do you relax when you aren’t writing? Tell us a little about your hobbies.
Steinke: I love spending time with my family, traveling the world with my wife Susan, going fly fishing, and participating in other outdoor activities like hiking and increasingly, pickleball. I’m trying to get in a bit more snow skiing but I’m not sure how much longer my body will stand up to the wear and tear of the ski slopes!
Chanti: What can we look forward to seeing next from you? Will Jake Fortina be taking on more terrorist groups?
Steinke: Change of Mission, the third book in the Jake Fortina series, was released last summer. Just like the first two books, Major Jake Fortina and the Tier One Threat and Jake Fortina and The Roman Conspiracy, this story is about an ordinary US Army officer who finds himself facing extraordinary national security threats. Thus far, thankfully, Change of Mission has been well received. In it, we follow Lieutenant Colonel Jake Fortina as he decides whether to continue with his same career path or make a change in his life’s mission. Meanwhile, he and his Italian bride, a Carabinieri officer, must confront a confluence of threats from Iranian extremists, as well as the Italian and Russian mafias.
I’m currently more than halfway through writing my fourth book, Vital Mission, A Jake Fortina Series Love Story. Jake Fortina will be called upon by a dear Ukrainian friend to help with the rescue of two Ukrainian children who were abducted from their bombed-out Ukrainian city and taken to Russia. This latest book in the Jake Fortina series is projected for publication in the July-September 2025 timeframe.
Chanti: What is the most important thing a reader can do for an author?
Steinke: Leave a review—and hopefully it will be a good one — on a major book selling or endorsing platform, such as Amazon, Barnes & Noble, Goodreads, or Audible. In today’s social media world, authors live and die by readers’ reviews.
Chanti: What excites you most about writing?
Steinke: The conceptual challenge and the entire creative journey! It’s like putting a puzzle together, but you must first create the pieces from pretty much a blank slate… or a good outline! I also enjoy entertaining, educating, and even occasionally enlightening readers. I would like them to experience the organizations and professionals out there who keep the United States and our Allies safe, with much of their work done behind the scenes, while we sleep comfortably.
Ralph Richard “Rick” Steinke is the award-winning author of the Jake Fortina global thriller series, including Jake Fortina and the Roman Conspiracy, awarded the Grand Prize for 2023 in the Global Thriller – High Stakes category at the Chanticleer International Book Awards (the CIBAs) in April 2024. The Jake Fortina series, beginning with Major Jake Fortina and the Tier One Threat, was also selected as a Book Series Finalist at the CIBAs.
Steinke has spent a lifetime in US national security roles, including twenty-eight years in the US Army and fourteen in the Department of Defense. His official duties have taken him from the U.S. Military Academy at West Point to over thirty countries on the Eurasian landmass, including Afghanistan and Ukraine.
He holds master’s degrees in West European studies and diplomacy from Indiana and Norwich Universities, respectively, as well as post-graduation certificates in national and international security affairs from Harvard and Stanford Universities. His passions include faith, family, fly fishing, and travel.
CIBA 2023 Grand Prize award-winning Author Kevin Miller sat down for a 10-Question Interview with Chanticleer!
Recently, Chanticleer had the pleasure of speaking with Kevin Miller, former US Navy fighter pilot and author of The Silver Waterfall. Miller takes readers into the cockpit of the world’s most powerful military aircraft in his four book series, Raven One. Miller’s award-winning fictional account of the Battle of Midway, The Silver Waterfall, took home the 2023 Hemingway Grand Prize for Military Fiction. Miller is an expert in combat air battles and literacy advocate and I know you’ll enjoy learning more about him and his thrilling novels!
Here’s what we talked about:
Chanticleer: Your specialized military knowledge is the subject of your writing. Tell us a little about yourself. What led you to write about the Battle of Midway?
Miller: In a previous life I was a career Navy fighter pilot, with most of my time in the F/A-18 Hornet. To viewers of TOP GUN and TOP GUN II… yep, I did that. My career took me to command a carrier-based fighter squadron that I led in combat. Wrapping it up at the Pentagon, I retired with the rank of captain after serving 24 years, logging over 3,600 hours and 1,000 carrier landings on numerous extended deployments.
At my retirement ceremony a fellow aviator suggested that I write a book, a suggestion I immediately waved off. Undeterred, he pressed me – hard – and told me that I have stories. Later I gave it some thought. Yes, I do have sea stories, and a passion to answer the question I was asked so often when people found out what I did for a living; Wow! What is that like? Having no idea where to start or what writing entailed, I figured why not? At least my manuscript could be something for the kids. So, months later in the summer of 2005 I began writing what would become Raven One.
Before I wrote the first sentence, I had never considered writing a novel, considering it something that mere mortals could never attain. The discipline! As I wrote – seat of the pants – a story formed, and after fits and starts (setting it aside in frustration for months then picking it back up and writing in a flurry of activity) I finished Raven One in late 2009… and knew that I had something.
Querying literary agents to represent me, despite the encouragement of many to keep writing, proved a failure. However, Kindle Direct Publishing was coming into its own, and publishing as an independent author became more attractive with each rejection from “New York.” Networking led me to fellow aviation thriller author George Galdorisi, who led me to his micro-publisher and military thriller author Jeff Edwards of Stealth Books which is now Braveship Books. Under their guidance, Raven One was published in the summer of 2014. The novel peaked at #29 in all of Amazon by the spring of 2015.
Chanticleer: That’s a huge journey and a familiar one for many. Was there a point where you realized you had become an author?
Miller: Yes, holding that first copy of Raven One in my hands was a special moment. I wrote – and published! – a novel! But it was weeks later as the novel gained a following that I noticed the comments in the review section. The glowing reviews were from strangers who loved the book – comparing the writing to Clancy and Coonts – and encouraged me to write more. Soon I heard from my friends, many of them former squadron mates who know how to give and receive honest feedback. They were blown away by the story and how I told it, and they met me at gatherings with copies for me to sign. Gratifying! And that’s when I knew Raven One was not a one-off, and that I had to keep writing
Chanticleer: That’s wonderful! Likewise, your Chanticleer award winner, The SilverWaterfall, is a great story full of action, suspense, history, and so much more. Can you talk more about your relationship with your genre?
Miller: Writers typically write what they know about, so for me the military action-adventure genre is a natural. My Raven One series novels are military technothrillers, a genre first made popular by Tom Clancy. They are found in War Fiction, War and Military Action, Sea Stories, Sea Adventures, and the like. Amazon allows authors great specificity in genre selection, and I could probably keep my latest novel High End as a perennial #1 in an Authentic and Contemporary Carrier Aviation Fiction Above the Arctic Circle genre but playing games like that is not for me as I want my books to compete and earn their accolades honestly. That said, I often see romance books in War Fiction when the only “war” part is that the love story is set in a wartime setting. We know why authors do this; all’s fair in love and war.
