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An Interview with Author Heidi Marshall

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Before coming to the United States, author Heidi Marshall wrote more than 50 radio scripts of children’s stories. After immigrating, she became an award-winning short story author published in several anthologies. In September 2024, she released The Town That Lost Its Colors, her debut children’s chapter book “written in the tradition of fine tales of courage and respect, with modern themes of inclusion, forgiveness, and kindness.” You’ll find Heidi on her Amazon Author Page.

What would you like readers to know about the story you tell in The Town That Lost Its Colors?
It began in Spanish, my native language, as a short radio script, with the title El Pueblo que Perdió sus Colores. The story had a few elements of the book as published many years later, but vastly different themes and characters.

What unique challenges did this work pose for you?
Finding the right ending, once I committed to re-write the book for a grandniece’s birthday, after it had been set aside, sometimes for years, because of life’s more demanding expectations. I tried several endings that only brought the book to a standstill — until that Eureka moment. After that, ideas flowed, and the sentences practically wrote themselves. I never did tell my grandniece which birthday I was talking about…just in case.

Who are your main characters and why will readers connect to them?
Princess Imogen, the main character, wants to help her people but has no notion how to go about it. She figures things out as she goes, improvises, and that makes the readers want to help her succeed. I hoped to draw enough empathy for the little unicorns’ plight for the reader to take part in their story. The monster, well, his broken horn broke my heart, and I was just making that up.

Who did you write the book for? What topics does The Town That Lost Its Colors touch on that would make it a perfect fit for the classroom? 
I feel that the topics of acceptance, forgiveness, inclusion, and respect for differences have become more important now than ever before.

As to the first part of the question, I could never have written this book for a specific age group. My respect for children’s wonderful ability to imagine is too much to box them within age brackets. I wanted my words to trigger the children’s own imagery of the story. I understand that a book “for all ages” seems to be a bad idea nowadays commercially, but I believe that if parents love a story, the more likely they are to read it to young children, or gift it to children beginning to read chapter books.

How did you feel the first time you held your book and saw your story come alive in the artwork of illustrator Adrienne Kinsella?
It was wonderful to hold a complete version, although it was only a proof.

Tell us how the book came together.
The story and I changed and grew old together. It took that long! The illustrator Adrienne, from a talented branch of the family, happened to be available at the right time. The editing process evolved from my SouthWest Writers Sage challenge submissions.

What was your favorite part of putting this project together?
Seeing the book become real. I learned so much! Illustrations coming to life by Adrienne’s hand. The book falling naturally into chapters, which made the illustrations also fall in place as introductions to each chapter — captions and all! Kathy Louise Schuit with her considerable talent and attention to detail making all the book elements come together seamlessly with her design and layout.

When did you know you wanted to be a writer? What is the first piece of writing you can remember finishing?
It was when I read in front of my elementary school fourth grade teacher and classmates an assignment about the first Hispanic woman ever to win the Nobel Prize in Literature, the Chilean poet Gabriela Mistral. The kids looked blank, but I saw my teacher surreptitiously wipe a tear from the corner of one eye. I wanted my written words to cause that reaction in people. I realize now that a lot of youthful, heartfelt purple prose could have caused that tear.

What is the best encouragement or advice you’ve received in your writing journey?
Learn the craft. Talent is only the beginning.

KLWagoner150_2KL Wagoner loves creating worlds of fantasy and science fiction. Her current work in progress is The Last Bonekeeper fantasy trilogy and short stories in the same universe. A member of SouthWest Writers since 2006, Kat has worked as the organization’s secretary, newsletter editor, website manager, and author interview coordinator. Kat is also a veteran, a martial art student, and a grandmother. Visit her at klwagoner.com.



An Interview with Author Gary Lucero

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Gary Lucero is an author, poet, and software engineer who has published poems and short stories, as well as a book of photography dedicated to his best friend and constant companion Geordi. Gary’s newest poetry collection is The Unknown Race, released in April 2025. Look for him on his website GaryLuceroWriter.com, Facebook, Instagram, and his Amazon author page.

At its heart, what is The Unknown Race about?
About humanity and our passions, our mistakes, and about how we are often controlled by that one percent of the world, the richest of the rich.

What unique challenges did this work pose for you?
I always struggle with structure. How to put a book together so it makes some sort of sense. What poems to include, in what order. I had those same concerns with The Unknown Race. It’s a delicate process that requires concentration and constant revision and review.

What inspired you to put this collection together? How many poems did you write just for this project and how many were already written?
The books I’ve created so far are all collections, so it’s a matter of writing, revising, and finding enough content of a similar type to create a book. About a third of the poems are from late last year, and the rest were written specifically for The Unknown Race.

How are the poems organized and why did you arrange the collection that way?
I created three chapters based on the poems I completed. Ramblings is a collection of poems about humanity, and many of these are older poems from Fall/Winter 2024. Ravings are rants about big money and the government that enables it. Regrets are about my life, its disappointments, etc. The title poem, which ends the Regrets chapter and the book, is my big rant, which looks at my life and how insignificant it is when compared to the grand scheme of things.

How did you choose the title of the book?
I came up with the title in the late 1990s. At the time I was thinking about how we’ve treated the Native American people, and how that kind of process where you take a race and sterilize and destroy it causes them to lose themselves, and how they might forget who they are. Of course, this kind of process isn’t specific to Native Americans as it’s been going on for as long as man has lived. More recently, I started thinking how the concept of The Unknown Race applies to anyone who forgets who they are, where they came from, or why they exist. It could be from an external source like slavery or ethnic cleansing, or sometimes we do it to ourselves by running away from our culture and the pressures it places on us. However it happens, we might become an unknown race.

The Unknown Race is your fourth collection of poetry. How does it differ from the other three, In Life There Is No Escape (February 2025), In Letting Go (October 2024), and When I Flew (March 2024)?
In Life Is No Escape is a collection of extremely negative poems that I quickly threw together. I came up with this idea of a person who has lost everything and has tried to end their life, but God refuses to let them die. It came together at a very low point in my life, and I felt very strongly about it at the time. Unfortunately, I don’t think I quite achieved what I was aiming for. In Letting Go has mostly older poems, some from as far back as the 1990s. It’s my “catch-up” collection. When I Flew is now unpublished and its poems overlap with In Letting Go.

What was your favorite part of putting this project together?
I believe the cover turned out nicely, despite its somewhat unusual appearance. And the book was fun to create and came together quickly. I felt less nervous and more self-assured about The Unknown Race than my previous books, and I think the content overall is of better quality.

Of all the books you’ve written, which one was the most challenging to write?
In Letting Go was difficult because I had to figure out the order, and which poems to include, and I was hesitant to include the final chapter, “And So It Is With Heroes.” I struggled with that book, and while I’m generally pleased with it, it could be better.

You write poetry and short stories. How has your experience with one affected or benefited the other?
Sometimes when I’m having a difficult time developing new poems, or good poems, I create small prose fragments, and they help me work through my feelings and try different things in a manner that’s easier than trying to pen a poem. So, I think they are complementary forms of writing, and I will continue to pursue prose, but I don’t know if I’ll attempt to release more short stories or not.

Do you have a preference for poetry structure or form when you write or read?
Truth is, I didn’t read poetry before the end of last year! I learned about poetry in high school but never realized it has its own set of rules, and that there are scholars of poetry, and people who look at it with such a critical eye. My poetry was always based on lyrics in music, mostly rock and progressive rock. I’m learning about poetry now, which is difficult, to say the least. It’s been challenging. But to answer your question, I mostly write in free verse but I’m still trying to get a handle on it, so my poetry structure changes from day to day.

How important is accessibility of meaning? Should a reader have to work to understand a poem?
I think accessibility is extremely important, and my personal style is pretty basic. Personally, I prefer reading poetry that isn’t a puzzle, and much of the poetry I read turns me off because it’s too esoteric or rambling or self-absorbed.

When did poetry become important to you?
In 11th grade, I took a creative writing class and as soon as I learned about poetry, I started writing and never stopped. I don’t remember if our teacher, Mrs. Barnes, read to us from any of the great poets or not, but she was always supportive of the terrible poetry I wrote, so I just kept writing. Over the decades since, I’ve continued to write, but it’s become much more important in the last couple of years.

