[jonmcdonald]

Unemployed – Oh yes, just at the beginning of what they quaintly call the Great Recession. What to do? I cleaned out all my closets, categorized my recipes, actually cleaned under things, and yet I was still banging around my little abode like a house fly trying to escape through the screen.

Then a dear friend suggested I read the works of E.F. Benson, a British writer from the 1930’s and 40’s. I was just in the mood for his amusing tales of a group of society women in a small English village. Oh the shenanigans. There was more intrigue and manipulation amongst these ladies than within the Balkan countries before World War I. I was totally hooked. I read all of his Queen Lucia books and slowly realized how the social scene of my own little town of Santa Fe, New Mexico resembled the society in this small English village. Then lightning struck. And out of this electrical incident came Divas Never Flinch my first satirical novel.

Now I had written before – but not fiction. I’d written stage and screen plays – all unsuccessfully, except for a performance of one of my plays at the Mark Taper Forum in Los Angeles. So Divas was my first venture into fiction. Many short stories (collected in Gotta Dance with the One Who Brung Ya), and other novels followed. And I find that I am most content writing fiction. And to my surprise I seem to have a penchant for dry humor. Who woudda thunk it? In any case I hope you enjoy my stumbling efforts.