The Silver Waterfall: A Novel of the Battle of Midway, for which I was honored to receive the 2023 Chanticleer Hemingway Award, is pure historical fiction. To me, historical fiction provides the human emotion to a true event without changing any of the facts of that event, such as Shaara’s Pulitzer-winning masterpiece The Killer Angels. Our novels put the reader there, amid the real men who fought these battles, giving these historical figures voice as to what they experienced. Some historical fiction authors are too loose with facts and invent facts, even going so far as to impugn the reputations of the real men who were there. I could not live with myself if I did that, especially for an event like Midway, already full of drama and amazing chance.
Just won the CIBA Grand Prize in the Hemingway/Military Fiction division!
Chanticleer: We’re always astounded at the commitment to veracity of our historical fiction authors. The amount of research that goes into that is incredible. For your own writing day, how do you stay on track to finish your books?
Miller: Stephen King says that 1,000 words of writing is a good day of writing. If I get to a break in the story and stop for the day at 950 or 875 words I don’t beat myself up, but 1K per day works, especially if you have other activities (I do business consulting and teach middle school history) to fill your day. Promotion is part of my writing workday, as of course is research for my type of technical and historical writing.
Outlining? Yes and no. I have one in my head and follow it, but because it’s not written down, I can ride along on those magical moments when my writing takes me someplace I had never expected. The Silver Waterfall involved a historic event that has been written about extensively and that I knew well, but even in that novel I could “ride” when the muse took me to a new place when describing the human experience of a known historic event.
As Stephen King suggests, I’m one of those who writes and sets it aside for a few weeks to germinate, then prints it out to go over it with a pen to fix/improve. Several cycles: read it “fresh” after several months and you’ll unearth little gems to spice it up and rough patches you missed to sand and polish.
Chanticleer: You’ve talked a bit about Tom Clancy and Stephen Coonts as comp titles for your work earlier on, but which authors do you for inspiration, advice, or just because you like their work?
Miller:
Herman Wouk
Wouk is an absolute badass of a writer, from his unflinching views of human nature to his superb research of his subject. As a Midway historian with a carrier aviation background, Wouk – who was an officer but not an aviator in WWII – wrote passages in War and Remembrance about the carrier pilots at Midway that impress me not only by their accuracy in flying the airplane but their human emotions in the middle of deadly aerial combat. His fictional German historical commentator von Roon – a brilliant character – gives context to the history the characters are living inside. The Caine Mutiny is a masterpiece in human conflict and the unfairness of life. Wouk puts you inside the mind of a three-dimensional character like no one else.
Michael Shaara
Many are not familiar with this name from 50 years ago, who at the time received a Pulitzer for The Killer Angels, the classic historical fiction novel of the Battle of Gettysburg. Shaara – who was an Army veteran but not a noted Gettysburg historian – brought Lee, Longstreet, Chamberlain and Pickett to life without changing any facts of the battle, giving the reader the honest insights and impassioned pleas of the real men who fought at Gettysburg as to how they should deal with the enemy across the field. Shaara was 100% my inspiration for The Silver Waterfall. As the country was recovering from its Vietnam War trauma, The Killer Angels was not successful when published in the mid 1970’s. Shaara did not live to see it adapted into the movie Gettysburg and the commercial success Angels has subsequently received. Another of his works was published posthumously and adapted into a movie: For the Love of The Game.
Captain Edward L. Beach
Ned Beach was a WWII submariner who after the war and while still on active duty wrote the novel Run Silent, Run Deep, an immediate hit with post-war audiences that was adapted into a movie starring Clark Gable. The story is of conflict inside the control room of the submarine between two officers who each want the same woman back home but must cooperate to lead the crew against the enemy above them. This human tension centered in pride is a feature of all my novels. Beach wrote more novels including Dust on the Sea and Cold is the Sea, both to critical acclaim. During this time, he was given command of the nuclear submarine Triton that circumnavigated the world while submerged, an incredible feat in the day. Sadly – and not surprisingly to this naval officer – Beach was not selected for promotion to admiral as the higher ups were jealous of his fame and considered his creative pursuits unseemly.
I write in his third-person style, calling my protagonist by his last name while placing the reader on the bridge of a ship or in the cockpit of an airplane as it really is, and expecting the reader to keep up.
Pat Conroy
Pat Conroy grabs you and does not let you go with the raw human power of his writing. Just wow. Like all the greats, he is honest – and fearless. Known best for The Prince of Tides and Beach Music, for me as an aviator, The Great Santini will always be my favorite. However, it is far from a military technothriller. It is a human story as all of his are about the reality of the most sinful of the deadly sins, pride. The Lords of Discipline is another unforgettable work which, like Santini, is more memoir than fiction. Pat Conroy had a rough upbringing, and as they say in sports, left it all on the field in his writing, holding nothing back. Just wow.
Khalid Hosseini
I’ve never visited or even flown over Afghanistan – my time in the fleet was before that – but I have been there thanks to the writing of Khalid Hosseini. Like millions of readers, I too was enthralled by The Kite Runner and his sequel A Thousand Splendid Suns. Hosseini’s vivid descriptions of place, the detail, and of course his insights of human nature and the fascinating culture of Afghanistan – both lovely and horrifying – are unforgettable. He explained Afghanistan to foreign readers in a no-nonsense style, unapologetic and fresh. We recoil at the cruelty and betrayal – I cannot believe they treat their fellow human beings like this! – but turn the page anyway as Hosseini assures us, yes, they do. I seek to describe and explain my former world with verbal images like Hosseini did his.
Chanticleer: That is an amazing personal canon to draw from. Do you also enjoy craft books, and do you have any you would recommend?
Miller: The classic Bird by Bird by Ann Lamott was enjoyable, but Stephen King’s On Writing, Pat Conroy’s My Writing Life, and especially Steven Pressfield’s Do the Work and Nobody Wants to Read Your Sh*t were each helpful to me and I would recommend them to anyone who writes creatively. People often ask me for my insights as they prepare to write a book. I explain that writing, at the bestselling and award-winning level, is hard, hard work and there’s no escaping it. While I cannot explain how I write – I just let it rip! – these giants have written helpful guides. Enjoy.
Chanticleer: While most people think of writing as a solitary activity, we often find it has far reaching impacts. How has being an author affected your involvement in the community?
Miller: Author implies authority, and I am an authority on the Battle of Midway, now recognized by all in my circle because of the success of my historical fiction novel. Two years ago, I spoke at a gathering of all the U.S. Navy admirals in naval aviation about the lessons of the battle, lessons they can use today, and next year I’ll speak at a large event to commemorate the battle. Because I am also connected to today’s fleet, my Raven One series novels are prescient for today, especially my last two that involve China and Russia, and I’m often invited to give talks at Rotary Clubs and veterans groups to educate the public about the need for strong sea services. Publicity earned from the CIBA recognition of The Silver Waterfall cemented my position as an authority on Midway.
Chanticleer: That’s incredible! Becoming an expert of such an important historical event is really quite an accomplishment! And we at Chanticleer are very happy to know your CIBA award has helped to bring more attention to the Battle of Midway and your wonderful novel. Are there any activities you are involved in that improve or promote literacy?