How does a poem begin for you, with an idea, a form, an image?
Usually, it’s a line or two from something I think, or see, or hear. Then I keep working on it, revising and expanding until I think it’s complete, or I abandon it. For me, poetry is something I try to work on daily, mostly on my phone. I’m constantly shuffling poems around from one folder to another, deciding if they belong in the book I’m currently working on, or maybe a future book, or if they are left unfinished or aren’t good enough to consider for any book.

What writing projects are you working on now?
I’ve been told by a couple of professional poets that my poetry is not poetic enough. That it’s often more prose than poetry, and it lacks proper use of metaphor, simile, rhythm, etc. So I’ve started a new book where I take my poems and turn them into stories and musings. I turn them into prose, which is an interesting process, and one I’m excited to see how it turns out.

Is there anything else you’d like readers to know?
I’ve never been part of the poetry scene, and I’m still not. I feel like an un-poet in many ways, estranged from what is considered proper or good poetry. I don’t know if I’ll ever appreciate real poetry or find my way past my amateur status. I might not. But if I can entertain or challenge a group of readers, then I’ll have had some level of success.

KLWagoner150_2KL Wagoner loves creating worlds of fantasy and science fiction. Her current work in progress is The Last Bonekeeper fantasy trilogy and short stories in the same universe. A member of SouthWest Writers since 2006, Kat has worked as the organization’s secretary, newsletter editor, website manager, and author interview coordinator. Kat is also a veteran, a martial art student, and a grandmother. Visit her at klwagoner.com.



An Interview with Author David F. Menicucci

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David Menicucci is a professional researcher retired from Sandia National Laboratories who still volunteers part-time as a research professor for the University of New Mexico. He has published three nonfiction books and is the author of, or contributor to, nearly sixty research publications. His newest nonfiction release, Two Centuries to Freedom, The True Story of One Family’s Two-Century Migration from Lucca, Italy, to New Mexico and Other American States (Sunstone Press, March 2025), is a comprehensive view of early 20th-century Italian immigration as seen through the eyes of the Menicucci family. The book contains over a hundred historical photos, maps and diagrams. You’ll find Dave on Facebook and his SWW author page. Look for Two Centuries to Freedom on Amazon and Barnes & Noble.

When you began writing your family’s history, what did you hope to accomplish? By the end of the journey, do you feel you were successful in your goals?
I wanted to tell a fascinating true story, one fully annotated and referenced. Most importantly, I strove to tell what drew these dirt-poor immigrants to this country. America’s free market capitalism allowed them to own their own business and the freedom for self-development. The story of Catholicism is a large part of the story, especially how the Italians used prayer to generate hope in the most calamitous of situations. There are detailed accounts of the grandiose midnight Masses at Immaculate Conception Church in the 1950s that required ticketed reservations for a seat in the pews. Whether the book is successful remains to be seen. The goal is to educate people by encouraging reading. The Albuquerque Public Library has nine copies, and an e-book will be available shortly.

What unique challenges did this work pose for you?
Wringing out the juiciest information, such as the story about the Menicuccis’ and Matteuccis’ experiences with depression. The book provides vivid details about the ravages of mental dysfunction in Albuquerque in the 1950s and the impact it had on the early Italians who feared it like a dreaded disease. But obtaining the information was difficult because people feared speaking out lest they be blamed for spreading scandalous information, even if the information was verified and all the participants had been deceased for decades.

When did you know you wanted to write the book that became Two Centuries to Freedom? What prompted the push to begin the project?
My mother, Emma Dalle Menicucci, in about 2000 knew by my many publications that I could write. She suggested that the family story would be interesting for people to know because it exemplified the features of America that drew the immigrants here and how those features allowed the family to thrive. She supplied interesting material and stories, which piqued my interest. But it was Rick Nathenson’s Albuquerque Journal article in 2010 that sparked my effort. In that article, he asked whether a gang of local Lucchese (Lucca Italians) chased a Chicago Mafia gang out of town in 1928. He left the question unanswered, and it intrigued me sufficiently that I set out to answer it. That led to intriguing discoveries that convinced me that a compelling story about Italian immigration was waiting to be told. The answer to Nathanson’s question is on page 225 of Two Centuries, section entitled: “Lucchese to Albuquerque’s Defense.”

How is the book structured and why did you choose to put it together that way?
The book covers a chronological period beginning in the 1780s and ending in the 1980s, thus the “two centuries” title. It is structured by date. Appendices provide additional detailed information on specific ancillary topics but of significant importance. About eighteen pages of references provide the source materials that I used. The Notes explain how I used these sources to develop my conclusions in each chapter. My self-imposed constraint was to meet the International Genealogical Standard of Proof, which generally requires two independent sources to verify a conclusion.

Tell us how the book came together.
I wrote the book and then sought out a publisher. Rose Kern suggested self-publishing, but the book is large (644 pages), has many references, and a hundred pages of notes, including tables and other graphics. So, due to the complexity, I hesitated to take this on myself. Because of my affiliation with the university, I began soliciting publishers, starting with UNM Press. Unfortunately, they are not community-inclined. I solicited others until I found Sunstone Press. I was able to negotiate a fine deal.

The book comprises three phases of effort: 1) Ten years of research, 2) Two and a half years of writing, and 3) Two years of marketing. My marketing plan has three targets: 1) Family and Friends, 2) Local folks in Bernalillo, Sandoval, and Santa Fe counties, and 3) National and international, especially Italy. I am in phase 2. I will launch phase 3 at the world’s largest international genealogy conference in Salt Lake City in March 2026, where I will speak.

What are some of the most surprising facts you discovered while doing research for this project?
Three surprises. First, how crazed most Italians are over Porcini. Some of the anecdotes are on par with Three Stooges skits. Second, the amount of alcohol consumed by the Italians. A typical immigrant family fermented about 200 gallons of wine and distilled 5-10 gallons of grappa annually. (Grappa is a low-quality brandy, ~70 proof, produced by fermenting and distilling the leftover skins and seeds of squeezed wine grapes.) My grandfather took four shots of grappa daily—in coffee, lunch, dinner and before bed. And he drank water and wine at meals. My grandmother drank about ¾+ bottle of wine daily. They both died in their 80s, 90s of old age. Third, the profound nature of scandal in immigrant Italian culture, which exists today. Scandal is an innate fear in many Italian families that rivals horror tales of goblins and evil specters. It impacted my ability to collect data. I visited my aunt in Louisiana three times to convince her to relate intriguing inside stories that she had been harboring for decades. Only when all the participants in the story were dead—fortunately, she had survived them—did she reveal the details. An appendix is devoted to the issue of scandal in Italian culture.

What was the most rewarding aspect of writing Two Centuries to Freedom?
Researchers are educators. My goal is to discover new things and tell other people about them. Publishing a detailed, properly referenced, fully annotated report of my extensive findings is immensely satisfactory.

How do you conduct your research? How does your research continue once you begin writing?
My process of discovery is involved, and I will have more to say in some workshops I am planning for SouthWest Writers. But simply, I collect a lot of information, then sort through and quality-assure it and subsequently categorize all. I look over the categories and decide what kind of story they tell. If the emerging story is worth telling, I synthesize the categorical information into a coherent narrative. One of the book’s most unique features is that it tells this story in the context of history. This means it explains what the people did and the coincidental historical conditions that influenced their decisions.

Naturally, once the writing begins, discrepancies arise that require additional research. These interruptions can disrupt a train of thought in a writing session, so I triage each new side-finding and decide whether to table it for later or interrupt the work and integrate it into the trove of data. Diversion is typical in research and is one way that novices can be sidetracked into unproductive paths of inquiry. I keep my eye on the main goal at all times.

What does a typical writing session look like for you? Do you have any writing rituals or something you absolutely need in order to write?
Every author has his/her way. I focus on the reader. I imagine speaking directly to him or her in simple words. I make liberal use of parables. I like to tell stories that engender my primary goal—to educate. I measure everything in the book against that standard. I ruminate much before I write. I began the process by imagining the whole story as one—where does it start, where does it go, and where does it end? That encapsulates the project and provides a clear goal. Then, I put myself in the reader’s shoes and ask what might be interesting and important to understand the story.

I contemplate much and write a little. I frequently mull things over for weeks, usually at one of my retreats, such as our mountain cabin, home greenhouse, basement brewery, the Jemez streams, UNM golf courses or my workshop. I bring a notepad and jot things down as I think about them. At some point, I have enough to begin drafting. Once I start, I sprint to the end. Typically, for a writing session, I select a goal, such as completing a fixed number of related sections. I had several 72-hour periods where I slept a total of eight hours and ate nothing but a couple of cups of soup and a sandwich. I do not recommend this but it has served me well since graduate school, and I have many publications and two professional careers as evidence.

