In recent days, blogger Colline has been kind enough to bestow upon me the Very Inspiring Blogger Award, while H. Conrad Miller and Rola Yousef have both sent the Versatile Blogger Award my way. From Kourtney Heintz, I received the Liebster Blog Award. Thank you, comrades in scribbling, for this recognition—and, more importantly, for your readership. These awards come with certain requirements, so I’ll combine them here. First, seven random things about myself:
1. I have slight OCD and have to check I’ve locked the door four times when I leave the house (insert snickering here . . .).
2. If given the choice, I prefer Beefeater’s gin over Tanqueray.
3. I often feel I was born a couple of generations too late. I wish I could have experienced London and Paris in the twenties and thirties. I would have worn a fedora and smoked cigarettes. San Francisco in the sixties would have been pretty cool, too.
4. I’ve yet to write the book I was “meant” to write—whatever that is.
5. If I ever scored a major bestseller and had the financial means to do so, I would take my family on a week’s vacation to Goldeneye, Ian Fleming’s Jamaican retreat where he penned the James Bond novels. It’s now a high-end resort.
6. In an attempt to be healthier, I’ve stopped drinking on weeknights. I now only enjoy alcohol on Friday and Saturday nights.
7. I hope my next book, Human Game: The True Story of the ‘Great Escape’ Murders and the Hunt for the Gestapo Gunmen, due out in October, sells well!
Now, I’ll list some blogs that I enjoy visiting (these, obviously, are in addition to the four folks mentioned above):
1. Fellow scribe Marc Schuster has a dry wit that I always find entertaining. Be sure to check out his book The Grievers, due out in May.
2. Kate, the 4 a.m. Writer, publishes great posts on pursuing “The Dream.”
3. Julie at Word Flows shares with readers her creative process. It’s always interesting to see how other writers work.
4. The poems and paintings of D.F. Barker are beautiful.
5. I also enjoy the artwork of Moyra Blayney.
6. Sally Panayiotou shares her struggles with the “work in progress.”
7. The Literary Man . . . the title speaks for itself!
8. Becoming Madame is a wonderful blog about living in Paris. If you can’t visit the city, this is the next best thing.