Miller: I teach middle school history at the honors level, one day per week. My honors students are above average readers, and during the semester I assign reading. The novels Around the World in 80 Days for 6th grade geography, and The Red Badge of Courage in 8th grade U.S. history are examples, and after they complete the reading, I have them write essays about them in class. They grumble of course, but where else will they read these classics of literature?
Chanticleer: Being a teacher is such a gift to the future. Thank you for doing that work. Your students sound lucky to have you. If we can bend your ear for us for a teachable moment, what are some marketing tips that you would recommend to our authors?
Miller: My publisher says there is nothing like writing a new book to sell your current one, however paid FB and Amazon ads work, as do email lists. Promo stacking with services such as Amazon, BookBub, Robin Reads, ENT and others is an effective strategy. While I’ve snagged three BookBub featured deals (all for Raven One) I’m still struggling with breaking the code on what works (regarding Canva creatives) for BookBub advertising. Posting on social media almost daily about my flying days and sometimes me with my book is effective; Chanticleer author D.D. Black does this very well on Instagram. So does Tony Selimi, who says authors must get famous to get a larger audience. Get a Facebook business page with others on social media to gain follows. LinkedIn is good, Pinterest during the Christmas gift giving season, and, of course, email. Recommend investing in KDP Rocket, and David Gaughran is a superb follow for indie writers on all aspects of publishing and promoting.
Chanticleer: That is a wealth of excellent information for authors. What about for readers, what help can readers be to authors?
Miller: Receiving a kind email from a reader is gratifying, and I always write back thanking them, and then ask them to leave a review. WE all know and crave the social proof of reviews, but my sense is that only 1-2% of readers leave one. Wish that Amazon allowed us to thank them when they do. Passing the word of course is nice of readers. Word-of-mouth advertising can’t be beat. Then there’s good old-fashioned encouragement. Writing as we know is hard drudgery, and for me the end-product is what drives me, not any joy or “rush” in the act of writing. Doing the work as Pressfield says and producing something that people can appreciate today and decades from now is my “why.” Thank you to the readers, known and unknown to me personally, who have encouraged that.
Retired U.S. Navy Captain Kevin Miller graduated from the University of Mississippi and was designated a Naval Aviator in August 1983. He flew the A-7E Corsair II and FA-18C Hornet operationally and commanded a deployed strike-fighter squadron. He finished his career in the Pentagon serving on the staff of the Secretary of the Navy, retiring in 2005.
After leaving the service Kevin was employed as an associate at two Washington DC defense consulting firms, then as a not-for-profit executive, and today is the Owner/Principal of MPK Defense Consulting. He is also the Best-Selling and Award-Winning author of the Raven One military action-adventure series and the historical fiction novel The Silver Waterfall: A Novel of the Battle of Midway that was awarded the 2023 CIBA Hemingway Award for excellence in 20th Century Wartime Fiction.
Kevin lives in Pensacola, Florida and is working on his next novel. Find out more about Kevin and his novels on his website.
Science Fiction award-winningAuthor Timothy S. Johnstonsat down for a 10-Question Interview with Chanticleer!
Recently, Chanticleer had the pleasure of speaking with Timothy S. Johnston, author of both The Rise of Oceania and The Tanner Sequence series. His latest book, The Shadow of War-the latest in The Rise of Oceania series, took home the 2023 Cygnus Grand Prize for Science Fiction. Johnston is an award-winning author and literacy advocate and I know you’ll enjoy learning more about him and his thrilling novels!
Here’s what we talked about:
Chanticleer: Your passion for storytelling shows through in your writing. When did your love of storytelling begin?
Johnston: It came from a love of stories when I was a child. It didn’t matter what format or media; I just loved a good story. I still feel today that a good story has a great power to heal. Escapist entertainment is crucial, and everyone can use more in their lives. It serves a valuable purpose for us as human beings—as a way to escape our lives, the daily grind, our worries and anxiety. Escapism has the power to take away our pain. When I was seventeen years old, after years of reading great books—everything from Edgar Allan Poe to Asimov, Crichton and Agatha Christie—and watching gripping genre films from directors like James Cameron and Steven Spielberg, I knew that writing was what I wanted to do. I wanted to contribute to the genre and provide escapist entertainment for people. I set my sights on this goal and…
It took me twenty-five years to actually achieve it. My first book deal was for The Furnace, which I landed when I was forty-two. It was a quarter century of rejection, but it was important because during that period I was learning the craft. I was improving and studying the entire time. I accumulated hundreds of rejections during that period, and I had five books completed on my hard drive when I finally landed the deal with Carina Press. But since then, I haven’t looked back. Fitzhenry & Whiteside just published my ninth book, A Blanket of Steel.
Chanticleer: That persistence really paid off! I love that you framed the journey as essential to mastering your craft. Speaking of craft—how did you decide on your genre?
Johnston: The genre I write is TechnoThriller or Science Fiction Thriller. I write thrillers that take place in unique and dangerous locations. There is always a technological component to them, and the settings are unique and dangerous. However, they are all grounded in reality. I don’t write aliens (yet) or concepts that are too outlandish. I want to capture that mainstream audience and keep them entertained and interested in a story that could really happen. One full of tension, twists, and turns. A rollercoaster ride, if you will. I love stories that involve horror, thrills, suspense, and characters on the verge of death or disaster. I want massive stakes and tremendous villains in my stories. I also want mystery, and some gruesome violence is always good. This is what I write, and I love it!
I also want to increase diversity in my writing. I am most proud of The Shadow of War because it includes a Muslim woman as a star in the ensemble. I feel that Muslim women are often relegated to the background, as the wife or daughter perhaps, and in this book, I wanted to bring my character, Sahar Noor, right to the forefront and make her an integral part of the story. I wanted her to be a powerful and important element of the narrative—necessary to the plot—and a person who helped control and dictate events. In the book, she is a popular politician, and in fact, a celebrity. The novel is a grand heist spanning the world and is so much fun. I loved writing it. Sahar is one of the greatest characters I have created, and I am so proud of her, and I’m thrilled that the book won the 2023 CYGNUS Award Grand Prize! It fits into the TechnoThriller genre, but it’s a climate-themed (Cli-Fi) adventure as well.
Chanticleer: Sahar Noor sounds like such a compelling character! We love seeing authors push for representation in genres where it hasn’t always been prioritized. The underwater elements in your books are riveting and make me think of The Expanse. How do you come up with ideas for these unique plots?
Johnston: I love stories in many forms. I love movies, TV, books, and narrative-driven Sci-Fi/Horror video games. I soak up everything I can get my hands on. In my creative formative years, I developed a love for a certain genre and style. I would seek it out anywhere I could find it. All those stories played a role in my creative process. I want to honor everything that’s come before, while also breaking new ground. I want to make the reader feel comfortable with the genre and plot at first, but also hit them with things they’ve never experienced or even thought about before. The Shadow of War is a great case in point. In many ways it feels comfortable because it’s a heist. It’s covert espionage, which people enjoy. But it’s also about a group of people trying to get their hands on an energy (particle) weapon for use underwater. This is extremely rare in fiction, in fact, I can’t think of any other examples. Underwater adventures are rare to begin with. But underwater heists even more so. But an underwater heist that also features an energy weapon is totally unique. Then throw in a sinister betrayal that catches the main character, and the reader, completely off guard. But it all takes place in a familiar genre, which is what I enjoy.