What writing projects are you working on now?
I have several planned, all related to Two Centuries to Freedom. Presently, I am working on The Culinary Principles and Practices of Albuquerque’s Early Italians. This will explain how the Italian immigrants in the city cooked, what foods they ate, what practices they brought from Italy, how their food impacted the local populace and culinary fusion with the Anglo and Hispanic cuisines, especially the use of New Mexico chiles in Italian food. I am also in the process of telling the Two Century story visually, in a screenplay.

KLWagoner150_2KL Wagoner loves creating worlds of fantasy and science fiction. Her current work in progress is The Last Bonekeeper fantasy trilogy and short stories in the same universe. A member of SouthWest Writers since 2006, Kat has worked as the organization’s secretary, newsletter editor, website manager, and author interview coordinator. Kat is also a veteran, a martial art student, and a grandmother. Visit her at klwagoner.com.



Author Update 2025: Zachry Wheeler

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Zachry Wheeler is an award-winning science fiction author who has published over twenty books across four series. His newest release, Starship Eternity: A Sci-Fi Horror Short (January 2025), is the fifth addition to his Twisted Simulations series. Look for him on his website ZachryWheeler.com, his new YouTube channel, and his Amazon author page. For more about his writing, see his first interview for SouthWest Writers and his interview update.

Zachry, there’s a lot to catch up on in your world. You’ve taken a hiatus from writing to focus on photography. What lead up to that decision?
This is how I avoid burnout. I never shelve my creative drive, I just point it at something else until my batteries recharge. Photography has always served as a great counterweight, in that it scratches the creative itch while also forcing me to touch grass.

When you’re working on both writing and photography, do they share your time in equal measure?
Not at all. There is always a primary focus, otherwise the quality suffers. At the moment, I am delving deeper into photography while casually working on writing tasks. I still promote my books and develop new ideas, but without any goals or time pressure. For now, my brain is focused on what camera settings produce the best hummingbird photos.

As a creative, do you find one medium (writing or photography) more intimate than the other?
For me, writing is more intimate. I really enjoy the challenge of snapping good photos, but I’ve spent decades with my story characters and know them like family members.

What is the most rewarding aspect of both artistic endeavors?
In photography, it’s a perfect moment. You are constantly hunting for perfect weather, perfect lighting, and perfect timing. When you “get the shot,” it’s a fantastic feeling.

In writing, it’s a happy reader. When you put so much time and effort into creating, editing, and publishing a story, there is nothing more rewarding than a fan telling you why they loved it.

You’ve made big changes regarding your interaction with social media. According to your website, you’ve moved away from all platforms and you’re focusing more on your website, blog, and mailing list. You stated social media was “actively harming” your brand. Can you explain what you mean by “harming” and in what ways has changing focus helped your brand?
We all know that social media is catastrophic to mental health. In my opinion, trying to leverage it effectively is not worth the stress and reputational risk. Brands have done serious damage to themselves by posting the wrong things at the wrong times, no matter how innocent. It’s also a massive time sink that eats into valuable creative time.

In my own experience, I noticed that I was wasting too much effort chasing engagement. The resulting frustration would derail my process and cause me to rant in writing groups, which is never a good look. I realized that social media was more bane than boon, so I deleted all of my accounts and walked away. The resulting peace of mind was immeasurable. Many authors are waking up to the fact that you don’t need social media to be successful.

If I’m not mistaken, you spent some time as a script doctor. What was that experience like and are you still called upon from time to time to help?
I lucked into this role, which I found to be surreal yet enjoyable. Long story short, my novel Transient (Immortal Wake #1) got optioned for a feature film and landed in development for a time. That got my foot into the door and a few chance encounters resulted in some work as a script doctor. It’s different from writing the screenplay (which I have also done), in that you’re using your author skills to polish dialogue, fix structural errors, and find plot holes. It’s actually quite fun and engaging. I haven’t done much doctoring in recent years, but I’m always up for it when the producers need me.

What marketing techniques have been most helpful to you?
I spent many years in the marketing trenches, where I flushed piles of cash down the toilet. As with everything in advertising, some things work, most fail. I have found that the only surefire bet is BookBub. Their featured deals are very expensive and hard to get, but they offer the only guaranteed ROI in the game. It took me several years of patience and perseverance to get into their regular rotation. Now it’s the only service I use. I compiled my strategies into a marketing guide on my blog, which you can read here: https://zachrywheeler.com/an-authors-guide-to-marketing/

I’m seeing more and more authors put out short stories and novelettes in chapbook form. Has this been beneficial in gaining visibility for your work?
Very much so, and for many different reasons. First and foremost, it expands your readership net because the attention economy is a difficult nut to crack. People who read novels and people who read short stories are rarely the same. But, if they enjoy your writing and become fans, then they will cross over. In addition, shorts and novellas are much easier to produce and publish. It’s a great way to mitigate risk if you want to experiment with different styles or genres. Shorts are also great fodder for freebie promos and reader magnets.

What draws you to the dark side of literature?
I have always been a big horror fan, so it was only natural that it would creep into my writing. My first true horror title was The Bone Maiden, a prequel novella to the Immortal Wake book trilogy. I greatly enjoyed that writing process, which got me thinking about a new horror series. That became Twisted Simulations, a collection of short stories with sci-fi horror themes. This is another series that I have an abundance of ideas for, so I’m sure it will continue.

You have a tech noir series, Immortal Wake; a sci-fi comedy series, Max and the Multiverse; and a collection of chilling tales called Twisted Simulations, to name a few. All are diverse. Do you have a favorite?
I am proud of them all, but if I had to pick one, it would be Puki Horpocket Presents. This is a sci-fi comedy series that spun off from Max and the Multiverse. It’s about a famous journalist who profiles extraordinary beings in the cosmos. The stories are so much fun to write because I blend so many different styles. I use interview formats, first-person commentary, third-person narration, you name it. I definitely want to return to this series at some point because I have so many ideas for new tales.

What authors influenced your writing?
Douglas Adams has been my favorite author since childhood and his influence can be seen all over my works. Andy Weir is another big influence, as I greatly admire his ability to blend sharp humor with hard science. On the darker side, I have a wide range of influences, everyone from Max Brooks to George Orwell.

I always like to get an author’s take on critique groups: some can help, some can hinder. Do you work with a critique group or share your work with anyone prior to putting it out into the world?
Critique groups are double-edged swords. Good ones can elevate you to new heights. Bad ones can destroy your motivation or blind you to obvious issues. I have experienced both and it took a while to find what works best for me. I have a small group of trusted peers who serve as my beta team. The key is to find people who enjoy your work, but are willing to give you fair and honest feedback. Seems simple, but they are very hard to find. In my experience, most people are either pleasers (everything you do is great) or punishers (everything you do is crap). Sadly, fair is rare. And for the love of all that is good and holy, be receptive! A good critique group is worthless if you aren’t willing to heed the advice.

What’s on the horizon for you? Will you be adding to these series, or are there other series or standalones percolating that you can tell us about?
I honestly have no clue, but that’s only because I’m currently enjoying a hiatus. I have several new ideas and many works in progress, so who knows.

If you want to stay in the loop, the easiest way is to sign up for my newsletter. As a special gift, I will also send you a free limited edition eBook!

Su Lierz is a horror writer in the Land of Enchantment. Her short work can be found in anthologies and several publications including Grey Sparrow Journal and The Horror Zine. She lives in Corrales, New Mexico with her husband Dennis.



An Interview with Author Roger Floyd

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Roger Floyd is a retired research virologist who is now a science fiction author of short stories and novels. He harnesses a fascination with outer space and space travel to bring readers on a journey with his characters to other planets and the stars beyond. In his debut novel, Explorer: Part I of the Anthanian Imperative Trilogy (August 2024), a team of explorers from a dying planet investigate their civilization’s best chance for survival. Look for Roger on his website RogerFloyd.com. Explorer is available in most bookstores, through IngramSpark, and from Amazon.

