Welcome to my newsletter! "In a world where character is everything...What Are The Three Musketeers of Storytelling?" Grab a drink and sit back, Reader, This one is going to be a bit long because it’s about character creation, a little bit about research, and a little bit about the foundation that one can build with backstory. I want to take a little time to emphasize a point (or two or three) about the importance of character, research, and backstory. I’ll use my Blackjack series — and get...
about 1 month ago • 3 min read
Welcome to my newsletter! "Without this, your characters drift in a lifeless void." Forgive me, Reader, Originally, I planned to continue a piece about the question “what if” and the powers one can gain from asking that question when determining a plot, character, or story structure. And trust me, we’ll get to that in an upcoming issue. But as I sat with my notebook and a favorite cup of tea, something else pushed its way to the front of my creative mind: the incredible power of...
3 months ago • 2 min read
🔥 THE CASE IS WIDE OPEN 🔥 shamus-sherlock-holmes-cover 🔥 One of Holmes' greatest challenges has arrived. 🔥 The curtain rises. The fog clears.And the truth steps out of the shadows. Before Holmes stepped on the scene, Ira Aldridge brought Shakespeare to life. His daughters, Luranah and Amanda, carried his legacy — and faced the world’s shadows. In this powerful new mystery, fact and fiction collide. 🕯️ I wrote Sherlock Holmes and the Hands of Othello to honor forgotten legacies and ask:What if...
3 months ago • 1 min read
shamus-sherlock-holmes-cover 📣 Greetings, fellow lovers of fiction — and mystery in particular! 🔍 Edited Monograph: Why Sherlock? Why would a poor Black boy love Sherlock Holmes? What was the appeal? Why mystery? Why admire a man who stood beside — and sometimes behind — the great colonizers of human history? After all, Watson was a medical doctor and a soldier in Afghanistan.England had invaded the Middle East, India, Africa, and lord knows where else. But Holmes…He was a loner.An odd man...
3 months ago • 1 min read
Welcome to my newsletter! "Ever noticed how easy it is to recall your mistakes?" Hey Reader. More often than not, I can remember my mine.I can remember them clearly… or as a muddled mess of unpleasant emotional recollections. I remember people shouting at me.I remember feeling stupid after making a simple mistake.I remember people turning down my work.Not getting anyone to even look at it.Not being able to sell it. And yes, I remember the times my work sold, was published, and was...
3 months ago • 1 min read
Welcome to my newsletter! "Jamal had no sense of his body. He couldn’t stretch out his hand before his face. If he still had one." Sit back, Reader. There's more. "Flash. Another impact, somehow inside him, around him, a part of him. Another hit. This time it entered him, possessed him. A sudden rush of warmth, anger, fear, innocence, electric, exploding “You’re the one who wanted to adopt . . .” A fragmented memory, harsh, isolated, deeply personal, painful -- but not his own. The stream of...
4 months ago • 1 min read
Welcome to my newsletter! "Good Still Matters — And So Do the Stories We Tell" Hey there, Reader, I’m not sure how this will work out—so think of this as a stream-of-consciousness experiment. Back in middle school, I had two good buddies—let’s call them Jamal and Jose. We bonded over comic books, action movies, and even made our own homemade good-guy vs. bad-guy films. They looked great in costumes; I was the overweight kid who usually played the villain. But we didn’t mind—because back then,...
4 months ago • 1 min read
Welcome to my newsletter! “What you write filters through who you are.” Reader, did you know ... I'm a person who was raised by a single parent — my mother — with regular visits to my grandmother and grandfather. However, many of the dominant role models I admired were fictional characters from television, films, books, and comics. One might assume that I learned the naïve lessons — that good always triumphs over evil, that being kind and generous leads to a loving and peaceful life, or that...
4 months ago • 1 min read
Welcome to my newsletter! “Two people, one terrible secret, and the pressure to reveal it before dawn.” Hey, Reader, Can you handle the heat? I've previously discussed Story Structure and the benefits of using Writing Prompts. Today, we’re going to use both. Here's a challenge for you: I’ll give you a framework for starting, developing, and finishing your story. The framework will be for a Microfiction (300 words or less) or Flash Fiction (500 -1000 words) tale. Here’s the prompt: Two people...
5 months ago • 1 min read