The Terminator is a great example of what I’m referring to. Think about that story for a minute: It’s a Sci-Fi time travel adventure, which audiences love. It’s gripping, suspenseful, and has a wonderful villain. The narrative features characters trying to prevent an apocalyptic disaster, to save humans in the future, and nestled within that is the greatest love story in the genre. At least, that’s what I tell my daughters! The Sarah/Reese story is so damned compelling that it overshadows the actual violence and adventure, but in a good way. For Kyle Reese to make that journey, stripped of anything that might help him, knowing he’ll likely die, and just to meet the woman he was in love with but had never met. It’s a shockingly great concept, but it’s hidden within this Science Fiction adventure. He doesn’t have a chance in hell at defeating the T-800, but Reese travels to find Sarah anyway because of the high stakes, and because of love. That’s what turns my crank, creatively speaking, and that’s what I try to do. I want my readers to feel comfortable at first, and then surprised by what quickly develops. And of course, I want them on a rollercoaster adventure with lots of twists and turns.
Chanticleer: You’re definitely taking familiar genres and elevating them with fresh twists. Terminator is such a classic! Moving more to the craft of it, how structured are you as you put these stories together?
Johnston: I create the characters and the setting. I create the story and the plot. I design an ending that I shoot for—and then I start writing. I am aiming to hit that ending, but the characters soon take on lives of their own and do surprising things, even to me. But I still shoot to get to that ending, and it helps me write. I also have a set time for writing each day. But before all this happens, I’ll research for months. Then I write to hit a goal each day. I want to hit the reader with surprise after surprise, with betrayals and real emotions, like we all experience in real life. I will maintain a rigid routine each day until the writing is done. When the first draft is finished, I’ll spend months editing it, tearing it apart and rebuilding it. And during it all, I’ll work with a graphic designer on the maps, diagrams, schematics, and more. I’m very structured, but the story does take on a life of its own, and very quickly too. I just love that. I love characters surprising me and doing something that I had never planned or expected! And I’m the writer! That’s the funny thing. Sometimes that ending will change, but it’s always in my mind. Sometimes slightly amorphous or ephemeral, but I am always thinking about it as I’m writing. Even as I write the first line, I know what the ending should be, or might be.
From left to right we have Michael Crichton, Agatha Christie, Isaac Asimov
Chanticleer: Wow! That is extraordinarily disciplined! I often feel like I dream of being that sort of writer, and I imagine many people feel the same. thinking of dream writers, who are your own inspirations? How do they inspire your work? Chanticleer: Name five of your favorite authors and describe how they influence your work.
Johnston:
Michael Crichton. He had a way of writing Science Fiction for mainstream audiences, and that’s also what I’m writing: TechnoThrillers. He kept all his writing grounded in reality and relatable to the audience. His storylines and exposition are easy to understand, and he wrote about cloning (Jurassic Park), time travel (Timeline), underwater adventure (Sphere), nano swarms (Prey), and so much more. He tapped into the mainstream audience very, very effectively. He was the best in the genre.
Agatha Christie. She created the “classic” murder mystery. There are essential elements that her writing defined: a claustrophobic location, a dangerous environment that confines the characters, a small cast of characters, a killer, an investigator, a rising body count, power outages, and twists. I wrote three murder mysteries that take place in outer space (my first book deal, for The Furnace, The Freezer, The Void) and they are all based on her formula. I used science as my methods of murder, but the formula Christie created is now so classic that it belongs to her. She was the best in the genre.
Isaac Asimov. The greatest Science Fiction writer ever. Period. I know people debate this, but for me there’s no doubt. He defined robots for modern civilization. His writing style and unique storylines are what captivate me about him. The style of his writing is also extremely compelling. It’s tight. It’s not drawn out and meandering. I love how he used dialogue to drive the narrative. Sometimes he’d have two or more characters speaking, and he wouldn’t even describe the setting, the location, and so on. It didn’t matter. The only thing that mattered was what the characters were saying, because it was always driving the story forward. And there were no superfluous scenes in his writing. They always had a point. I loved that about Asimov. There will never be someone better. He was the best in the genre.
Chanticleer: Continuing to dive in to craft, the writing experience is different for everyone. Starting from your inspirations above, how did you develop that storytelling skill? And what advice would you give to writers who want to do the same?
Johnston: My stories have a lot of unexpected twists and turns. They contain betrayals and events that are unpredictable. I like this in the books I read and the movies I watch. Sometimes I will experience a story, either in print or film, and discover that the narrative lacks depth. It travels along a straight line from A to B. There is nothing in between. But to be a good writer is to be a good storyteller. That is the most important thing. Tell a kickass story that carries people away to some other place and time, one that provides escapism. That’s why I’m in this business because so many readers want that. They want stories that capture their imagination and take them away from the daily grind for a few compelling hours. But also, stories that have settings, endings, twists, situations, and characters that are unique and difficult to predict. To beginning writers, I would say: Don’t be afraid to take chances and put your characters in tough spots. Don’t be scared to kill someone or make someone do something you wouldn’t normally do. If your characters solve a problem, create two more for them to deal with. Put them through hell. Make them earn that ending! The journey for the reader should mirror that of the characters. The ending should be satisfying and cathartic. That’s why we are writers—to put people in tough, uncomfortable situations and see how they can get out.
Chanticleer: That’s a tall order—but you’re clearly up to the challenge! You mentioned how much you learn from stories across different media. How do you go about improving your craft as an author?
Johnston: I experience as many stories as I can in the same or similar genres. This includes books, TV, movies, and narrative-driven video games. It’s important for us storytellers to understand why some stories work and some do not. Why some beginnings rock but the endings fail. Why some twists work but others feel forced. Why some tropes are actually good and feel comfortable for readers, but others are unnecessary and may in fact break the fourth wall. This is why immersing yourself in stories, regardless of the medium, is so important. How we learn to tell a good story is driven by the stories that have had a huge impact on us previously and understanding why they had that impact. Usually, it’s due to an emotional connection, and we need to learn what worked and also what didn’t. To do this, we need to watch and read as much as we can.
The film Edge of Tomorrow, or Live Die Repeat, with Tom Cruise, is a good case in point. Why did that story work so well? It was highly entertaining, one of his biggest science fiction hits, and audiences universally loved it. Well, consider these character and story elements: The world is at war with an unbeatable alien force. Tom Cruise portrays a coward at the beginning. He knows that if he were to go into battle, he’d die. He does everything, therefore, to avoid the fight. This is contrary to every character he has ever played. In the first fifteen minutes of the movie, the viewer is thrown into this situation with Cruise, where we know he is not going to survive that first battle. It’s completely compelling and engaging, not just watching Cruise be Cruise, but to watch him play this character on the ragged edge of life. And then, after he dies the first time, and as he begins to relive each day and learn what he must to do to survive this insane journey, it becomes a gripping study in character and action. The viewer has to keep watching to find out what happens. There is no other option. Books have to be like this too, and this is why it’s so necessary for authors to read and view anything they can in their genre, to learn what works and what doesn’t. To grip a reader from page one and never let go. That’s the trick! Experiencing stories from multiple types of media is so important for all storytellers.