What would you like readers to know about the story you tell in Explorer?
I think the most important takeaway for readers of Explorer is the fact that space travel isn’t going to be as simple and easy as all the popular fiction stories make it out to be. We see TV, movies, books, comics, etc, all the time which make it so easy to just get on a spaceship and travel to all sorts of places in the galaxy. Or even out of it. While these stories are fun and enjoyable, they’re somewhat misleading. It won’t be that easy. There’s a certain naivety in that concept, a certain laissez-faire attitude that can’t be brushed aside in real life. We’ve already seen some of the most unfortunate results of that attitude: Apollo 1, Apollo 13, Columbia, Challenger. Yet in the popular media, characters travel thousands of light years in a short amount of time in comfort and ease. I suggest we modify our expectations of space travel somewhat and realize it won’t be as wonderful as we make it out. We humans are highly sophisticated in terms of understanding our world and the environment around us, certainly, but we still have a lot to learn about other worlds, even just the ones close by. I, personally, would love to be among the first to land on Mars, but it still will be a very dangerous journey.

What unique challenges did this work pose for you?
Since this was my first large scale work, and in fiction (I’d only written scientific articles before), I had to learn how to write in a completely different way. I’d never done fiction at all. I started by getting subscriptions to writing magazines. I picked up books on writing, especially writing sci-fi, and I began attending meetings and conferences. I’d read mostly nonfiction in my early years, but I’d read some fiction, and I thought I knew enough to at least get started. So I did. But the challenges of fiction still made it necessary for me to delve into the process of writing in a big way.

Tell us a little about a few of your main characters and why you chose them to carry the story.
At first, the two main characters, Lilea and Jad, were simply two names out of ten that I developed when I was laying out the main story of the book. My first thought was to not use any one person as a main character and tell the story from the POV of each of the different characters. But I soon realize that concept wouldn’t work—too many characters for the reader to keep track of. I settled on Lilea because she was the youngest on the team, and the one with the least amount of space experience, and the least amount of training. What better person to watch grow as the story unfolds? Jad, on the other hand, was highly experienced and well trained, both in space flight and in his chosen field. Growth for him would be much more difficult. An interesting juxtaposition.

How did the book come together?
The main story idea came about over a period of several years. I was living in Cincinnati at the time, and the autumns in Cincinnati are spectacular. While watching the leaves fall one year, I wondered what a visitor from another world would think if he (she?) landed on Earth at that time. Would they think the trees are dying? From that basic concept I developed the story that became Explorer. Of course, I had to develop a good reason for them to visit Earth, and from that work back to their homeworld and make up all the details that went along with it. I started the book in 1998, and got a first draft of 248,000 words finished around 2003. Wow. Way too big. I began cutting and revising and cutting and revising for years, and never really finished it until 2023 when I declared it finished and copyrighted it. Done. (In the meantime, I wrote the second and third books of the trilogy.) Probably the most difficult aspect of writing was learning how to cut. Cut–cut–cut. I kept telling myself, “Everything I cut always makes the book better, even if I’m cutting out some things I like.”

What was the most difficult aspect of world building for Explorer?
The most difficult aspect of world building was not only developing the characters’ homeworld of Anthanos, but finding out what Earth looked like around 15,000 years ago when the story takes place. Research was essential more for the second point than the first. I did a lot of Google research, but much of what I needed wasn’t online. Living in Cincinnati, I went over to the library at the University of Cincinnati and found several books on Earth around the time of the Pleistocene Era, the time of the Ice Ages.

What was your favorite part of putting this project together?
Getting the first books from the printer.

Was it always your plan to write a trilogy? If not, at what point did you realize you needed more than one book to tell your story?
I didn’t start out to write a trilogy. That developed after I finished the basic story for Explorer and realized I wanted to continue the story. That developed into Traveler (part 2) and later into Warrior (part 3).

You began your fiction writing career later in life. What did your mature self bring to the writing table that your younger self never could have?
Probably a life of research which required absolute attention to detail and a commitment to finding out everything I could about a research project.

Knowing what you know now, what would you do differently if you started your writing/publishing career today?
Writing the second and third books of the trilogy went more quickly than Explorer. The second took about five years, the third about three. I suspect I learned a lot about writing just by writing novels.

Do you prefer the creating or editing aspect of writing? How do you feel about research?
I have an affinity for both creating and editing. Research comes naturally, having done it for years.

What does a typical writing session look like for you? Do you have any writing rituals or something you absolutely need in order to write?
I tend to write in the afternoon and evening. I’m not one of those who gets up at 3:30 am and writes just because it’s quiet or I’m rested or the kids are asleep. Generally, I like quiet when writing, or if I play music, it’s classical music. Rituals? No. Just sit down and boot up the computer.

What writing projects are you working on now?
Right now, I’m finishing the second in the trilogy, Traveler, working with the artist to get the cover and interior art done, and formatting the manuscript to get it ready for the printer. All very enjoyable.

Is there anything else you’d like readers to know?
Yes. Buy the book! It’s available in most bookstores (highly recommended), through IngramSpark (also recommended), and from Amazon.

KLWagoner150_2KL Wagoner loves creating worlds of fantasy and science fiction. Her current work in progress is The Last Bonekeeper fantasy trilogy and short stories in the same universe. A member of SouthWest Writers since 2006, Kat has worked as the organization’s secretary, newsletter editor, website manager, and author interview coordinator. Kat is also a veteran, a martial art student, and a grandmother. Visit her at klwagoner.com.



An Interview with Poet Mark Fleisher

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Mark Fleisher is an Air Force veteran and former journalist with experience as a combat news reporter as well as a newspaper reporter and editor. Now a published poet, after the release of his first book of poetry in 2014, his work appears in numerous anthologies. Mark’s fifth book of full-length poems is Knowing When: Poems (Mercury HeartLink, March 2023) in which he “writes of sadness and tragedy, lightens the mood with poems about love, nature, even baseball, as well as a mirthful look at technology. Fleisher’s blend of narrative and lyric styles cut to the heart of the matter, showing the ability to speak volumes in a minimum number of lines.” Look for Mark on Facebook and his Amazon author page.

When readers turn the last page in the book, what do you hope your poems accomplish?
I hope the poems in Knowing When encourage readers to think about what I’ve written and what, if anything, the words mean to them. Maybe shed a tear or elicit a chuckle.

Do you have a favorite poem in the book, one that has a deeper meaning than the others?
I don’t know if they are my favorites, but the three poems talking about gun-related events underscore for me the very real and serious problem we have in this country. If I had to pick a single poem it would be “A Bittersweet Christmas.” It involves a couple I knew in Michigan. The husband — now deceased — had dementia, and his wife thought a Christmas tree would provide him with a little joy.

How did Knowing When come together?
I would venture to say the title poem and the last poem in the book were written specifically for Knowing When. The others I had written over the course of several months. I like to mix humorous — at least to me — poems in with the more serious stuff. Because I had most of the poems already written and sitting in the computer, it didn’t take all that long to assemble. The editing cycle was essentially going through the book numerous times and then Pamela Warren Williams (my publisher at Mercury HeartLink in Silver City) found things I missed. She did the interior design and we kind of collaborated on the cover. I had an idea of a clock with no hands. She suggested one hand and I agreed. The cover is essentially in gray tones and black. One reviewer called it depressing, another said it was extremely effective. You never know.

When did you know you had taken the manuscript as far as it could go, that it was finished and ready for publishing?
Great question. I had the manuscript finished — at least I thought so — and sent it off to Pamela. A few days later, I was driving down 4th Street on my way to the gym. A song written by John Prine and sung by Nanci Griffith came over my audio system. The song was “You Broke the Speed of Sound of Loneliness.” It dawned on me that there must be another side of loneliness and I started composing the poem in my head. I went to the gym, drove home and remembered what I had conjured up in my mind. I called Pamela and she said there was time to add another poem.

How is Knowing When different from, or similar to, your four other full-length books of poetry?
While I wouldn’t call myself a “war poet,” my year in Vietnam as an Air Force combat news reporter certainly informs. My previous four books contained a fair number of Vietnam-related poems and a few about other wars. Oddly, Knowing When does not. That was not a conscious decision on my part. In fact, I wasn’t even aware of it until the manuscript was done.

What was the best part of putting this project together?
Finishing it. Seriously, working with Pamela. She’s published my last three books and her late husband Stewart Warren did the first three. Knowing in my mind and my heart that I did my best and believing I had a pretty good book. I guess that was borne out as Knowing When was a finalist for the New Mexico-Arizona Poetry Book Award and a bronze medalist from the Military Writers Association of America. An author whose name I don’t recall said for a man, holding that finished book in his hands is the male equivalent of giving birth.

