Describe your working environment.

I have what I call my Bat Cave in my finished basement. I have a nicely equipped gym and a small adjoining office. The whole place is usually a mess, with my bicycles and biking gear and other stuff tossed here and there and my office with scattered piles of paper, books and magazines. I hardly ever open the blinds, so I’m isolated from the world when I’m working. My wife says it’s a mess. She’s right. It is a mess – but I love it!

Are you a disciplined writer?

I don’t write often. I have no plan or system. I write when I feel like it. But when I sit down to write it becomes an obsession and I find it hard to stop. I wrote Joey Gonzalez in four hours. Once the story started coming out I could not put it down. I was hooked.

Have you ever suffered from writer’s block? What seems to work for unleashing your creativity?

I don’t suffer from writer’s block. If I did I would go for a long bike ride. I think about a lot of stuff when I’m out riding. If I ever started writing down all the stuff I think about on the road I might end up with a few books. Maybe I should carry a recorder.

What type of book promotion seems to work the best for you?

I’m having a blast doing radio interviews. I get a big adrenaline rush whenever I’m talking live on the air. I’m reaching a huge audience and I think the exposure could generate even more interviews. Radio is a great way to get a message out. Of course, TV would be better. I dream about being on Oprah’s TV show. Doesn’t every author?

What is the best writing advice you’ve ever received?

Please bear with me on this one. I want to build up to the advice. I once wrote an essay called “The last Voyage of the Sunfish” that was published in the National Submarine Review (my only other published work for which I received payment in money – not copies and a T-shirt). I was on the commissioning crew of the nuclear powered – fast attack submarine, Sunfish (SSN-649) from 1968 until I was discharged from the Navy in 1971. I loved that boat and I loved my shipmates. The day she sailed without me for the first time, I stood on the pier and cried.