Logan McKnight

I can't believe I haven't posted for a whole week. I know you've all been checking daily and getting more and more despondent :), so I apologize. I have been engaged in the Great Room Swap of 2007, which I will post more about later in the week.

Today I want to talk about these:




I've said I don't like fanfiction, generally speaking. I don't read it and have never written it. But that doesn't mean I haven't been inspired by other people's work.

My favorite character in Stephen King's The Stand was Nick, the deaf-mute. I read the book for a paper during my senior year in high school, to compare and contrast the incarnation of Death with the same in Piers Anthony's On a Pale Horse, which at the time was one of my favorite books.

In the miniseries in 1994, Rob Lowe blew me away with his portrayal of that character. I'd been writing for about a year at that time, maybe a little more, and had learned that whenever something obsessed me so much, writing helped assuage the resultant clawing need. (Now that I think about it, this obsession, though short-lived, came long before Brendan Fraser. So I guess it should get credit for my first. :) )

Out of that obsession came these four short stories. Logan McKnight is not Nick Andros. Rather, he was borne of the questions that character as portrayed by Rob Lowe made me ask. More importantly, Logan came out of my desire to know someone like that.

I wrote Seeking Peace and To Heal the Soul, but didn't submit them anywhere until I'd sold Second Chance at Forever to Echelon Press. With my publisher's encouragement, I wrote Opening Hearts and my favorite, To Change a Life. These are the only stories I've written that I keep coming back to for no reason beyond the joy of reading them.

Logan McKnight is a wanderer, but he's also a fixer. He sees life differently from anyone else and as such, can offer insight into problems and needs that the person (or, in the case of Opening Hearts, the couple) cannot see clearly themselves.

I admit these stories may be partly wish fulfillment. How lovely it would be, at our lowest, most desperate moments, to have someone hold our hands, lead us through, and get us to the other side happier and more whole.

It's an unfortunate side effect that no one sees how much Logan, himself, is in need...

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The very best thing about these stories? They're only a DOLLAR each!