Life at Open Heart Publishing

Hello Readers!

Our featured author for this post is Bob Clark.  Enjoy!

You know every old lady Bob met as a child just HAD to pinch those cheeks!

Who or what inspired you to be a writer?

When I was but a small tyke, I loved the way Edgar Allen Poe wrote his short stories, but most of mine are in a much lighter vein.

How do you organize the books on your bookshelf?

I let the books move around to the most comfortable spots all by themselves.  I don’t interfere in their lives.

How did you come up with the story “Whatever LuLu Wants”?

All my stories begin with a touch of inspiration and I often have no earthly idea where they will take me.  I never meant for this story to go in the direction it did.  The title comes from a song in the Broadway musical “Damn Yankees”.  In the show, Lola is really the Devil in the guise of a temptress and her song is “Whatever Lola Wants, Lola Gets”.  LuLu, however, is just a kid who wants a better life.

Tell us a funny or embarassing childhood story.

When I was around 5, my parents took me to a bris.  If you are Jewish, and I am not, you would know what this is.  If you’re not, I am not going to explain it now.  The adults mixed and mingled, but I was thirsty and I noticed glasses on the table.  Nobody spotted the chubby 5 year-old as he reached up and drank some of the funny tasting water.  Years later, I found out the water was champagne.  I slept for many hours on the way home that day and since then, I never again drank alcohol.

What do you feel is your most important contribution to the human race?

Not having produced any children, don’t blame me for anything they do.

What do you feel about your opportunity to be one of the innaugural authors in the first volume of An Honest Lie?

It is the single greatest achievement in my writing life thus far.  (That is meant to be a serious answer.)

Alice in Wonderland…Opium induced pedophile fantasies of a madman or pure genius?

I am often told about the hidden meanings in my stories and I scratch my head when readers tell me that.  My stories are just stories I dreamed up.  I am not that deep and I cared to look beyond Wonderland.

Bob Clark has been writing since first grade, but he started writing for pay when he became a radio personality and turned out hundreds of thousands of thirty and sixty-second commercial announcements. Many of those were tiny stories whose duty was to sell a service or a product. He has lived and worked in places ranging from the New York area to Oregon, from Indiana to Florida and in Mexico and Puerto Rico. After nearly 5 decades of slaving away behind microphones and cameras as a DJ, voice over announcer, talk show host, and TV news anchor, he retired to a more sanity filled life near the beach in Corpus Christi, Texas. There, he began to write short stories, novels and a memoir of his life in the sordid underbelly of the Mexican border. His short stories have been published in two anthologies of stories to be read aloud in competitions in high schools. All of them take place in the strange country called South Texas.