Q&A: Numbers and Favorites

How many books have you published?

There have been sev­en­ty-two nov­els, both long and short, and that includes two books sched­uled for next year.

There have been three col­lec­tions of short sto­ries and a fair num­ber of short sto­ries pub­lished indi­vid­u­al­ly in anthologies.

There have been a few pic­tures books.

There has been a pub­lished one-act play.

There are many paper­back reprints, for­eign lan­guage trans­la­tions, essays, and introductions.

Of all these pub­li­ca­tions, do you have a favorite?

The short, easy answer is no. How­ev­er, by way of self-moti­va­tion I try to tell myself that the book I am work­ing on—whatever it might be–is my favorite. Alas, that is some­times difficult.

While I do not have a favorite, I do think some books have been more suc­cess­ful than oth­ers. That is, I believe they achieved most of what I want­ed. In that sense, I have par­tic­u­lar fond­ness for such as the Pop­py books, The Barn, Catch You Lat­er Trai­tor, Wolf Rid­er, and True Con­fes­sions of Char­lotte Doyle. Also, the col­lec­tion of short sto­ries, The Most Impor­tant Thing.

Regard­ing oth­er people’s books, do you have some favorites?

The ones that come to mind are Trea­sure Island by Steven­son; The Wind in the Wil­lows by Gra­ham;  A Christ­mas Car­ol by Dick­ens; The Mal­tese Fal­con by Ham­mett; The Sun Also Ris­es by Hemingway.