When did poetry become important to you?
I’m a relative newcomer to poetry. Didn’t like poetry very much or understood much of it through high school and college. When I started visiting New Mexico in 2010-2011, I started writing poetry. I have no clear idea why that happened, maybe because of the poetry community in and around Albuquerque. My reason for coming to New Mexico was an affair of the heart. I reconnected with a wonderful woman who I had briefly known — we had two dates — before I went to Vietnam. We hadn’t seen each other in 43 years. I remember writing romantic poems as our relationship grew. Most of them pretty bad as I really had no idea what I was doing.

How important is accessibility of meaning? Should a reader have to work to understand a poem?
Accessibility of meaning…I’ve been told my poetry is accessible and approachable. I am best categorized as a narrative poet, telling a story. That’s an outgrowth of my newspaper/magazine background. When I started writing poetry, I had a hard time with lyrical poetry. I’m more comfortable with it now. Still there are some things I’ve written and then said “where did that come from?” Someone — I can’t recall who — said some poems come from way out there and you are merely a conduit in sending it to readers.

How does a poem begin for you, with an idea, an emotion, an image?
Yes, yes and yes. I’ve even written a few poems generated by dreams, like having lunch with a young Einstein.

What writing projects are you working on now?
By the time this interview posts, I’ll have my next book in my hands. It’s called Persons of Interest and it’s different from the other books. This book contains 13 stories and 13 poems, a Baker’s Dozen of each.

KLWagoner150_2KL Wagoner loves creating worlds of fantasy and science fiction. Her current work in progress is The Last Bonekeeper fantasy trilogy and short stories in the same universe. A member of SouthWest Writers since 2006, Kat has worked as the organization’s secretary, newsletter editor, website manager, and author interview coordinator. Kat is also a veteran, a martial art student, and a grandmother. Visit her at klwagoner.com.



Author Update 2024: Michael Backus

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Author and creative writing instructor Michael Backus is an essayist, novelist, short story writer and screenwriter as well as a memoirist. His latest release, The Heart Is Meat: An 80s Memoir (Oil on Water Press, August 2024), is a “raw…tender…self-portrait of the artist as a strung-out young meat market worker in the throes of a volatile love affair” and “vividly evokes the carnival seaminess and romance of pre-gentrified downtown New York.” You’ll find Mike on his website MichaelJBackus.com and on Facebook and Twitter. For more about his work, read SWW’s 2017 and 2022 interviews.

Why did you write The Heart Is Meat and who did you write it for?
In my synopsis/pitch for the book, I wrote:

In 1982, NYC’s meatpacking district was a wild confluence of meat market workers, gay men hitting The Mineshaft, NJ mafiosos, veterans of three wars, heroes of the French resistance and Holocaust survivors.

It was a startling new world for a 22-year-old who grew up in a small town in Indiana. I never dreamed of moving to NYC; if my sister hadn’t moved there in 1978, it wouldn’t even have been on my radar. I got a job tossing meat at Adolf Kusy Pork and Provisions through my sister’s boyfriend; it was 1982 and NYC was still an exciting and scary place and the Gansevoort Meatpacking district on the north edge of Greenwich Village was like nothing I’d ever experienced. It was pure chaos from 3:00 to 10:00 am, the streets clogged with hundreds of men in white coats, trucks blowing their horns, semi-trailers wanting to get unloaded and gay men frequenting the Mineshaft and the Anvil, two heavy leather clubs. More than anything, I wanted the book to be a document of that time and that place, a world of drugs, violence, levity, desperation, and hard work. I wanted to recreate the ongoing profanely aggressive dark comedy that was the meat market in general and our meat house in particular. Jimmy, my old boss at Kusy’s, had t-shirts made up that read “Adolf Kusy Pork and Provisions, we have the meat and the motion, the wild and craziest meat house in NYC.” A few years ago, I tracked down Jimmy and he said;

“I wish now I had a tape recorder and had just recorded every day down there. Just the…stories alone, the shit people came up with every day, the insanity of that place.”

If you go to NYC’s meatpacking district today, it seems almost impossible to believe my market of the early 80s ever existed. There’s the new Whitney museum, a seemingly endless number of high-end stores and restaurants, the lovely High Line park built on the old High Line railroad tracks (weedy and abandoned in the 80s). Today, a Van’s shoe superstore sits where Kusy once did. So first and foremost, I wrote the book because working there was a central experience in my life and I wanted to honor that. But I also felt some responsibility to make the book a document of a place and a time that’s so long gone, it’s hard to imagine it ever existed.

When did you know you wanted to write this portion of your life’s story? What prompted the push to begin the project?
I wrote a fiction short story back in the 90s called “Meat” that is loosely based around my experiences in the market in the 80s. It was published in the Portland Review, a literary magazine out of Portland State University and for a long time, I considered that my best short story. At that time, I wasn’t very interested in memoir. I resented its place in our literary culture, the idea that memoir was somehow “more true” than fiction, which is a ridiculous simplification. If I thought about it at all, it was as a possible novel and as a possible novel, I wasn’t interested in imposing an invented plot on what had been my life.

Then life intruded. I got older, people close to me started dying of old age and at some point, it was like someone threw a switch and I found myself writing short memoir pieces which eventually led to beginning the book that would become The Heart is Meat. One thing I learned about memoir is it’s easier to structure your narrative if you simply commit to a chronological approach, the structure takes care of itself and you can concentrate on content. With fiction, structure is never a given and the sheer number of ways you can approach a fiction narrative are daunting. That wasn’t an issue in writing this book and I found that very freeing.

I should also mention that a large part of the book is about maintaining a live-in relationship, living in the East Village of the early 1980s, going to art shows and dance clubs and guerilla art installations on the Hudson River piers. I try to capture what it was like to live in a New York City very different from today; how it could be scary, but it was also lively and exciting.

How is the book structured and why did you choose to put it together that way? How did you decide when to end the memoir?
I structured the book chronologically more or less but I made a couple of decisions about structure. For one, I wanted to start on action, just jump right into the moment so I didn’t detail how I ended up in NYC in the beginning, I started right in the middle of a day at work in the market, a day when my character was expected to apologize to a meat inspector I’d had a run in with a few days before. Adolf Kusy Pork and Provisions carried only boxed meat, so meat inspectors never bothered us, but they could cause problems if they wanted to which was why I was being forced to say “I’m sorry” for something I considered the fault of the inspector. This forms the first 30 pages or so of the book.

After this opening, I mostly moved forward chronologically but about halfway into the book, I have a second structural section where over a five-day period (the overall section is called “The Great Stakeout” and is broken down into sections marked Day One, Day Two…to Day Five) I detail two dramatic events happening at the same time. At work, there had been a holdup and murder in a nearby meat house and Adolf Kusy had the most ready cash on hand (we did more retail business than anyone else in the market) and everyone was sure we would be next. Plainclothes cops spent five days wearing white butcher’s coats and pretending to work among us while waiting for the robbers to strike. At the same time, the mother, father and sister of the woman I lived with were visiting from overseas and staying with us in our cramped East Village apartment. Each of the five days, I navigated work and cops and possible danger from 4:00 am to 2:00 pm, then after, when normally I’d be napping, I hosted her parents, running around the city, doing touristy things. It was a lot going on at the same time, but it ended up being a central structural part of the book.

About the ending, I struggled with it for some time and I still don’t think it’s perfect. If the book is partly about working in the Gansevoort meat market and living in a very different NYC, it’s also about the slow dissolution of a relationship. I used that final breakup as the end of the book, but after I was done, I interviewed my old boss Jimmy and added an Epilogue with information on what happened to some of the characters in the book over the previous 25 years. Jimmy remembered some things differently than I did and I included those memories without changing my own, this memoir being how I remembered my life back then. The epilogue also allowed me to include one of Jimmy’s memories about the market then, which helped me make one last point about the uniqueness of that particular time and place, which worked as the actual ending to the book.

Tell us more about how the book came together.
Writing took a couple of years; I mentioned a fiction short story “Meat” earlier, that story had an aggressive, profane and hopefully comic voice and I was able to find that voice very early on in writing the memoir. That was a huge help. But after multiple rejections, I’d more or less given up on publishing the book. It had some of the best writing I’ve done in my writing career, but it seemed out of step with our literary and social culture; the meat market world in 1982 was often over the top in how people expressed themselves, how they acted (toxic masculinity sums up the market nicely), and while I’m totally on board with our larger culture’s attempts to embrace a more open, inclusive approach to everything, I wasn’t sure my book really fit into the American literary world of today. Oil on Water Press is out of England and I don’t think it’s a coincidence that an English publisher accepted my book. I’m not convinced an American publisher ever would have. In terms of the book cover, the publisher came up with it after I sent them a photo from the 80s of Adolf Kusy’s sign outside the meat house. I liked it from the start and after I was able to get a couple of blurbs from known authors, the cover was complete.

