My Author Manifesto

As I was mulling the best content for the home page of my author web site, I searched for some all-encompassing words that could somehow capture all of my published works and — more broadly — the very reason that I write.

The result, it seems, is a kind of “author manifesto.” But I don’t know if that is even the best thing to have on one’s home page, and some day a marketing expert (far more Internet-savvy than me) will probably take pity on my web traffic numbers and advise me to redo my entire home page. For that reason, I thought I should at least store these thoughts in the form of a blog post for posterity (or just to remind myself, after I’ve forgotten why I’ve spent countless hours holed up in my writing cave, what my manifesto is!).

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My Author Manifesto

Words and stories have always fascinated me because of their mystical power.

They can travel from the author’s mind to the prison cell of a man serving time for a crime he didn’t commit (or has finally come to regret).

They might appear in the hospital bed of a woman fighting cancer and craving the smallest pleasure to balance out her day of pain.

Even more often, words and stories can entertain a hard-working employee stuck on an otherwise long and dreary commute.

Books can reassure lonely or bullied souls that they are not nearly as alone as they think, and they can give inspiration or courage to people facing great challenges of almost every kind.

There is a magic to storytelling and language because these are so essential to that which makes us human — from laughing to crying to sharing.

And literature combines the beauty of storytelling and language with imagination, which then frees us from our natural limitations and transports us to new horizons.

Fiction is the playground where language and imagination reunite to run about freely.

From the comically absurd to the dramatically poignant, the great record of our collective experience and individual journeys is stored in the bank of humanity known as literature. And I am here to make my tiny deposit.

As you wander about my web site a bit, I hope you discover something that intrigues you.

Above all, I hope that you enjoy my words and stories.