Earl T. Roske

Like most, I've written stories since childhood. Like a few, I've been distracted by life and have gone long periods without writing. Starting about twenty years ago I began to write short stories to entertain myself and a couple friends.\nThen, about twelve years ago I took a class on playwriting with the idea that it would improve my story dialogue. It did more than that, improving my plot lines and the agency of my characters. However, I became distracted with writing plays. Most were ten-minute plays. Some of those have been produced locally and internationally.\nBut, I missed writing novels. Novels, I felt, gave me more time to explore a character and a story. That was six years ago. A lot has been written since then.\nMuch of my first published novel, Tale of the Music-Thief, was written during my newborn daughter's naptimes. I sat next to her crib, my battered, refurbished laptop on my knees, typing as long as the nap allowed. The book cover was a generous gift by someone who saw my DIY attempt and took pity on me. The book had more spelling mistakes than D.C. has lobbyists. (They were later cleaned up and moved out.)\nSince then I've written enough short stories to fill a small collection (Ofendra), published another novel (Last Wave) and write several more that I'm currently working on getting cleaned up, dressed up with a nice cover, and then publishing (Novjaro, Last Dance, Tale of the Missing Village, Floaters).\nI enjoy writing and that's why I do it. Constructing a world and building a story within, that's one of my definitions of fun.