Summer 2009

Closures in Blood: Hello to all…It’s well past due that I provide readers with an update on the next (and final) segment of the Converging trilogy. Over the last few months, I’ve been working diligently to add luster to the final draft of the novel. Once this has been completed, the novel will go through the long and often painful editorial process and it will be ready for release. When? As predictions are perilous snakes that often have a tendency to bite their masters, I will not hazard an exact guess at this time. Let it suffice to say that the novel will be ready once I am convinced that it can stand as a fitting conclusion to the series.

Each novel has a character and life of its own…with a creative process that is unique to the story being told. The Converging was a comparatively straightforward horror offering and while the characters were complex and challenging, the story itself flowed straight and true like an ancient river. Mark of the Demon was a far more challenging novel to write primarily due to the character evolution of the main antagonist, Cynara Saravic, and the crucial development of her relationship with Elizabeth Simpson. Like a skilled farmer, it was necessary to sow and nurture a host of subtle story elements in order to cultivate a credible ending for the second volume of the trilogy.

If asked to characterize my time spent writing and polishing Closures in Blood, I would say simply that it’s been fun. The characters have been very vocal in speaking to me and telling me precisely what part they would like to play in the unfolding of events and so the words marched across the page in smooth and purposeful fashion.

The Converging trilogy is based on the concept of a variety of diverse forces (some willing, some not) coming together at one critical juncture in the weave of time…with explosive, often lethal impact. This has never been more apparent than it will be in this final volume. Elizabeth Simpson will take center stage in this novel, but what of Cynara Saravic, her tormentor? I can say only this…through the wonders of fiction, is death ever really permanent? Along with a host of familiar characters, the reader will be introduced to a demented televangelist, a persecuted Wiccan priestess, a teenage runaway with an excruciatingly painful past and many other dynamic characters…each with a pivotal role to play in the drawing down of the story. I can promise this…after a wild rollercoaster ride, the Converging series will indeed achieve total closure. The crucial questions will all be answered and the characters who survive will be free to live out the remainder of their lives in peace, quiet and relative obscurity.

Ending this update where it began, I can only say that the novel will be ready when it has been written to the best of my capabilities…having said that, I can tell you this…

When this screen changes from orange to green, Closures in Blood will have arrived.