I love the genre. But I don’t really write about vampires per se in “Black Rush”. I write about people with certain predilections. In the story their partiality for blood is a metaphor for addiction. Actually, there are a number of bloodsuckers in the book. The vampires just happen to call a bit more attention to themselves.

Everybody I know is a character, and a writer is a student of human moves. If you listen closely and you observe without prejudice or bias, real life will trump fiction any day of the week. Obvious comparisons aside, I found my vampires smack dab in the middle of Washington D.C. meandering among residents of the predominantly African-American neighborhoods, peopled by black drug dealers on U Street and their white clientele who drive across the city from Georgetown. (In the book the vampires are black; among their victims is the white middle-class.)

It’s a great privilege but an enormous responsibility you’re given, this power to paint pictures with words. If just one reader opens the book, the author is instantly mentoring. This carries a special import for those who write children’s books. A child’s mind is a blank slate, whatever the recurring topic or theme. That said, I don’t think any author should ever be a shrinking violet; fact is many probably aren’t even capable of blowing anyone’s mind, but just to know you have the potential….

Tinker Bell came into my bedroom when I was around 11 years old. I didn’t find out until later that she was my muse, one of the nine goddesses of literature whispering inspiration. First, it was those pesky high school English theme papers; so I’m glad she stuck around. Telling stories, I suppose, is something I tumbled to as a child. After Tinker Bell came into my life, putting the words down on paper became my obsession—writing poems and plays and songs and even letters to the editor.

I recently completed a screenplay based on a novel for a future film project; I’m finishing a murder mystery for publication this year; I’ve started a biblical novel to be published next year; and in my spare time I’m developing a science fiction tome—it’s going to be a very large book. I’m kind of crazy, a sort of sub-species of Homo Sapien, but it’s always important to be putting your craft to work.

Until it’s published, not much—but like “Black Rush” the book is honest about being what they call ‘a D.C. novel’ in the sense that it involves blacks and whites and all those cultures and colors in between. Believe me, Washington is not Capitol Hill. That’s only one of many neighborhoods inside the Beltway where all these cosmopolitans live. The new novel centers upon a murder which sets up the protagonist to ride a rollercoaster investigation through a web of interlocking mysteries leading to a surprise ending. It sounds like “The DaVinci Code.” I know my publisher hopes it is.

Make it interesting, damn you! (laughs) No, not really. Every novel must find its niche. But no matter how interesting or well-written a novel is, without publicity and promotion and advertising and marketing it will fail.

It’s fundamental. Simply put, it tells a story. Storytelling, I believe, poses tough questions and promotes critical thinking by challenging complacency and opening up debate. Genre fiction, if it’s any good, should be asking the hard questions—sometimes loud and often unreasonable questions. But when it’s all coming from a vampire people might listen. If they don’t, then you write about extraterrestrials. Maybe that’ll work.

I want them to look at the front cover and say, “Damn, this looks good!” And then after reading the last page, maybe think “How sweet.” But then have that bitter aftertaste, knowing there’s this messy, bewildering mélange of utter sadness dwelling on a gritty patch of civilized modern life where the unspeakable happens and other horrors occur too often. We can see there are worse things than vampires; drinking blood just seems somehow easier to swallow than delving into any of that.

My muse becomes my mistress and my wife becomes my widow. Writing is not a team sport so it’s essential that I enjoy my own company during which time, well, time itself becomes irrelevant along with the phone ringing, my wife calling or the sky falling, until I perform a kind of alchemy I never quite feel worthy of. Okay, to talk about it is somewhere between boring and horrendous but I revel in it. I get up as early as daybreak, if not earlier, sit at my laptop in my office with my music—Ennio Morricone—and for hours on end play with my computer. Then, but only if I’m lucky, after about three years or so I come out of my office, kiss my wife and hand her the manuscript for “Black Rush”.

I would advise that writing is not something you would like to do. If it is, then you might do it well enough maybe to get published but you won’t survive as a writer in the long run. You’ll eventually go on to do something else. On the other hand, if you feel you have no choice but to write, then you know there are forces at work here that must be obeyed. Consequently, you’re never not writing—forgive the double negative. Having said that, don’t worry yourself sick about lagging pace or unoriginality in style or things of that sort, at least not in the first draft. Just get it on the page. You can cut and edit once you have something that’s worthwhile. Most important is don’t waste your time. If what you’ve written so far you cannot commit to, a deep-bone commitment of maybe a year or more of your life, a year you know you will never get back, then DELETE THAT SUCKER! Try something new. Now this brings me to the last thing, which actually is the first: have a story to tell. Quirky characters and quaint dialogue is wonderful but a novel in search of a narrative is a rudder in search of a ship. A book without a story is the worse thing you can spend your money on.

I read EVERYTHING. Nothing escapes my notice, especially when I’m researching. You name it; I’ve peeked at it…technical manuals, textbooks, the Internet, a fold-out menu from a new Chinese restaurant in the neighborhood. And I’m a huge fan of David Kelley. But you don’t read David Kelley; you listen to what he writes, say, for “Boston Legal”. It’s dramatic literature and he’s a remarkable talent. As you can see, I spare myself nothing. Okay, if I start listing the books, I will leave you with a misimpression. I’ll just say it’s a short list and Poe is on it.