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I write therefore I am. I am therefore I write. One or the other.

A dear friend passed away on Tuesday. She’d been battling cancer for several years and leaves her husband and two teenage children. One of my college buddies died in March. He’d been with a bunch of us at the Breeders Cup in Kentucky last October telling jokes, drinking bourbon, and celebrating life. His wife found him dead on the couch from a heart attack. Another close friend, who I’ve known for over 40 years, almost died last year and still faces serious medical issues.

I could on but I ca...

Much the process of writing and publishing a book is intense and exhausting. But there’s one aspect that brings nothing but joy �� crafting the dedication.

My first book was the young adult novel Good News/Bad News published way back in 1980. It was the realization of a lifelong dream and I dedicated it to the person I loved most in the world: Lillie, my maternal grandmother. My father had died when I was eighteen months old, and Lillie came to live with us in the Bronx. My mother was working...

There’s a Yiddish proverb that suggests, “If God lived on earth, people would break His windows.�� The point is that even the ideals that live in our minds would not survive the harsh light of reality. This point is even more important today where far too many politicians and pundits wax poetic about the good old days and traditional values.

Consider the likely response if Jesus suddenly appeared in the twenty-first century in the exact human form he embodied in Jerusalem. How many people do y...

I’ve written several pieces exploring why the male characters in my novels tend to be misogynist A-holes. But I recently had an experience that made me realize I’m looking at the issue from the wrong perspective.

I was minding my own business, when three twenty-somethings sat beside me �� two female and one male. It was clear they had just met and the “dude�� (‘cause that’s what he was) was in full-flirt mode seeing which of the two he could most engage. He asked what they did and Female A said...

What first inspired you to write or who inspired you?

I can’t point to any specific event or moment in time. I’ve been an avid reader since early childhood. I remember being sick in bed with the flu when I was in grammar school. My father brought me a stack of books �� mostly fiction and biographies �� from the library and he couldn’t believe how fast I read them all and asked for another batch. I loved the way reading helped me escape the discomfort of being sick, and somewhere deep in my psyc...

One could make a strong argument that the three scariest words to state aloud (particularly in the political realm) are these: I don’t know. That phrase is an explicit admission that we’re less than perfect. Our fear of saying I don’t know is amplified by the worries that we should know it and that everyone else knows it.

There are two alternative approaches to saying I don’t know. The first is to remain silent. You might look away and hide your head, try to change the subject, or excuse your...

Going Both Ways, like my previous novel Still Counting, features a lead character who personifies every boorish male trait I want to protect my daughter from ever encountering. Patrick Morelli is a 27-year-old underachiever who still lives and acts like an adolescent frat boy. He stares at the slightest hint of cleavage and immediately undresses every woman with his eyes regardless of age, shape, race, or political affiliation. Actually none of those traits matter to him. All he’s concerned a...

I recently had an epiphany �� actually two epiphanies that complement and affirm each other. In addition to writing, teaching, and consulting, I’m a part-time chauffeur for a local car service company. That’s when the first epiphany occurred.

I was driving a client from Logan Airport to a downtown Boston hotel. I knew exactly where the hotel was and how to get there. Nonetheless, we are required to have GPS running on all jobs. I was literally two blocks away from the hotel when the GPS sugges...

We’re thrilled to be talking to Patrick/Trish Morelli from Phil Fragasso’s, Going Both Ways. It is a pleasure to have him/her with us today at Pimp That Character!

Thank you for your interview, Patrick and Trish. How old are you and what do you do for a living?

PATRICK: I’m 27. I’m a writer by day and a waiter by night.

TRISH: I’m also 27 like my male chauvinist pig alter ego. I feel compelled to point out that Patrick is a wannabe writer who’s never published a thing in his life and mostly w...