Happy Friday, my friends!
I'm so excited to introduce you to one of my best buddies, Mr. Alan Black. Alan is not only a friend, but is also one of my beta readers and has given me so much help with my writing, I can't thank him enough.
I snapped this picture when we were at the Tucson Book Festival two weeks ago. I think it captures his fun and quirky personality pretty well. He is, as they say, a card. Which card, you ask? The joker, of course. By the way, Alan and I will be signing at the Book Vault in Mesa Saturday 3/28/15 from noon til 4:00 along with Kris Tualla, Deena Remiel, and Gini Koch. If you haven't met them yet, try to stop by if you're in the area. It's a great store. If you're not in Arizona, I'm sure I'll get them on here one Friday soon, so you can meet them, too.
If you have a sense of humor, I'm sure you'll find his books to your liking.
Take it away, Alan!
I've been writing novels since 1997 when I started Eye on The Prize. My writing tastes are as eclectic as my reading preferences. I admit that I love writing much more than editing and the whole publishing process. Marketing of my work leaves me as baffled as the whole string theory thing.
I was born in central Kansas and grew up in Gladstone, Missouri. I graduated from Oak Park Senior High School and eventually earned a liberal arts degree from Longview Community college. I spent most of my adult life in the Kansas City area. The exception came at the orders from the U.S. Air Force when I was stationed in Texas, California, Maryland, and Japan. My wife and I were married in the late 70s and moved back to Independence, Missouri, but now we live in sunny Arizona. The dry desert air stimulates my creativity more than the juicy air in Missouri (pronounced here as 'misery') and I've yet to shovel sunshine out of the driveway.
My desire to write started in the second grade. I was given an assignment to write a short story about Greek mythology. My teacher took the time to call my parents and express her appreciation of the story. Although neither of my patents remembered the incident, it had an impact on me, eventually leading me to write Eye On The Prize, taking two years to complete. I've gotten faster since then completing a recent manuscript in three weeks
One of the things I was most exited about was becoming a #1 bestselling author on Amazon and Kindle for Metal Boxes, a young adult, science fiction, military, action adventure. I have published eight. I'm a self-published multi-genre writer. One writer friend called me 'timeless' because I wrote historical books, novels based in the present and tales of the future. My main goal is to write story driven novels with scifi novels that are more character and action driven than focused on science, story driven historical that are not history lessons and entertainment based literary fiction.
My vision statement: "I want my readers amazed they missed sleep because they could not put down one of my books. I want my readers amazed I made them laugh on one page and cry on the next. I want to give my readers a pleasurable respite from the cares of the world for a few hours. I want to offer stories I would want to read."
Feel free to ask any questions in the comments or connect with me at AlanBlackAuthor.com
I really liked the way you have write up this blog about Mr. Alan Black. He seems a great person. I will definitely read his books, as I am a great fan of reading books. Recently I bought few books from launching event at Chicago venues. I enjoyed reading them.
ReplyDeleteThanks, Drew. Alan is a great guy. I hope you enjoy his books!
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