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Chanticleer: Pivoting again. No writer is alone in their journey, and one of our favorite questions is how does being an author affect your involvement in your community?
Johnston: I definitely recognize that I am in a position to help inspire people about my genres. I can influence people’s decisions on what books to read or movies to watch or games to play. It’s why I review movies and games on my blog, Life After Gateway. I want to tell people, “Hey, if you love Sci-Fi/Horror, then this is a game you will really enjoy.” I also recognize that I have something to say about literacy in schools and what we need to do to attract people to read and write more. This is important, especially in our current society in which so much of life revolves around the smartphone or iPad. Trying to get students to experience pleasure in reading is more important than ever.
Chanticleer: That’s such an important mission! And it sounds like you take that advocacy seriously. Can you share more about the work you do to promote literacy?
Johnston: I make a point of visiting high schools in my community and I speak to the creative writing classes about writing, story, characters, and more. It’s important to me that I talk about my love of great stories in my genres—Thriller, Science Fiction, Suspense, Horror, Mystery—what makes them special, what works and what doesn’t, and so on. I love talking about these genres in film and books. The students love talking about stories and I work with them to develop ideas that might appeal to people. I also sponsor a writing award in my city’s Board of Education called the Timothy S. Johnston Future Writer Award. Each year, a graduating student receives the prize, which is a small cash award, a signed/framed certificate, and a letter from me. It’s important to encourage creative writers to never give up. It took me twenty-five years to land my first book deal. This business doesn’t come easy. It takes grit and determination. Success, even when it does come, isn’t actually success. It’s just another step on the ladder, and there are always future goals to work toward.
Chanticleer: Finally, you’ve achieved so much in your author’s journey. With everything you’ve done, what is it now that still excites you most about writing?
Johnston: When it comes to writing, telling a compelling story, keeping the reader glued to the page, and carrying them through a tense and gripping adventure excites me. Providing escapism to someone, to take them away from their daily tensions and workload, is the greatest reward for me. I want people to not be able to put my books down. I want them to keep reading long into the night. That’s what excites me. I want to inspire others through my writing and tell kickass stories. My writing is all grounded in reality and each book is a story that might happen someday, or likely will happen someday. That really inspires me, because I’m writing about that future experience, now, for people living today to relate to. I also think that I have something important to say. Sometimes it’s about increasing diversity in the genre. Sometimes it’s about climate change or science and technology and how we need to prepare for things to come. I love writing because I’m saying what I think should be said. Economies need to adapt to meet climate change head-on, humans need to prepare, and escapist entertainment is now more important than ever.
Timothy S. Johnston is a lifelong fan of thrillers and science fiction thrillers in both print and film. His greatest desire is to contribute to the genre which has given him so much over the past five decades. He has been an educator for twenty-five years and a writer for thirty. He lives on planet Earth, but he dreams of the stars.
Visit www.timothysjohnston.com to register for news alerts, read his blog and reviews, and learn more about his current and upcoming thrillers.
Hello friends, we have another fabulous interview for you today.
In 2024, David Calloway took home the 2023 Chanticleer Grand Prize in the Goethe Awards division for his fascinating novel, If Someday Comes. Here, he tells us how he was inspired by his own family’s history to write If Someday Comes and the subsequent heights it is now reaching! Take a minute or two and get familiar with David to learn more about his ancestors’ amazing story. You won’t be sorry!
Chanti: Your writing is very personal. What drove you to tell your family’s history?
Calloway: The heart of my wish to write and to tell my family’s story was to record for the coming generations the stories I heard from the old folks as I was growing up. I wanted to preserve the struggles, hardships, and triumphs of my ancestors’ American lives.
I think I always wanted to write, but put no real effort into it early in my life, as I was filled with self-doubts about my ability. Eventually I would overcome my inertia through the feedback and encouragement of close friends and family. In my professional life, I was in the motion picture and TV business, first as a cinematographer, then as a director, and then a producer. From day one, I read every screenplay – all revisions – and watched the words come to life on the screen.
Slowly, I learned what worked to tell stories economically, so some story sense came by osmosis, some by study, some by practice. I took story structure classes, studied Robert McGee. I read Bird by Bird by Ann Lamott and On Writing by Stephen King. I talked with working writers about series and story arcs, plotting, character, and foreshadowing. I also attended writer workshops, retreats, and read other successful novelists.
Chanti: When did you finally feel you were an author and add that to your extensive resume?
Calloway: The day I opened the box that brought the proof copy of If Someday Comes! Up to that point, there were many moving parts, the manuscript, the proof reading, the cover art, the endless formatting. Here in my hand was a real book, something anyone might buy. Unbelievably, it had my name as writer on it. It’s been published for many months, and I still find it hard to introduce myself as an author.
Chanti: Your ancestor’s story is so compelling. What genre best describes your book?
Calloway: If Someday Comes is historical fiction, closely based on the true story of my great-grandfather’s life during the American Civil War. I grew up knowing where people were during that period, but their exact relationships were lost in time, so I filled out the characters and created the tone of the plot as I went. Comments from the old folks like “he was a nice man” are not enough. It’s hard to avoid retroactively applied values to those times, and I’m sure some of my twenty-first century “I have judgement” slipped in there somewhere, but the goal of getting his story into a book was my true goal.
George Calloway
Chanti: How did find the information you used to fill in the background of the story?
Calloway: I read historical accounts of the period and subject, then added in my family’s tales of the past. I also created an outline of events for the story, and I used incidents I read about in books, letters, and newspapers for inspiration. The motivations of people never change for as far back as written history will allow us to see. Well-worn are the old trials of the human condition, and how often do we quote the Romans and Greeks on sex, greed, love, and jealousy. And of course, my own feelings on the same subjects.
Chanti: That’s a rich way to develop both character and story! How do you approach your writing day? What is your routine?
Calloway: “Sporadic” is my routine. I’ll write for several days, then none, then return to the page, then realize I need input, then read more history and other people’s work, stare at the blank screen, castigate my own procrastination, remind myself that no one is going to read this if I decide to cut it-so don’t worry. Then I despair that none will read the book anyway, convince myself that I’m hungry and a snack will get me going. I’ll check my email, take my dog for a walk, and then have lunch with old friends whom I’ve convinced my book is going great.
Ad infinitum.
Chanti: What about writer’s block? How do you handle it when the words just won’t come to you?
Calloway: Staring at an empty page with no ideas popping is tough. I write whatever comes to mind. It may have nothing to do with the book, or it may have a connection later on in the story. Some days are two sentence days, some are two-page days. I concentrate on my rights as an editor and will change or eliminate any thoughts, so I just jump right in.
If I’m really stuck, taking a walk helps. I leave the phone at home, as I find stepping away from it resets the brain. Sometimes I imagine your main character with walking with me. And the phrase “I’ve got to sleep on it” is a maxim I refer to often, because problems are solved and ideas are generated by whatever part of the brain is working at night. It’s an approach that work for me… sometimes.
