Doug Howery will be awarding a $25.00 Amazon GC and an autographed copy of the book to one randomly drawn winner via rafflecopter during the tour. Please note geographical restrictions apply. United States only for the physical prize.
Tell us about yourself:
I am 55-years-old. Learned to write by studying the craft and reading incessantly. I am a Biological Farmer. I grow microorganisms for a living. Writing alone does not pay the bills.
What was your first book?
“The Grass Sweeper God.” I am in the process of adapting it into a screenplay. It is based upon my mother’s 1982 suicide.
Describe your first break
My first break was publishing, “The Grass Sweeper God” through Amazon POD services. My other first breaks were working with great editors to get the book to a professional level. Also, working with Mario Sanchez Nevado, the book cover illustrator.
What is your favorite genre to read? To write?
Historical fiction; read and write.
Are Happy Endings are must in your stories?
NO. The ending should reflect the beginning, middle and end. If it is a dark story, then maybe a happy ending. My book, “The Grass Sweeper God” is a dark story and the ending is hopeful. That’s all one can realistically ask for, so I believe.
What makes a protagonist interesting?
Giving them hope and then taking it from them. Make them fight for what they desire, what they need and want and love. Put conflict in their way. Make them climb the mountain and not hang out in the middle, but make it to the precipice while fighting the entire way.
What is the best thing about being a writer?
Playing ‘God’ with characters’ lives. We can’t or want do that in real life, but between the pages, we are God, indeed. Telling a story that makes a difference in others’ lives.
What is the worst thing?
Not getting the time to write. My writing has not afforded me the opportunity to quit my full time job that pays the bills. I like the solitude of writing; no problem.
Pantser or plotter?
Panster for the most part. I like to see where the story will take me. But, if I get overwhelmed, I will plot an outline.
What do you see the direction of your future writing taking? What can we expect next? Give us a little taste.
Expect the screenplay version of, “The Grass Sweeper God.” Here is a little taste: https://youtu.be/9I2ViS1U8Do
Just for fun
Cat or dog person?
Dog person. His name is Buster Bean.
Favorite food?
Meatloaf
Favorite book?
The Color Purple
Favorite movie?
The Color Purple
Favorite holiday?
Halloween, oops, not a holiday. Oh well, still Halloween
Would you rather be the princess or the villain? Why?
Villain. Because a princess, I have been.
Who has more fun, orcs or hobbits?
Hobbits. I love their big feet. Has to be fun to stand so small on those huge feet!
I am 55-years-old. Learned to write by studying the craft and reading incessantly. I am a Biological Farmer. I grow microorganisms for a living. Writing alone does not pay the bills.
What was your first book?
“The Grass Sweeper God.” I am in the process of adapting it into a screenplay. It is based upon my mother’s 1982 suicide.
Describe your first break
My first break was publishing, “The Grass Sweeper God” through Amazon POD services. My other first breaks were working with great editors to get the book to a professional level. Also, working with Mario Sanchez Nevado, the book cover illustrator.
What is your favorite genre to read? To write?
Historical fiction; read and write.
Are Happy Endings are must in your stories?
NO. The ending should reflect the beginning, middle and end. If it is a dark story, then maybe a happy ending. My book, “The Grass Sweeper God” is a dark story and the ending is hopeful. That’s all one can realistically ask for, so I believe.
What makes a protagonist interesting?
Giving them hope and then taking it from them. Make them fight for what they desire, what they need and want and love. Put conflict in their way. Make them climb the mountain and not hang out in the middle, but make it to the precipice while fighting the entire way.
What is the best thing about being a writer?
Playing ‘God’ with characters’ lives. We can’t or want do that in real life, but between the pages, we are God, indeed. Telling a story that makes a difference in others’ lives.
What is the worst thing?
Not getting the time to write. My writing has not afforded me the opportunity to quit my full time job that pays the bills. I like the solitude of writing; no problem.
Pantser or plotter?
Panster for the most part. I like to see where the story will take me. But, if I get overwhelmed, I will plot an outline.
What do you see the direction of your future writing taking? What can we expect next? Give us a little taste.
Expect the screenplay version of, “The Grass Sweeper God.” Here is a little taste: https://youtu.be/9I2ViS1U8Do
Just for fun
Cat or dog person?
Dog person. His name is Buster Bean.
Favorite food?
Meatloaf
Favorite book?
The Color Purple
Favorite movie?
The Color Purple
Favorite holiday?
Halloween, oops, not a holiday. Oh well, still Halloween
Would you rather be the princess or the villain? Why?
Villain. Because a princess, I have been.
Who has more fun, orcs or hobbits?
Hobbits. I love their big feet. Has to be fun to stand so small on those huge feet!
