Today, 2/11/21, is the first time I am using this space to say a little about myself.

Shyness, a belief I would bore readers with my background or cause them to think I was using it to selfishly gain sympathy, prevented me in the past from sharing biographical information. However, because of my new novel, Ghost Dancer, I believe it is now appropriate to mention a few aspects of my childhood.


With Ghost Dancer I am a white male writing about a teenage girl, Native and African Americans, and a same sex, female relationship. So the question is, am I also “…a white liberal interloper, a cultural [gender] carpetbagger…” the criticism leveled at William Styron for writing The Confessions of Nat Turner? (William Styron’s Nat Turner: Ten Black Writers Respond.)

My mother was sadistic, my father--a murderer who sentenced to the electric chair died in prison--beat me. I know about childhood abuse and marginalized people. Because of my own childhood struggles I could write about Eleanor, the teenage protagonist in Ghost Dancer, with an insight transcending gender. I care about her. Although fictional she is authentic and I am grateful I could give her a voice.

I hope readers will find Ghost Dancer worthwhile and my treatment of the subject matter respectful. I know with this story I have walked on sacred ground. I have tried to do so with an honest and open heart.