Chanti: Those are great pieces of advice for breaking out of a block. Beyond writing, what sort of marketing tips do you have for authors?
Calloway: Online ads are the only strategy that has worked for me. Spending lots of money in trade magazines has been a complete bust. I advertise on Amazon and Facebook. Set a budget and see how it works for you. Even so, It’s a struggle. Contacting public libraries, local papers, community clubs (Rotary, Elks, Chamber of Commerce) help – they always need luncheon speakers. I also make a point of being available for online book clubs and chats, and I have a website that has book reviews, awards, and links to other websites. www.IfSomedayComes.com. And I always encourage readers to write reviews online. It really helps others to decide to read the book.
Chanti: What is your next project? Another story about a member of your family?
Calloway: Yes! I am working on my Grandfather James’ story as historical fiction. He was born a slave in 1860, and grew up to become a surveyor and farmer. James and his brothers – all graduates of Fisk University – worked for and with Booker T. Washington in the building of Tuskegee Institute. James ran the farms and also taught farming. He was Tuskegee’s representative sent to Washington, DC to lobby for land grants to help finance the school. Later, James was hired by the German government and traveled to Togo to teach cotton farming.
Chanti: Who are the perfect readers for If Someday Comes?
Calloway: The book is a story of family, both before and during the Civil War. It highlights the close relationships between owner and slave, and as was so often the case, is about one large family separated by race and class.
The story includes the good stuff, like love, courage, ingenuity, as well as the bad stuff of violence, cruelty, famine. Everyone suffered during the war; but remarkably, George (my Great Grandfather) kept everyone alive on both sides of the color line.
It will be a book for anyone interested in the Civil War, the experience of slavery in East Tennessee, and the relationship of whites and blacks in the South.
David Calloway was born in Chicago and grew up in Palo Alto and Berkeley. Calloway holds an MFA from UCLA in Film Production. His first job was as an Editor, progressing to Cinematographer, then a Producer of features and television. He is a member of the Producer’s Guild, the Director’s Guild, and the Academy of Television Arts and Sciences.
Calloway is a Director on the board of the Angel’s Gate Cultural Center and on the board of the Offshore Racing Outreach Foundation.
Calloway lives and works in Los Angeles, California. You can find out more about David Calloway’s writing on his website.
If Someday Comes available on Amazon in print and Kindle, and as an Audible book.
Thriller and Horror Author Alexandrea Weis sat down for a 10-Question Interview with Chanticleer!
We had the pleasure of speaking with Alexandrea Weis recently. The author of more than a dozen books, her YA Thriller Have You Seen Me? took home the 2022 Clue Grand Prize for Thriller/Suspense. Weis is an award-winning author, screenwriter, advanced practice register nurse, and historian born and raised in the French Quarter of New Orleans. Here’s what we talked about:
Chanticleer: Thank you so much for making the time for this interview. To start, when did you realize you that you were an author?
Weis: Probably after I published my third book. It wasn’t a fluke anymore, and I had readers interested in my stories. I began to believe I could do this professionally. Being an author is really a mindset, but it doesn’t happen overnight. You put your first book on the market and doubt you can do it again. By the third book, you’re looking forward to writing your next story.
Chanticleer: I love the idea of embracing the author mindset and the way in which you slowly build up confidence. What sort of stories do you write? What genre do you write and what led you there?
Weis: Thriller/Horror. It was a progression for me to this genre, but I love the challenge of tying all the elements together and keeping the reader guessing about the outcome. It also allows me to utilize my nursing experience by incorporating forensic aspects that are so important when writing thrillers. In addition, I write about the area where I live, Southeast Louisiana, as often as I can. We have such a rich history that lends itself beautifully to this genre.
You can get a visceral sense of Weis’ genre from the books on her site.
Chanticleer: Thriller and Horror could definitely interact with nursing experience in some fascinating ways. When you’re writing how do you interact with the conventional rules of writing?
Weis: I believe that when you break the rules, you create an exciting and unpredictable story. That doesn’t mean breaking away from the expectations of specific genres—readers expect certain things—but I try to push those boundaries.
Chanticleer: We owe so much innovation to people who push boundaries. What about outside of writing? Tell us a little about your life outside of being an author.
Weis: I’m a permitted and certified wildlife rehabber with the Louisiana Department of Wildlife and Fisheries, so when I’m not writing, I’m working with orphaned and injured wildlife. With Hurricane Francine passing through our area recently, I’ve been busy with displaced babies after the storm. You haven’t lived until you’re surrounded by hungry baby squirrels. I love working with wildlife and rescuing domestics as well.
Chanticleer: That sounds both adorable and also quite difficult. The number of hurricanes and “once in a lifetime storms” we experience these days is terrible. Sorry for the tangent. How do you come up with your ideas for a story?
Weis: I am constantly coming up with ideas. I can drive to the grocery store and have a new idea for a book series. I love working history into my stories and often find ideas when reviewing Louisiana folklore. I was raised in the French Quarter, so the history of the area has always become ingrained. We lived in an old Creole Cottage with a rich past representing the French and Spanish influences on the city. I was also raised around Cajuns and learned a great deal about tales associated with the swamps, including fanciful legends blended with historical facts. It’s a colorful place to live, and everywhere you turn, there is a terrifying account about a haunted stretch of marshland or the ghostly encounters inside a Creole cottage in the French Quarter. It is fodder for the imagination and has always inspired me to weave the magic of where I live into my books.
Chanticleer: That’s so cool! We just had a post celebrating Anne Rice’s birthday, and I know she grew up in the same area. So, moving from how you come up with your ideas, how structured would you say you are in your writing?
Weis: I usually have a pretty detailed outline, especially when working on a thriller. So many elements need to be addressed and fed into the ending; you need a well-thought-out progression of the storyline. When writing outside of that genre, such as when I’m tackling a romance or paranormal story, I’m not as strict in sticking with my outline.
Chanticleer: I love outlines as suggestions for the path rather than hard and fast. What about craft – how do you grow as an author?
Weis: Take risks. For me that was writing in genres I wasn’t comfortable with. I started romance and had reservations about moving into thrillers, but once I wrote my first one, I found the challenge addictive. I’m always looking to move into an area I’m not familiar with to learn and grow. I’ve also stretched my creative chops into writing screenplays and television shows. It’s a different form of writing, but it also teaches you to put as much into a scene while using the least words possible. It also helps hone dialogue skills.
Chanticleer: That courage to try new things is an inspiration. What new things are coming up as you continue to grow and challenge yourself?
Weis: I have two series I’m working on. The St. Benedict Series, with Lucas Astor is set around my hometown of Covington, Louisiana, along the Bogue Falaya River. It’s a thriller/horror series about a powerful family and their fall from grace. I love this series and its characters. I’m also working on The Basin Series. The first book, Cypress Hill, will be out next year. This is a spooky thriller set in the creepy Atchafalaya Basin and filled with local legends. The cast of characters are close to my heart and unforgettable.