Any “Oh, wow!” moments while doing research for this book?
Nothing so dramatic, but when interviewing my old boss, I discovered that a couple of guys I worked with had died just a few years after I left the job. And he had details that were different from mine. For example, in “The Great Stakeout” section of the book, I remembered the two killers being described as Serbians. He remembered them as Jamaicans, and while I acknowledged that in the Epilogue, I didn’t change anything in the body of the memoir. It seemed useful to acknowledge the reality that memoir is as created a world as fiction; that the moment an event is over, it becomes a memory and all memory is subjective.

One last sad thing; I always imagined finding Jimmy, my old boss, and giving him a signed copy of the book, that he more than anyone would appreciate the details. It was one of the reasons I wanted to get the book published in the first place. But just a couple of months ago, while trying to figure out how to get the book to him, I found out he died in 2023 at the age of 73, which was a surprise since he seemed healthy and robust his whole life.

Did you ever feel you were revealing too much about yourself while writing The Heart Is Meat? If so, how did you push past this feeling and continue?
Absolutely, I freaked out fairly regularly about it. I published a novel, The Vanishing Point, a couple of years ago and while the main character has a lot of me in him, I could always hide behind the idea that this is fiction and that character is NOT me. But in the memoir, the character literally has my name. It IS me. There’s a genuine vulnerability to that and I can’t claim to have fully come to grips with it, though in the end, it is what it is. In terms of pushing past this fear, when writing, I always tell myself that I need to be as open and honest as possible and if at some future point, someone wants to publish it, then I’ll worry about it then. And I’ve been writing a long time now, I’ve taught creative writing for over 20 years and I’m still teaching it. I’ve long ago come to peace with the notion that I might at times be showing too much of myself, which isn’t the same as saying I never have moments of doubt and worry.

There’s another consideration. The girlfriend who I was living with (Maya in the book) is alive and well. I met her in college, we both ended up in NYC, we lived together for five years on 12th Street and Avenue A. I still know her, mostly in a “like your post on Facebook” way but she didn’t ask to be a character in a former boyfriend’s memoir and I feel some trepidation about that. I have not talked to her about it and part of me has to be selfish and say, “This is my story,” but that doesn’t mean I’m not aware that I’m revealing intimate details about someone who hasn’t been part of my life for 30 plus years.

How did you pick the title of the book?
I worked on the title with my sister and her partner; they came up with the Heart is Meat part, I wanted to add something about what it was so I added An 80s Memoir to the end. I sometimes go back and forth even at this late date on the title, but here’s the thing. When I published my novel The Vanishing Point, I had changed the name a couple of times and The Vanishing Point was the original title and I was eager to return to it. But now in retrospect, I find The Vanishing Point kind of mundane and mostly forgettable. It sounds generic. Whatever else, The Heart is Meat is not generic.

What was it about New York City that first drew you to it? Has your view of the city changed?
My sister moved to the city from Indiana in 1978, she still lives there. I visited her in 79 and while I was not the kind of kid who ever imagined himself living in NYC, something about the vibrancy of the place interested me. It was dirty, it was dangerous, but the streets were also full of people at pretty much any time of the day or night. There were artists and writers everywhere, so in 1982, thinking of myself as a fiction writer, I moved to the city because it seemed the best city for a fiction writer to live in. And it was, pretty much in every way other than doing the work itself. I wrote almost nothing in my time there but much of what I experienced informed everything I eventually did write. I left the city in the late 80s to go to grad school in Chicago but returned in 1998 and spent the next 16 years there and it was a totally different city. Still lively and crowded, but not in any way scary anymore (despite what certain politicians say, NYC is one of the safest cities in the country), I built a fine life around working for a college on the upper east side (both in the administration and teaching creative writing as an adjunct professor), I rode my bike everywhere, I played basketball four times a week at the 92nd street Y. In so many ways, it was an idyllic lifestyle and totally different from my experience in the early 80s. But one of those differences was how expensive it had become and when I lost my apartment in 2014, I literally could not afford to live there anymore. If I could have afforded it, I’d probably still be there.

KLWagoner150_2KL Wagoner (writing as Cate Macabe) is the author of This New Mountain: a memoir of AJ Jackson, private investigator, repossessor, and grandmother. Kat has a speculative fiction blog at klwagoner.com and writes about memoir at ThisNewMountain.com.



Author Update: Lynn Ellen Doxon

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Lynn Ellen Doxon had authored over a thousand newspaper and magazine articles, three nonfiction books, and a children’s book before she branched into historical fiction in 2022 with the publication of the first World War II novel in her Becoming the Greatest Generation series. Book two in that series, and her newest release, is The Moonlight Cavalry (Artemesia Publishing, April 2024). You’ll find Lynn on her website LynnDoxon.com and her Amazon author page. For more about her work, read her 2023 interview for SouthWest Writers.

The Moonlight Cavalry is the second book in your Becoming the Greatest Generation series. Can you give readers a little background on this new book?
In the first book, Ninety Day Wonder, schoolteacher Eugene Sinclair is drafted against his will as war rages in Europe but before the US is involved. Following boot camp he is trained for the Coastal Artillery and sent to the shores of Puget Sound. He feels his calling is in medicine and manages to get additional training as a pharmacist. His pharmacy training is completed on December 5, 1941.

After the Pearl Harbor attack, he is almost immediately reassigned to anti-aircraft artillery and sent to Camp Davis in North Carolina for Officers Training School. On his way there he meets Sarah Gale, a young woman who works in the camp laundry. Ninety days later he is commissioned as an officer and deeply involved with Sarah Gale.

Following further training in Texas (and New Mexico since Fort Bliss extended all the way to what is now White Sands) and Florida, where Sarah Gale is now stationed as a WAC and they become engaged, he was sent to the Pacific, where he is separated from his battery.

In The Moonlight Cavalry, Gene leads a replacement platoon to the island where his unit will soon arrive, then rejoins the unit as they follow the 24th Infantry around New Guinea and the Philippines. Along the way they experience pitched battles, battle fatigue, friendly fire and the biggest killer in the Pacific, tropical diseases. Gene contracts malaria and is plagued by hallucinations of his fifth great grandfather’s experience in the Revolutionary War.

What drew you to the historical fiction genre?
I discovered historical fiction in elementary school, and it quickly became my favorite genre. In high school I waded through several Michener novels and read War and Peace.  I was a voracious reader all my life and read The Thorn Birds (which isn’t historical fiction) in one sitting when it first came out. When I decided to start writing full time, historical fiction seemed the natural choice.

Were there any scenes you found difficult to write? How did you move past that?
As the relationship developed between Sarah Gale and Gene, I had to consider how to write intimate scenes between them. Since this is a 1940’s novel I went with the suggestive level of many 1940’s movies, but I still am not sure those scenes are as engaging as they could be.

What is the most difficult aspect of writing historical fiction?
There is a lot of research involved in writing historical fiction and the temptation is to try to include all you have learned. I quickly figured out that my long descriptions were not as engaging as Michener’s. They sounded more like the academic writing I did on the way to getting my MS and PhD. I tried to remove everything that did not contribute to the story.

Also, this story takes place recently enough that there are some people who remember it and more who can say “that’s not what my dad told me.” Sometimes I could not find research on details I wanted to include so I just made things up. It is fiction, but the historical details still need to be accurate, or somebody will call you on it.

When writing a series, what is it that keeps readers coming back for more?
Each book has to be a complete story but still have some unanswered questions to draw the reader to the next book. Of course, everyone knows how the war comes out, but how does Gene fare for the remainder of the conflict? It is also important to have characters people love. I hope I have made Gene and Sarah Gale into characters that people want to know.

How much involvement did you have regarding the book’s cover design?
I sent the editor several suggestions and he sent back something that was much better.

What is your elevator pitch for The Moonlight Cavalry?
The Moonlight Cavalry is the story of a searchlight battery of antiaircraft artillery, told by their executive officer, island hopping across the Pacific during World War II.

Authors are faced with handling much of their own exposure when it comes to media and marketing. How do you balance your writing career with the business of being a writer?
My daughter and I just started a digital marketing company. In that process I have learned a lot about effective websites and social media marketing. The problem is I simply don’t have time for everything, and things aren’t too well balanced at the moment.

