As I like to tell people, I’m a good writer but a terrible author. I’ve spent more than 30 years writing news stories and close to two decades putting novels together. When I lived on Maui I also wrote a couple one-act plays, and seeing them produced by small community theaters in Hawaii was a highlight of my career.
But being an author requires more than just putting 60,000+ words on paper in a coherent, interesting manner. Authors, more so today than ever before, also have to sell their books, though book clubs, paid advertising, book shows, newsletters, social media (especially TikTok) and traditional media like interviews and book reviews.
I hate doing all of that. I even dislike talking to other writers. No two writers practice the craft in the same way, and since none of the books and novels I’ve written have ever sold well (though at least one can be found in libraries around the world), I feel it’s not my place to offer any kind of advice. I even hate telling people I’ve written books at all, fearing they’ll think I’m foolish for even trying to do something so archaic.
Even though I know we live in a hyper-capitalist market that requires everyone who wants to make a living as an artist to self-promote, I still stubbornly act as though I can just write novels without paying attention to that.
Which is dumb.
So anyway, my new novel is titled The Leading Lady. It’s about an actress named Holly Hart who’s staring in a low budget movie that’s being filmed in Newport Beach, California in the summer of 1998. She really needs the $2,500 she was going to make from the movie to pay off credit card debt, but production suddenly shuts down after Brock Williams, the lead actor, goes missing. So Holly and two of her co-stars decide to go find Brock. But the more people they talk to, the more they realize that few people are sorry to hear that he’s gone.
The novel is a cozy mystery, but with a dark subtext because none of us truly know everything about the people we call our friends. Can a book be both fun and dark? I really hope so because that’s what I was going for here.
In an attempt to promote this new book, here’s the novel’s first chapter. If you enjoy it and want to see where the story ends up, here’s a link at the end where you can buy it. And as always, thanks for reading!
THE LEADING LADY
Holly was still wearing the neon orange string bikini from the day’s first scene when she raced past Robby. Each slap of her flip flops bounced through the cramped but sunny Balboa Inn courtyard. Though he only glimpsed her face a second, he suddenly wondered if she was on her way to kill someone.
“What’s wrong?” he yelled her way, but she ignored him. Robby slowly rose from his fabric chair, ostentatiously stretched his arms into the sky, then started following in her wake.
“Henry?” she yelled. “Henry!”
Oh good, she was on her way to kill the director, Robby thought.
When he caught up to her he saw Henry sitting in his own chair, not even looking at Holly as she towered over him, her hands gripping the chair’s armrests.
“What the hell is going on?” Holly was clearly asking a question but Robby thought her tone sounded way more like giving a command. “Where’s Brock?”
Huh, Robby suddenly thought. He quickly glanced around the courtyard. Brock wasn’t here. Brock was supposed to be here. Brock was on the call sheet. He had two scenes coming up today involving Holly and him.
Henry shrugged his shoulders as Holly let go of the chair and took a step back.
“I wish I knew,” Henry finally said. “Doesn’t matter now anyway.”
Holly, brushing some of her still-wet hair from her eyes, clearly didn’t like his answer. Robby’s stomach suddenly got twitchy, the way it always did before boarding a plane or walking into the doctor’s office. Bad news was close, maybe seconds away.
“What do you mean?” Robby asked.
“I mean we’re shutting down. Kaput. Show’s over.”
Robby could hear Holly take in a slow, deep breath, the way she always did before reaching up to pluck violence off the shelf.
“Why the hell are we shutting down?” she asked. “A half hour ago Robby and I finished a scene — a great scene, you said — and now we’re getting ready for Brock’s big fight sequence in the alley. He’s probably on his way right now.”
Henry shook his mop of white hair roughly but still refused to make eye contact with anyone. “Nope, Brock’s out somewhere. Wife called earlier, said she hasn’t seen him in a day or two. He also hasn’t returned multiple messages from her, me, both ADs and at least one secretary over at the studio. Can’t have a picture without our leading man, so we no longer have a picture.”
“Wait,” Holly said, her hands now on her hips. “I just talked to him the other day. He called me ‘toots’ like he always does when he’s been drinking. Said the big shower scene we’re gonna shoot was one of the sexiest he’d ever read and he was gonna try to get you to change it from Robby to him.”