The Bogue Falaya River
Chanticleer: Those both sound amazing! We’ll definitely keep an eye out for them. As we prepare to wrap up, I’m curious: What is the most important thing a reader can do for an author?
Weis: Let us know what you think! Either by review, email, posting on social media, or whatever a reader feels comfortable with, but please reach out. Every writer loves to hear from readers, especially if you loved the book. You so often work in a bubble, and to get words of encouragement, or even criticism, from a reader is valuable feedback. Writers always listen to what readers have to say. So don’t be shy.
Chanticleer: Writing truly happens with a community with reviews and outreach being one of the best ways for readers to participate with writers. Thank you for that advice. Finally, at the end of the day, what excites you most about writing?
Weis: There’s nothing better than finishing a book, bringing all the elements together, and realizing you’ve created a, hopefully, compelling story. It’s an incredibly satisfying experience. That’s what keeps me going.
Alexandrea Weis won the Clue 2022 Grand Prize for her YA Thriller Have You Seen Me?
Weis is a member of the International Thriller Writers (ITW) and Horror Writers Association (HWA). She lives with her husband outside of New Orleans where she is a permitted/certified wildlife rehabber with the Louisiana Wildlife & Fisheries and rescues orphaned and injured animals.
Maryanne Melloan Woods won the Grand Prize in the Dante Rossetti Division of the 2023 Chanticleer International Book Awards for his novel, Sour Flower. The Dante Rossetti Book Award recognizes emerging new talent and outstanding works in the Young Adult fiction genre. The Dante Rossetti Book Awards is a division of the Chanticleer International Book Awards (The CIBAs).
The Young Adult division includes:
Contemporary Young Adult
SFF & Paranormal
Dystopian/Edgy/Urban
Mystery/Thriller/Suspense
Historical Young Adult
YA Adventure/Romance
Join us in getting to know the incredible writing of the Dante Rossetti’s newest Grand Prize Winner: Maryanne Melloan Woods!
Chanti: Thank you so much for taking the time to do this interview with us. To start, tell us a little bit about yourself and how you started writing.
Woods: I come from a family of writers: my parents and brother were all journalists, and my sister writes songs and poetry. So, when I was little I just thought that was what people did! But I can remember at age eight making a firm decision that I wanted to be either a writer or an actor. When I became a playwright (and later a TV writer), I developed a way to do both; I act out the parts in my head when I write scripts, and now novels.
A bit more on my writer’s journey: I remember when I was a teenager seeing a TV show where they interviewed TV comedy writers who worked in a “writers room” and I thought: that’s what I want to do.
But how does a Jersey girl make that jump? I was lucky enough to go to a high school that had a playwriting class, and then got to be part of a wonderful playwriting program at Drew University. After that I got involved in New York theater, and then took a deep breath and made the jump to L.A, where I was lucky enough to land a great agent. I wrote my “spec scripts” (which are scripts you write for existing TV shows that you use as writing samples) and my agent sent me around on meetings.
Partners is an American sitcom starring Kelsey Grammer and Martin Lawrence.
Just driving on to movie lots for the meetings blew my mind! And then when I finally landed my first sitcom-writing job – which was “Partners” with Jon Cryer – and met the other writers, I had the feeling that I had stumbled into some magical land where everyone spoke the same secret language I knew, and cared about the same things I did, like creating vivid characters, how to craft a joke etc.
I learned so much about the craft of comedy and writing in general from that job and the ones that followed. But after several years in Hollywood, I felt a strong pull back to the New York area (where I promptly met my husband and just stayed.) I knew I wanted to work in theater again, but I was also interested in the possibilities of YA fiction, which was really heating up at the time.
My first novel, Lazarus, originally started its life as a TV pilot that didn’t get picked up. But I just couldn’t let go of the story. So, I dug deep, read all the recommended YA fiction I could, and settled on two that I really studied, because I thought they were so good. The Hunger Games, by Suzanne Collins (maybe you’ve heard of it) and The Fault in Our Stars by John Green. Those books were my training for learning a new form and ultimately writing Lazarus.
As I became a novelist I found I could use the storytelling skills I’d learned as a scriptwriter. Writing a first person narrative is a bit like writing a very long (and well-structured) monologue. I’m working from inside the characters’ minds again.
In my new novel Sour Flower, I found I could use the comedy writing chops I learned as a sitcom writer. There’s a lot of humor in the book, as well conflict and trauma.
Chanti: What an incredible start! That’s so wonderful that you were able to connect with a group that spoke the same language as you. Finding your “people” is so critical in the writing world. Would you talk more about genre, comedy, and your own writing?
Woods: My “lane” for much of my career has been comedy. Comedy-writing comes easily to me; I understand how it works. Sour Flower is a coming-of-age story that is initially quite comedic but ends up exploring deeper themes such as family dysfunction and substance abuse.
However, when the idea for my first novel, Lazarus, came to me, I knew it wasn’t a comedy, it was a mystery. And mysteries of course require very intricate and precise plotting plus clues and misleads, which DIDN’T come as easily to me. So, I studied the form and found the authors I liked best in this new genre (Ruth Ware tops my list.)
I had already learned so much about giving book characters a deep emotional life from Suzanne Collins, and while she doesn’t write mysteries, per se, she is the queen of the cliffhanger chapter ending. I found that to be an essential device in crafting Lazarus, which evolved into a paranormal thriller. I had to dig extra deep to write a YA thriller, using every element of craft I’d ever learned plus learning new ones that suited the genre. I think I have a handle on it now and indeed my forthcoming novel, The Last Howl of the Westerlakes, is also a mystery/thriller. So, I guess I would say that if you’ve honed your storytelling craft well, you can learn to write in a new genre. All of my work has comic elements, but if I had to label my novel-writing genre now, I’d call it “voice-driven YA fiction.”
Chanti: It sounds like you’ve done an amazing job creating a personal canon of books to help inform your writing and work. To ask something adjacent, what do you think about writing rules? Do you follow them, make up your own, or some combination?
Woods: I follow the rules that I learned starting as a theater major with a concentration in playwriting. I always think in terms of three acts, a structural form which goes back to Aristotle, and I’ve found that structure works well for writing novels too. In “Act One,” which is usually about the first quarter of a story, you’re setting up your characters and story and getting the reader/audience engaged. You’re also establishing tone, setting and genre. The protagonist’s journey begins, and you set up the desire line they’ll pursue until the story’s conclusion. In the middle section of Act Two, their journey becomes more and more challenging, with many setbacks and adversaries. In the last act of your story, you’re building to the climax of the piece, in which your protagonist finally battles their toughest opponent. I’ve found that this structure works in any genre or form: mystery novel, sitcom script, sci-fi western feature, or what-have-you. It’s what readers/audiences want and expect from a story.
Chanti: And speaking of story expectations, how do you come up with your story ideas?
Woods: I get little kernels of ideas, or mental images that play out like a short video. I’ve learned that if I keep coming back to it, there’s something there that I have to pay attention to. Something that I want to explore more deeply.