GENRE: Historical Fiction
~~~~~~~~~~~~~
BLURB:
Sixteen-year-old Smiley Hanlon is a young woman tethered to a young man's body. In the 1950's Appalachia coal fields of Solitude, Virginia, Smiley is placed in the "Mentally Retarded Class" because he is effeminate and wears a blouse and saddle shoes to school.
Smiley is backed by his best friend, Lee Moore who protects Smiley from a father and many townspeople who hate him. Smiley has dreams of becoming an entertainer. Raised by his aunt in a juke joint, as a child Smiley sings and dances on the Formica bar top into the wee hours. Chosen as the female lead, Dorothy, in a new town production called Dorothy of Oz Coal Camp, his dream is being realized. The triumph of the play and his dream is sabotaged by his father and classmate bullies culminating in a tragic and horrific moment that changes both Smiley and Lee, forever.
Smiley and Lee flee to NYC. They learn that prejudice is prejudice whether in the coal fields of Virginia or on the streets of NYC. Smiley suffers at the hands of his real mother who is a religious zealot. She tries to change who Smiley is because he is a boil on the body of Christ. Lee suffers at the hands of psychologists who practice Aversion Therapy-electric shock treatment to cure his homosexuality.
What doesn't kill you makes you stronger. Both Smiley and Lee become forces of change as do countless others. In 1969, Smiley Hanlon and his friend, Lee emerge as leaders of a gay revolution, the historical Stonewall Riots. The riots are vicious but the real battle will be won or lost on another continent: Solitude, Virginia.
The Grass Sweeper God is a force of nature that flows through all things...straightens out that which is bent...which is sick...
~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Excerpt Three:
Madam Luna: Celestial Fortune Teller, Spiritual Advisor, Psychic and Conjurer of Bad and Good Fortune. The circus had come to the fairgrounds and later, Solitude’s Main Street would swell. People would line Main Street and scurry about in a trance-like state, like they had been put under an ancient spell cast by a conjurer. Elephants, giraffes, zebras, and lions from Africa would parade down Main Street, and people would be entranced. Clowns, fire breathers, bearded ladies, conjoined twins, along with every other human oddity would demand an audience without the sense of judgment, but instead bewilderment. Madam Luna would work her magic, conjuring up spirits, and for every conjure bad bequeathed good. It was how the heavens aligned by balancing the space and time in which bad and good thrived. To conjure up the spirits, to conjure up forces beyond mortal expectation, was to play with the fire of the gods. And she was a fire breather. Those that requested a conjurer’s service always paid the price because people’s nature was to want bad to happen to others. There was always a price to pay for such a request. Madam Luna believed in the adage: We reap what we sow. This was part of the unspoken conjure.
AUTHOR Bio and Links:
DOUG HOWERY has been writing both fiction and essays since 1990. His essays and familial stories have appeared in The Blue Ridge Lambda Press.
In many of his stories, as in "The Grass Sweeper God," Mr. Howery's true lode, his font of inspiration is in the passion and suffering he has experienced.
Author, Doug Howery penned the novel with insight into his own struggle for sexual identity and personal tragedy. His mother committed suicide in 1982, blaming her two sons' sexual identity in a letter and declaring herself a martyr for intolerance and social bigotry. She referred to her own sons as "Gutter Rats that Could Rot in Hell" and represents the hate and mistrust that have plagued society.
Suspense author, Maggie Grace, with the North Carolina Writers' Network writes about her cohort Mr. Howery: "What I like is the riskiness, the cutting edge of the narrative voice we hear. The moments when he lapses into descriptions of the moon, of the horse, etc. are true poetry that offers some relief from the coarseness of the story, and he places them well. He has an ear for the rhythm of the story, a natural sense of when to end--hangs fire with a new way of looking at someone or something, turning the entire chapter on its ear. I like the way he makes it impossible for the reader to stop reading at the end of the chapter."
Mr. Howery lives in Virginia with his partner of 34 years where he is at work on his next novel.
Links:
Buy @ Amazo
n: https://www.amazon.com/Grass-Sweeper-God-Doug-Howery-ebook/dp/B00JMVE036?ie=UTF8&*Version*=1&*entries*=0
Twitter:
https://www.twitter.com/@dhowery1
Goodreads:
https://www.goodreads.com/author/show/8087260.Doug_Howery
Facebook:
https://www.facebook.com/pages/The-Grass-Sweeper-God/1475772659315049#!/pages/The-Grass-Sweeper-God/1475772659315049
Book Website:
http://www.dhowery-book.com
Book Video Trailer:
https://youtu.be/Bz6bNcZ6p4E
Linkedin:
https://www.linkedin.com/in/doug-howery-90bb975a
~~~~~~~~~~~~~
BLURB:
Sixteen-year-old Smiley Hanlon is a young woman tethered to a young man's body. In the 1950's Appalachia coal fields of Solitude, Virginia, Smiley is placed in the "Mentally Retarded Class" because he is effeminate and wears a blouse and saddle shoes to school.
