***CONTINUED FROM LAST MONDAY . . . Most of the time aboard the Grandeur of the Seas, I was either walking the track on the upper deck or immersed in a good book somewhere, hidden away in a quiet corner of the ship. After all, I had all those calories Read more…
Which story shall I tell you first? The one about how I almost broke my neck taking a tumble from the balcony onto the theatre seats below? Or how it felt to peer up at the underbelly of a jet airplane performing a very low-altitude landing few feet above my Read more…
I’ve been struggling with this column for days. I even went into semi-seclusion for a week without realizing why—until yesterday—when an old friend offered his condolences. My sister Lisa died two years ago today. The call came that morning, while I was working on The Savage Murder of Skylar Neese. Read more…
News Flash!!! I have lots of exciting news to share, but first I really need to apologize to my readers, for keeping you waiting all this time. I have a good reason, several really, why I couldn’t get myself back to blogging, but to be honest, they’re just wimpy excuses. Read more…
Mum’s the word for another week, I think, before I can say which TV show will air a segment about my next book, Guilt by Matrimony. I can say this: the host is not only handsome, but he asked great questions. The show promises to be exciting and I can’t Read more…
Years ago when I published The Deputy for West Virginia police officers, a question arose about what would be considered newsworthy. At the time, the board of directors chose to let me have the final say over editorial content. When a fellow officer was later charged with DUI, I chose Read more…
Welcome to winter in all its glory: snow and ice and subzero temperatures when the wind chill decides to kick in, as it did most of the last week—and as it’s sure to do again. Accompanying these feats of the elements are frozen pipes and broken furnaces or, if you Read more…
I now consider myself an expert on United States health care. That’s why I can tell you what went wrong in the first U.S. case of Ebola. No, I didn’t go to medical school; nor do I have a degree in the field. And it’s not because of my first-place Read more…
Robin Williams is dead. He left behind a world of grief, even though 99.9-percent of us never met him. We knew him, though, as much as we can possibly “know” anyone through a lifetime of work. All of this grieving is about losing Mork, Mrs. Doubtfire, Patch Adams, and My Read more…
I’ve been away since last Wednesday, and I’m kicking myself for not writing this sooner. Just because I didn’t, though, does not mean that today’s date–the two-year anniversary of Skylar Neese’s disappearance–has not loomed large on my mind. How could it not, given that the book about her murder comes Read more…