The idea for Lazarus came to me in the form of an image: a teen girl surrounded by the bleak, harvested cornfields of her prairie hometown, grimly intent on solving a murder. I knew that the girl was a great, natural detective, in fact she had better detective instincts than all the adults around her, including her police chief father. I knew that she had a love of funky thrift store fashion and that, at only 16, she had a profoundly deep relationship with her charmingly wise-ass boyfriend. And I knew that he had died, but that the death was a minor impediment to a love as great as theirs.
I was working in TV at the time so initially Lazarus was a pilot. It got me a lot of meetings around Hollywood, but ultimately didn’t get picked up. But I couldn’t let go of the story; it really resonated with me. So, I turned my attention to YA fiction.
Sour Flower is based on the upbringing of a friend of mine who was the responsible kid growing up with free spirit hippie parents in San Francisco. She wanted more from life than the day-glo, stoner chaos she saw around her, and managed to make her own way. I carried that story around in my back pocket for years; originally I thought it would make a great feature script. But when I started writing YA, I knew it would be perfect for a coming-of-age novel.
My next book, Last Howl, was based on an image again, this time of an idyllic suburban backyard garden party that’s suddenly disrupted by an unseen shooter. Stay tuned for that one!
Chanti: You have so many irons in the fire! With so many projects, how structured are you in your writing work?
Woods: In a word: very! With every project I write I outline and outline and then outline some more. I need to know where I’m going and have to know the progression of every chapter before I can start fleshing it out. Some writers can start without a road map, but I can’t. That said, many elements of the story change when I transition from outlining to actually writing. In both novels I’ve completed, I realized halfway through that the way I was taking the story wasn’t going to work. So, I had to put the central story line up on blocks and re-examine it. Once I figured out how to take the story in a better direction, more outlining! Luckily in both cases, the story flowed more smoothly, and everything finally clicked into place. It’s funny – I start out knowing the story will change, but I need to have a complete outline at the outset regardless. Go figure.
When not writing, Maryanne’s favorite hobby is playing and singing with The Johnny Woods Band.
Chanti: With that structure in mind, how do you approach your writing day?
Woods: I try to write for three to four hours every weekday morning. Particularly once I have an outline, I know what chapter or scene I’m going to write that day, so I just have at it. I usually only write one chapter a day. As far as writer’s block goes, I don’t generally have it, but I used to sometimes back in L.A. when I knew I had to have a spec script ready for hiring season in the spring. There was so much pressure. I got some great advice from a friend once: “Just sit down and write badly for a at least an hour.” You give yourself permission to start working whether it’s perfect or not. And before you know it, you’re in the flow, and you’re probably not writing too badly after all.
Chanti: You’ve named so many great authors and books. Can you offer up five of your favorite authors and describe how they influence your work?
Only five..? That’s gonna be hard! Since I’ve already mentioned John Green and Suzanne Collins I’ll skip over them here. I swoon over the writing style of both Markus Zusak and Fredrik Backman. Their storytelling chops, writing style and wisdom about the human condition never fail to amaze me. They make me try to raise my game. I love E. Lockhart’s great, out-of-the-box writing. She’s taught me to break rules and reach further in my descriptions. I think Ruth Ware is the best thriller author working today. I’ve learned so much about crafting mysteries, especially pace, suspense and misleads – from her. And for humor I’d have to say David Sedaris. I snort-laughed all the way through his book Me Talk Prety [sic] One Day. And his books aren’t just funny, they’re wise, relatable and heart-breaking too.
Maryanne and her husband, Johnny Woods at Haight Ashbury, a key location in Sour Flower.
Chanti: Those authors are amazing! It sounds like you have such a good base for your writing life. What areas would you say you are most confident in for your writing and what advice would you give someone who is struggling in that area?
Woods: I’m most confident in developing multi-layered characters, and writing dialogue. I have an exercise I use every time I start a project that helps me to flesh out the characters so I know how to write in their voice. First I explore each character’s wants, needs and fears. Then I figure out how each main character could be in conflict with every other main character. The latter part of the exercise often gives me good story ideas, as well as a deeper understanding of each character.
Chanti: That sounds like such an excellent plan! I’ll have to try that in my next project. As we wrap up, we’d love to know what you’re working on now.
Woods: I am really juggling right now. I have a TV pilot – a family dramedy – that I need to finish. Then I’ll get back to writing my new YA thriller, The Last Howl of the Westerlakes. At the same time, I’m working with a composer on my new musical, The Storm. And if you happen to be in Alabama in February you can see the premiere of my family musical, Who’s Afraid of the Big Bad Book? at Birmingham Children’s Theater. So definitely many irons in the fire!
Chanti: We know Sour Flower is currently a manuscript. For aspiring authors with incredible writing like yours that’s looking for the right home, what sort of a place are you looking for in terms of placing it?
Woods: I’m looking for an editor who likes YA lit with equal parts humor, heart and angst. One who loves good character/voice-driven stories, who has the skills and background to point out the things I’ve missed and help to make this novel as good as it can be. I’m also looking for a well-established publishing house that has the resources to support and promote a solid YA offering.
Thank you Maryanne for taking the time for us to interview you!
Maryanne Melloan Woods is best known as a writer/producer for TV shows such as NBC’s Suddenly Susan, Fox’s Partners and Showtime’s The Chris Isaak Show, among others. Her screenplay, Steve, won “Best Comedy Feature Script” at the 2016 Nashville Film Festival. Her screenplay Match Made in Heaven won the Scriptation Showcase Screenwriting Competition in 2021.Her complete TV and film writing credits can be found here: Maryanne Melloan Woods – IMDb
Her YA novel Lazarus, a paranormal thriller, was published by Owl Hollow Press in 2020. Her second book, a coming-of-age YA novel entitled Sour Flower, won the 2023 Chanticleer International Book Awards’ Dante Rossetti Grand Prize for YA Fiction (it is not yet published.) She is currently at work on her third novel, a thriller titled The Last Howl of the Westerlakes.
Maryanne holds a B.A. in Theatre Arts from Drew University and an M.F.A. in Screenwriting from The American Film Institute.
She is a member of the Writers Guild of America, The Academy of Television Arts and Sciences, The Dramatists Guild and the Society of Children’s Book Writers and Illustrators.
Hello friends, we have another fabulous interview for you today. Rick Steinke took home the 2023 Chanticleer 
Ralph Richard “Rick” Steinke is the award-winning author of the Jake Fortina global thriller series, including Jake Fortina and the Roman Conspiracy, awarded the Grand Prize for 2023 in the Global Thriller – High Stakes category at the Chanticleer International Book Awards (the CIBAs) in April 2024. The Jake Fortina series, beginning with Major Jake Fortina and the Tier One Threat, was also selected as a Book Series Finalist at the CIBAs.
Science Fiction award-winning
David Calloway was born in Chicago and grew up in Palo Alto and Berkeley. Calloway holds an MFA from UCLA in Film Production. His first job was as an Editor, progressing to Cinematographer, then a Producer of features and television. He is a member of the Producer’s Guild, the Director’s Guild, and the Academy of Television Arts and Sciences.
Thriller and Horror 
Alexandrea Weis won the Clue 2022 Grand Prize for her YA Thriller 
