ROLAND YEOMANS ... THE MAN BEHIND THE PROSE- PART II

I hope you enjoyed my guest, Roland Yeomans, author of The Bear with Two Shadows. Roland is kind enough to forgo the beach today to visit my blog for another segment of his blog book tour.

Michael: Hi, Roland. Thank you for coming back. There are few things that I can't wait to ask you about.

Roland: Hi, Michael. It is always a pleasure to meet with you.(He nods and flashes a smile.)

Michael: I remember reading that you once owned a book store. How intriguing. Could you tell us about it?

Roland: Mother had contracted cancer, and so, with the help of two good friends, and emptying my life savings -- I started a bookstore in the local Mall. 

I could then go with Mother on her trips to out of state hospitals.  The rest of the time I became a bartender without the booze.  All were welcome at my store.

With my extensive knowledge of literature and psychology, I could point out the books I knew would really appeal to my customers who I thought of as friends.  I could be there for them when the world became dark ... as it always becomes for every teen sooner or later.

Michael: I remember you mentioning in one of your posts that you wrote a series of stories for an ill child. Tell us more about that.  

Roland: It was the time when the first two Harry Potter books were out.  The ill girl wanted so badly to read them.  But they contained the Dark Arts (cue the spooky music) without mention of God.  The conservative mother said no.  But she was not a heartless orge.

She had talked to me, seen me write pseudo-XENA scripts for three close friends who were battling memories of sexual abuse.  She even read them as I wrote them on the showcase next to my cash register.  She asked me to write of fairies, Avalon, monsters, magic ... but God had to be in the mix.

Michael: Isn’t that the prelude of your character Fallen’s birth?     

Roland: Yes, Fallen was born. That was the catalyst of her birth.  Her and her teenage love, Blake Adamson, the clone grown from the tissue sample taken from the tip of the Spear of Destiny.  Yes, that spear.  But what did that make Blake?  I never answered completely.  My laptop would be considered an antique I guess.  I wrote the two novels (big enough to be split into 4 smaller books) on floppy disks.

Michael: Floppy disks?

Roland: Yes, floppy disks.  Am I old school or what?!

The girl loved them.  The mother would read and re-read chapters the mother had printed out night after night in the hospitals.  I don't have any hard copies.  The mother buried the chapters with her daughter.  A part of my heart was buried with her.

Michael: Wow, Roland. (A tear rolls down my eye.) I-I don’t know what to say. But there are so many more questions that I would like to ask. (Roland nods.) Have you been writing for most of your life? 

Roland: Yes, I have been writing since I was little.  I guess one of the fortunate things about my house burning to the ground was the loss of my early novels and short stories.  I cringe even thinking of the names of my heroes : Wolf McMourn ... Silver Ambrose Hart (who survived the explosion of his ship which sailed the Time Stream, washing up on the time shores in only his longjohns ... and so ... I cringe to write this ... and so was born LongJohn Silver.  He was my first hero -- that is my only excuse!)


Michael: What else have you written?

Roland: I've written science fiction of the near future, far future, and distant past, Noir crime mysteries, Old West/horror, historical fantasies, urban fantasies, and YA urban fantasies.  I wrote a Sherlock Holmes novel about the Ripper murders that went up in smoke.  If it made me smile or teased my imagination, I have written it.

Michael: Now most of us know about you and your teenage buddies had a special relationship. Could you tell more about that?

Roland: As for the League of Five : I've reprinted that post so often I fear my blog friends are getting bored with five young friends and the Lakota mother who held them spellbound into the late hours of the morning with the tales of Dr. Fu Manchu, Sherlock Holmes, and John Carter of Mars.

For someone who loathes to talk about himself, I sure have gone on, haven't I?  And I haven't even talked about my love of poetry, spawned from Mother reading aloud in her rich voice, rolling the sounds of the words into the darkness.


Michael: Maybe just a tad, but we love it! Roland, thank you so much for sharing your life with us. It has been wonderful to have this personal chat with you, and I know it will make our friendship stronger. Who will be your next stop of your blog tour?


Roland: Becky (Words Crafter) @ The Rainy Day Wanderer.


Michael: I can't wait to drop in on Becky tomorrow. Safe travels Roland.


Roland: My St. Christopher statue jumped off the dashboard during the last hurricane! But so far the Father rides in the passenger seat.


I'd like to leave you all with a synopsis of The Bear with Two Shadows...

To this day the Lakota still whisper an ancient legend around the campfire.  They whisper lest Estanatlehi, The Turquoise Woman, overhears and visits her sorrow and her wrath upon the talebearer for speaking words long, long forbidden.           Then why speak them at all?           Why?            Listen to the sigh of the world in the winter winds.  It is the sad nature of all Two-Leggeds that the forbidden tale is the very one most hard not to hear -- or to pass on.            And it begins, as most forbidden tales do, with a woman.            The Turquoise Woman.            She whose cold and remote thoughts some see in the sky as the Northern Lights.  Not that she cannot love.           But her love is both haunting and terrible beyond any singing of it, as Hibbs, the Bear with Two Shadows, discovers.

Everyone, Roland is offering some AMAZING signed editions to all of you! So don't forget to leave you email in the comments section.

A comment offers one entry per host. Another two entries for linking the book to twitter or Facebook. Make sure to email Roland @ rxena77@yahoo.com And any blogger who posts a legitimate review on Amazon by March 31st will get three entries into the drawing. Believe me you don't want to miss out on any of these amazing signed books. Drawing will be on April 1st.