Henry looked up. “It was pretty hot, yeah. But there’s no fucking reason for Chip the Handyman to have sex with Jenny. Chip the Handyman has sex with Candice in the picture. Incredible — has he ever not been a horndog? Anyway, who cares because we are shut down.”
Okay, now the totality of what Henry was saying finally hit Robby. He felt like vomiting, and not only because he was really looking forward to that shower scene. “They can’t shut us down!” he practically yelled for no reason except he felt he needed to say something.
“Can and did,” Henry said.
Holly frowned. “You seem way too fine with this,” she said. “What happened to you’ve been trying to make this movie for a decade? You’ve worked on this script for years — you’re producing it, for fuck’s sake. And now you’re just giving up?”
Robby’s heart was beating fast, and for once it wasn’t because he was standing next to a nearly naked Holly. The movie shutting down meant Holly, Henry and everyone around him — including himself — was suddenly very much out of work. Rent was due in two weeks. He had a checking account, which would last him a while. Okay, not long. At all. And yeah, that shower scene had been in the back of his mind ever since he found that he’d been cast. This was the first time he’d done a movie with Holly Hart before, and he really wanted to film that scene.
“God damn it,” Robby said. “We need to get this movie back on track.”
“You said it,” Holly said, her arms now defiantly folded against her chest. “This is fucked up, Henry. You can’t shut down this movie. I need this movie! First time I get top billing — even over Brock! — and you’re pulling the plug.”
“I’m not shutting it down!” Henry yelled. He was on his feet now, though Holly was still about an inch taller than him. “The studio’s shutting it down. They’re sick of Brock’s antics and bullshit. He’s probably off with some bimbo. You think he cares about the movie? About you? Fuck that guy.”
“So recast him,” Robby said.
“Too late for that,” Henry said. “Doesn’t matter anyway because the studio will probably use the film shutting down as some kind of tax dodge. I bet they actually come out further ahead with us in the shitter than they do if we finish the movie. They probably love this, and no, I am not being sarcastic.”
Holly took another long breath. “Then I just need to go find Brock, like, fast.”
Henry snorted. “You needed to find him, like, two hours ago.”
“I can find him,” Holly said. “I can clear this up. Give me a few hours.”
“You’re not gonna find him in a few hours,” Henry said.
“Then give me a few days. Give me ‘til Monday.”
“I need to start that racing movie on Monday.”
Robby, suddenly sensing an opportunity to spend a great deal of time with Holly, moved closer to her. He thought about the scenes coming up with Holly — good scenes, scenes where she’d be even less dressed than she was now, like that long, lingering shower scene near the end. All that went away if the movie ended today.
“I’ll help. Not like I have anything better to do.”
Holly smiled. “See? We’ll bring him back. Tell the studio everything’s under control, we’ve got this. In a few days, everything’ll be back on track.”
Robby was now just an inch from Holly’s tanned shoulder, which was covered by her wet bottle blonde hair. She smelled like the ocean and suntan lotion. The nervous anxiety was still churning in his stomach, but the thought of hanging out with Holly for a few days was definitely better than sitting around his place waiting for Brock to show.
“I want to finish this movie,” Holly said. She was smiling now. “I love this movie, Henry. You know that.”
Henry was looking right at Holly now. “You just want the $2,500 you’ll make when we’re done.”
“I do want that,” Holly said, not even hesitating. “I need that. You know I need that to pay off my credit cards. But I also need to finish this. I’m 32, Henry. If this goes south, I don’t know if I’ll ever get another starring role.”
Henry stared at her a while, then nodded. “You’re lucky that I want to finish this thing, too. Go find that worthless turd and let’s be done with this.”
Holly threw her arms around him and kissed him madly on the cheek.
“We got this!” she said.
“You got this,” he repeated with a lot less emotion.
Smiling again, Holly spun around and took off towards her trailer. Robby jogged up to her. “So where are we headed?”
“First, I need to get dressed,” she said. “And you should, too. We’re gonna go see Brock’s wife.”
