Novels are just expanded feature stories
My posts about my early days in journalism were fun for me to write. There were great memories, and even greater people. But those journalism stories contain little clues to my current work as an author. Those clues tell what I wanted to become in journalism. That's what I wanted to become and not what I eventually ended up doing. I was a simple goal. I wanted to become a features writer. I loved nothing more than to meet people, pull up a chair, have a good cup of coffee and slowly learn about their lives. I loved meeting Tintype Gordon in Guerneville, Calif. He was a former corporate middle manager who left that life and started taking pictures of people in period costumes, one of those photographers who create sepia-toned final prints. I loved talking to police officers. I loved talking to Forest Service employees about their lives and projects. I tried to treat them fairly as I wrote my stories. But that feature story writer never had a chance to develop. The need for rep