Smiley is backed by his best friend, Lee Moore who protects Smiley from a father and many townspeople who hate him. Smiley has dreams of becoming an entertainer. Raised by his aunt in a juke joint, as a child Smiley sings and dances on the Formica bar top into the wee hours. Chosen as the female lead, Dorothy, in a new town production called Dorothy of Oz Coal Camp, his dream is being realized. The triumph of the play and his dream is sabotaged by his father and classmate bullies culminating in a tragic and horrific moment that changes both Smiley and Lee, forever.
Smiley and Lee flee to NYC. They learn that prejudice is prejudice whether in the coal fields of Virginia or on the streets of NYC. Smiley suffers at the hands of his real mother who is a religious zealot. She tries to change who Smiley is because he is a boil on the body of Christ. Lee suffers at the hands of psychologists who practice Aversion Therapy-electric shock treatment to cure his homosexuality.
What doesn't kill you makes you stronger. Both Smiley and Lee become forces of change as do countless others. In 1969, Smiley Hanlon and his friend, Lee emerge as leaders of a gay revolution, the historical Stonewall Riots. The riots are vicious but the real battle will be won or lost on another continent: Solitude, Virginia.
The Grass Sweeper God is a force of nature that flows through all things...straightens out that which is bent...which is sick...
~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Excerpt Three:
Madam Luna: Celestial Fortune Teller, Spiritual Advisor, Psychic and Conjurer of Bad and Good Fortune. The circus had come to the fairgrounds and later, Solitude’s Main Street would swell. People would line Main Street and scurry about in a trance-like state, like they had been put under an ancient spell cast by a conjurer. Elephants, giraffes, zebras, and lions from Africa would parade down Main Street, and people would be entranced. Clowns, fire breathers, bearded ladies, conjoined twins, along with every other human oddity would demand an audience without the sense of judgment, but instead bewilderment. Madam Luna would work her magic, conjuring up spirits, and for every conjure bad bequeathed good. It was how the heavens aligned by balancing the space and time in which bad and good thrived. To conjure up the spirits, to conjure up forces beyond mortal expectation, was to play with the fire of the gods. And she was a fire breather. Those that requested a conjurer’s service always paid the price because people’s nature was to want bad to happen to others. There was always a price to pay for such a request. Madam Luna believed in the adage: We reap what we sow. This was part of the unspoken conjure.
AUTHOR Bio and Links:
DOUG HOWERY has been writing both fiction and essays since 1990. His essays and familial stories have appeared in The Blue Ridge Lambda Press.
In many of his stories, as in "The Grass Sweeper God," Mr. Howery's true lode, his font of inspiration is in the passion and suffering he has experienced.
Author, Doug Howery penned the novel with insight into his own struggle for sexual identity and personal tragedy. His mother committed suicide in 1982, blaming her two sons' sexual identity in a letter and declaring herself a martyr for intolerance and social bigotry. She referred to her own sons as "Gutter Rats that Could Rot in Hell" and represents the hate and mistrust that have plagued society.
Suspense author, Maggie Grace, with the North Carolina Writers' Network writes about her cohort Mr. Howery: "What I like is the riskiness, the cutting edge of the narrative voice we hear. The moments when he lapses into descriptions of the moon, of the horse, etc. are true poetry that offers some relief from the coarseness of the story, and he places them well. He has an ear for the rhythm of the story, a natural sense of when to end--hangs fire with a new way of looking at someone or something, turning the entire chapter on its ear. I like the way he makes it impossible for the reader to stop reading at the end of the chapter."
Mr. Howery lives in Virginia with his partner of 34 years where he is at work on his next novel.
Links:
Buy @ Amazo
n: https://www.amazon.com/Grass-Sweeper-God-Doug-Howery-ebook/dp/B00JMVE036?ie=UTF8&*Version*=1&*entries*=0
Twitter:
https://www.twitter.com/@dhowery1
Goodreads:
https://www.goodreads.com/author/show/8087260.Doug_Howery
Facebook:
https://www.facebook.com/pages/The-Grass-Sweeper-God/1475772659315049#!/pages/The-Grass-Sweeper-God/1475772659315049
Book Website:
http://www.dhowery-book.com
Book Video Trailer:
https://youtu.be/Bz6bNcZ6p4E
Linkedin:
https://www.linkedin.com/in/doug-howery-90bb975a
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