What part do critique groups play in your writing process?
I find the critiques of other writers to be very important. I belong to a critique group that has made several suggestions that I believe will make the third book much better. I believe critique groups and beta readers are extremely important in the writing process.

When can readers expect to see book three in your Becoming the Greatest Generation series?
Life is pretty hectic right now. I am hoping to have a publication date in November 2025.

Su Lierz writes dark fiction, short story fiction, and personal essays. Her short story “Twelve Days in April,” written under the pen name Laney Payne, appeared in the 2018 SouthWest Writers Sage Anthology. Su was a finalist in the 2017 and 2018 Albuquerque Museum Authors Festival Writing Contest. She lives in Corrales, New Mexico, with her husband Dennis.



Author Update 2024: Irene I. Blea

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Dr. Irene Blea is a nonfiction author, novelist and poet, as well as a retired university professor and civil rights activist. Her newest book release is Dragonfly (March 2024), a collection of poems spanning 50 years of her life in which she “shares her transformation from the prescription of traditional female roles riddled by confusion and conflict to one of peace, understanding, and redefinition.” Look for Irene on Facebook. You’ll find many of her books on her Amazon author page, but Dragonfly is available here. Read more about Irene’s work in SWW’s 2015 and 2017 interviews.

What are you trying to communicate to readers through Dragonfly?
Humans need beauty in their world. It is a healing element. Each year I wait for a golden dragonfly to visit my yard. It stays for hours in the same place, and we commune with one another. I thank it for sharing its beauty. It makes me feel connected. If it does not appear, I miss it and wait for it the following year. The cover is indicative of my need for beauty and connection. As humans, we sometimes need to heal from something that has no name or something to which we have paid little attention. Because I have experienced this, I offer my understanding as a spiritual guide via poems of transformation and healing.

Is there one piece in the collection that gets to the heart of the whole?
It is difficult to select one, but I feel it is hija de la tierra because it speaks to healing from racism, class discrimination, and sexism. I often switch between two languages because this is the way I think and feel things. It is how I navigate in two worlds.

♦◊♦◊♦hija de la tierra
♦◊♦◊♦♦◊♦◊♦your ancestors were goddesses and kings
♦◊♦◊♦♦◊♦◊♦♦◊♦◊♦who ruled across lifespans
♦◊♦◊♦your ancestors have been diminished
♦◊♦◊♦♦◊♦◊♦to barrio dogs and cats
♦◊♦◊♦♦◊♦◊♦♦◊♦◊♦dogs and cats who roam the alleys of society
♦◊♦◊♦♦◊♦◊♦♦◊♦◊♦♦◊♦◊♦dogs and cats who teach us how to live
♦◊♦◊♦hija de la tierra
♦◊♦◊♦♦◊♦◊♦you were born to reign above the mountains
♦◊♦◊♦♦◊♦◊♦♦◊♦◊♦you should be born to live in peace

While going through your fifty years of poems, did you discover something about yourself or your poetry? Has your writing style changed over the years?
To my surprise, I discovered I was at the forefront of Chicano and Chicana poetry in the late 1960s and 70s. I had not realized this because I was busy researching, teaching, developing university courses, and writing textbooks because there were none in the beginning of the sociology of Chicano Studies. My feminism is consistent. The book is a composition of three chapbooks, and I inform the reader about how my style changed because of my education and some of it remained the same because of my politics.

What challenges did this work pose for you?
This work was not very challenging because I had read my poems to audiences for years, and I already had the work in print in the form of chapbooks. I dictated the work from the chapbooks to my computer, revised them a bit, and sent it to a couple of outside readers who made the work better.

How did the book come together?
I started the process on New Years Day of this year. The inspiration is the first sentence of the introduction to the book: “On January 1st, 2024, I opened my eyes and asked into the crispness of my bedroom if I would die that year. I have been obsessed with my death for decades… The room responded with, ‘I don’t know.’ I decided to rise and make some coffee….” While the coffee was brewing, I decided I did not want to die without letting readers know I had written poetry. My poems had been published in several places, but I did not have an entire book of poetry printed and distributed. It took a few months. As mentioned above, it was rather simple to put the book together since I had so much poetry categorized in the chapbooks.

The Dragonfly book cover is beautiful. Tell us about the process of working with the artist.
The publication is a composite of three talented females: me the author, Rose Kern the publisher, and my daughter, Raven, the cover artist who does not use her last name. We worked well together. Rose and Raven know their craft well and all I had to do was trust their feedback. I knew I wanted a “pretty” cover and Raven presented me with three options. Raven did the cover of my autobiography, Erené with Wolf Medicine, and I loved it. This made it easy to work with her.

How and why did you chose the title of the book?
The title is generally the most difficult part for me. It was late spring, and the publisher needed a title. Since I was waiting for the golden dragonfly to appear, Dragonfly seemed to fit.

Of all the books you’ve written, which one was the most challenging and which one was the easiest (or most enjoyable) to write?
Dragonfly was the easiest one to take from concept to publication and distribution. The most difficult book to write was my autobiography, Erené with Wolf Medicine. I wrote about leaving the Catholic Church, getting divorced, contemplating an abortion, domestic violence, and suicide. Each time I wrote about them, reviewed and edited them, I re-experienced the emotions. At the same time, in the end, it was cathartic, and I released a lot of sensations and found it healing. But it was difficult to take it from concept to publication, then release it for distribution.

What poets do you continually go back to?
I return to the classic Spanish writers because Spanish is such a beautiful poetic language. Sometimes the mystical, magical, tone of a poem is difficult to translate into English. Fedrico Garcia Lorca, Gabriel Garcia Marquez, and Pablo Neruda are among my favorites.

Do you have a preference for poetry structure or form when you write or read?
I write poetry by inspiration. Something needs to affect me profoundly. I am not trained in poetry, so structure and form are only important to the degree that I want to render emotion or message. Most of my structure and form is in breaking mainstream rules. It comes from reading and writing Chicano, Native American, and Afro American resistance poetry by other writers, which I began to do at the height of the Chicano movement.

Do you remember what inspired you to write your first poem?
As a child, I shared a bedroom with my younger sister, who was very ill and could not sleep. To comfort her, I recited poems. But I did not write anything down. Sometimes in the darkness of our bedroom, she would request a story that rhymed. They were generally about an animal, child clown, or a pretty lady.

How does a poem begin for you, with an idea, a form, an image?
A poem begins for me with an emotional reaction. They are like prayers.

What do most well-written poems have in common?
They must be written within the economy of language and render an emotional tone. I seek images and feelings, or that the scene is fully rendered. Well-written poems for me are not terribly long, epic, although my poems have become longer recently, and I cannot explain that. Except to say that the issues I have been writing about have to do with the environmental factors that ravage the environment and how Mother Earth struggles to respond to those ravages.

Is there anything else you’d like readers to know?
Healing must take place holistically at the physical, emotional and spiritual level. Pills, ointments, and massage can do some of that but there are other forms of medicine. Acupuncture, the sun, dragonflies, the presence of certain people, and animals can bring healing. These are healing elements, medicine, which address the physical, emotional, and spiritual components of health.

KLWagoner150_2KL Wagoner (writing as Cate Macabe) is the author of This New Mountain: a memoir of AJ Jackson, private investigator, repossessor, and grandmother. Kat has a speculative fiction blog at klwagoner.com and writes about memoir at ThisNewMountain.com.



An Interview with Author Steve Bennett

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Steve Bennett is a retired educator who also worked as a journalist for three New Mexico newspapers. In 1964, a shocking multi-murder occurred in San Diego, California in the seemingly idyllic suburb of Chula Vista where Steve was raised. Thirty years later, he began a decades-long journey to tell the story. His debut true crime release, His Own Flesh and Blood: The story of Raymond Goedecke, the killer in the choir (July 2023), is a “haunting exploration of deceit, manipulation, and the terrifying depths of human nature…a story that will leave readers questioning the very nature of evil and the masks that it wears.” Look for Steve on his SWW author page and on Amazon.

Steve, please tell us a little about yourself.
I was born in San Diego, California and raised in the suburb of Chula Vista. These were my formative years—beginning with kindergarten and continuing to college. A good athlete, I accepted a football scholarship to New Mexico State University where I earned a degree in education. For the next 37 years, I served as a teacher, coach and school administrator. During that time, I was a New Mexico Teacher of the Year nominee as well as an Outstanding Alumnus in the NMSU College of Education. Additionally, I worked as a journalist for three New Mexico newspapers. Since 1968, New Mexico has been and continues to be my home.

