Images like the one I have of my father flooding the yard stick in the mind. But what's the story behind the lingering picture or the haunting memory? Finding that out—well, that's why I love to write.

But I digress; back to the bio. My favorite childhood places were the family vacation spot near Hackensack, Minnesota on Ten Mile Lake, Mary's family's cabin on the Mississippi River, the Austin Carnegie Library, and Camp Olson YMCA.

A word about that camp. I am not an athletic person, but I loved the physical adventure provided at camp, especially the canoe trips.

I was on a canoe trip in Canada with friends from camp when I found out my oldest brother had been killed in Vietnam. August, 1969. If you read my third novel, Come in from the Cold, you'll get a pretty good idea of what happened next in my life (though I never joined a commune). How much of my writing is autobiographical? All of it. None of it.