My Early Influences
I have always enjoyed reading and my favorite types of stories are historical, especially biographies and westerns. My parents were both teachers and our house was filled with bookshelves overflowing with a great variety of books, fiction and non-fiction. My mother always said we were "book poor" because when my father found a book he liked, he had to add it to his library. I grew up surrounded by some of the best literature ever created and spent many hot summer days and cold winter nights with a good book.
I started writing when I was about seven when I discovered my father's old Royal typewriter in the attic and taught myself how to type with two fingers using the old "hunt and peck" method. It took a great deal of energy to depress the keys with enough force to create a single letter on the page, but I loved the process as much as I did creating stories (which were mostly plagiarized from movies or television shows I had seen).
Writing the Matty Books
My first successful writing efforts were with my good friend, Carole Shmurak. We read an article in Smithsonian Magazine about women who had disguised themselves and men and had fought in the Civil War. We had recently done some research into gender issues in middle schools and found the article fascinating. As we began to think about it we began imagining what it would take for a young woman to succeed in this endeavor and the result was our first book together,
Matty's War which was published using our pen name, Carroll Thomas.
Newspaper Serials
My first serialized story was
The Coltsville Fire. I got the idea for the story when I was doing research for a class in Connecticut History that I teach at Central Connecticut State University. It is one of those fascinating pieces of local history that is relatively unknown today and the most interesting aspect to me is that no one knows if the fire was an accident or if it was deliberately set as an act of espionage by southern sympathizers trying to prevent weapons made by Colt's from reaching the Union army.
Background
I was born in St. Louis, Missouri but have lived in Connecticut for most of my life. I am a former high school teacher and a Vietnam veteran. I live in Plainville, Connecticut with one of my five daughters and my miniature Schnauzer, Henry.
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