What was the impetus for writing His Own Flesh and Blood?
During my high school years in the 1960s, I believed the growing city of Chula Vista had it all: great weather, excellent schools, civic pride, very little crime. But those beliefs were shattered in August 1964 when I read the newspaper headline, “Homicidal Maniac Strikes, Four Dead in Chula Vista.” The article read, “Four members of the Henry Goedecke family were bludgeoned to death last night in their Chula Vista home.” Shocked citizens first believed the killer must be a transient, or an escaped mental patient. But the murderer—using a hunting knife and pipe—was eighteen-year-old Raymond Goedecke, the oldest son.

For me, the horror of the crime was magnified because the Goedecke family attended the Lutheran Church which sat directly across the street from my church, the First Baptist Church of Chula Vista. The close proximity of my church and Raymond’s church—where I had many friends—made his crime personal. And in the years to come, images of Raymond Goedecke would intrude upon my thoughts like an uninvited guest. But the real reason Goedecke cemented himself in my memory had to do with my teaching career. From the moment I stepped into my first high school classroom, dealing with dysfunctional and violent students, Raymond Goedecke became a fixture in my mind. At such times, I had a single thought, “Why did he kill?” His Own Flesh and Blood is my answer to the question.

Can you step us through the process you used when obtaining research material for your book?
Researching my book was daunting, a job spanning ten years. When I started the process, finding time for research was difficult since I was teaching full-time. So, research was limited to weekends and summer breaks. I began at the Chula Vista and San Diego Public Libraries copying newspaper articles which recounted the murder, trial and sentencing. Later, this continued at the San Francisco Chronicle and the Placerville Mountain Democrat. I obtained police records from the Chula Vista, El Dorado County, Vacaville and San Rafael police departments. An invaluable source was the El Dorado County Courthouse and San Diego Superior Court. In San Diego, I copied the entire trial transcript (one thousand pages) which enabled me to speak to the legal issues and combine them with newspaper articles and interviews, blending them together to create a consistent narrative for readers to follow.

Were you able to conduct interviews with anyone who had been directly involved with solving this case? How about descendants of the victims?
The simple answer is “Yes,” but interviewing former friends close to the Goedecke family (those traumatized by Raymond’s crime) was a delicate business. I approached everyone with the utmost care and sensitivity. However, the police officers, bailiffs, judges and parole officers (once I established credibility) were another matter. In particular, former Chula Vista police officers were eager to speak to me. I believe the Chula Vista Police Department did a flawless job to develop an ironclad case against Goedecke. The California Supreme Court decision (that vacated Goedecke’s death sentence) appeared to agree, since they found no legal or procedural problems with Chula Vista’s police investigation. In short, these former police officers were proud of their work.

However, when I first began, my first interview was with an old church friend from 1964, Lee Bendickson. A lawyer, he handled the Goedecke estate and later testified at Raymond’s trial. Bendickson helped by contacting people on my interview list assuring them I could be trusted. Above all, I avoided surprising people I didn’t know by cold-calling them. I conducted scores of interviews with Chula Vista, San Rafael and El Dorado County officers who were directly involved in Goedecke’s case. The most significant of these was the two Chula Vista officers who obtained Raymond’s confession to the murders. But my most important contact was with San Diego Superior Court judge William Kennedy. In 1964, Kennedy had been the lead prosecutor at Goedecke’s trial. Kennedy was instrumental in obtaining the trial transcripts of the 1964 proceedings.

Henry Goedecke (the murdered father) was survived by his mother Elizabeth Goedecke and a sister and her family. At the advice of a close friend of theirs, he asked that I not pursue an interview with the family since the murders were extremely traumatic for all of them. I honored his request.

All told, either by direct contact or telephone, I conducted from forty to fifty interviews—all of them tape recorded.

Do you think the time you spent working in journalism helped you transition into the role of writing nonfiction?
Doubtless, the two years I spent working in journalism helped improve my writing a great deal. Working for the Alamogordo Daily News—which went to press seven days a week—writing with the pressure of a deadline, everything improved: writing speed, organization, and flow of article. Above all, the experience impressed upon me the importance of accuracy of language: using precise nouns and verbs and, above all, never misquoting a single living soul. However, though rewarding and mentally challenging, newspaper reporters are paid even less than teachers. This is why I left my job in Alamogordo, to take a teaching position at the Mescalero Apache Schools, thus returning to teaching.

Did you experience any obstacles while writing His Own Flesh and Blood?
When I began the book in 1994, the judicial cases against Raymond Goedecke had been adjudicated, or legally resolved. Since no appeals or other legal issues were pending, police departments and courts were able to legally release information. Otherwise, there would have been significant roadblocks hindering or halting outright any request for information. Regarding personal interviews, most individuals I approached were willing to share their stories with me. However, a few—for personal reasons—simply declined.

If you found yourself stalling during the writing process, how did you move past it?
Like any writer, there were frustrating moments that stopped me cold. At such times I’d reexamine the crime photographs for another look. These images were black and white pictures and color slides, pictures that were chilling, sickening…truly beyond belief. The violence Raymond inflicted upon his family was unspeakable. To describe it as just a murder would be an understatement, it was a massacre. Raymond, a son and brother, slaughtered his family and reduced them to four, lifeless piles of bloody pulp. Every police officer who witnessed the crime scene told me they’d never seen this level of violence. Their beaten, bloody bodies scarcely looked human. But the photos taken at the San Diego County morgue were, for me, the worst. These showed the condition of the bodies after being washed and cleaned. With the blood removed, the damage inflicted on their bodies was shockingly evident: Ellen’s broken jaw, a deep wound on her chest from the pipe end; the gaping wound on Mark’s forehead that shattered his skull; their eyes closed as if sleeping, their lives and humanity ripped away. What made this more painful for me was the knowledge that Ellen and Mark were both awake when the attack began. Seeing this, no matter how often, summoned deep emotion, bringing tears to my eyes. However, this was quickly supplanted by another feeling…anger. “How could he do that to his own brother and sister, his own flesh and blood?” Soon, the awful bitterness would pass. Somehow the intense anger I felt for Raymond was rejuvenating. I went back to work.

How long did it take you from start to finish to complete your book?
The short answer is that I began researching and writing in 1994, but the book was not published until 2023. However, that’s not the whole story. When I began in 1994 (the year I joined SouthWest Writers), technology was less sophisticated. As a result, I approached the process the old-fashioned way by sending query letters to agents. Agents usually responded with, “Dear Mr. Bennett, your book, His Own Flesh and Blood sounds like a great story, however….” My file drawer is full of those. Eventually, I simply gave up. But recently, a few friends who’d read my manuscript showed a lot of enthusiasm. I began to look into publishing independently (Amazon, BookBaby, etc.). To my surprise, I discovered that Amazon publishes more books worldwide than anyone. But they hadn’t started their publishing arm until 1995, the year they published and sold their first book.

What other genres do you enjoy reading other than true crime?
My reading interests are quite broad, largely due to diversity of subjects I taught during my teaching career. Any subject related to history: American Civil War, First and Second world wars, ancient history and New Mexico history. Reading about native American culture; Navajo, Apache, etc., are subjects I find fascinating. This also includes biographies of great national and international leaders.

Who are a few of your favorite authors?
My favorite author list is a long one, but these are a few who stand out: Herman Wouk, J.R.R. Tolkien, Gore Vidal, Laura Hillenbrand, Drew Gilpin Faust, Ann Rule, Ron Chernow and, of course, William Shakespeare.

What’s on your horizon regarding writing projects? Do you intend to stick with true crime?
There are many true crime stories pertaining to New Mexico that interest me, however, I’m undecided. Since I have Attention Deficit Disorder, that is a subject I’d like to put on paper at some point.

Is there anything else you’d like readers to know?
Only that—after a break from writing for many years—I’m happy to be more active with SouthWest Writers, a fine organization.

Su Lierz writes dark fiction, short story fiction, and personal essays. Her short story “Twelve Days in April,” written under the pen name Laney Payne, appeared in the 2018 SouthWest Writers Sage Anthology. Su was a finalist in the 2017 and 2018 Albuquerque Museum Authors Festival Writing Contest. She lives in Corrales, New Mexico, with her husband Dennis.



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