The SHANNON MUIR’S INFINITE HOUSE OF BOOKS column on Mondays and Wednesdays is a place at Shannon Muir’s author website showcasing books from a variety of fiction genres, with an emphasis on interviews and guest posts from other authors. One thing Shannon firmly believes in for readers not only to learn about new books available, but about those who craft the tales behind them. As its name implies, SHANNON MUIR’S INFINITE HOUSE OF BOOKS weekly column features writers from all genres of fiction who want their potential audience to get to know them, and their works, better.Today, we look at HOLLYWOOD VIA ORCHARD STREET.
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Hollywood via Orchard Street
by Wayne Clark
Genre: Historical Fiction
Deciding that the hopelessness he sees around him on New York’s squalid Lower East Side during the Great Depression isn’t for him, a young man invents an alter ego with the chutzpah he hopes will make a name for himself. In the process he accidentally ignites a war between the Irish mob and a Chinese tong, learns to drink and finds love for the first time. Will he and his alter ego ever reunite? They will have to if he doesn’t want to lose the love of a beautiful Broadway actress.
When did you first consider yourself a writer? The realization came in stages. As an adolescent, I knew I wanted to write. My parents were readers and early on I loved the feel of a book in my hands. I got my first job as a newspaper reporter when I was still in my teens. I used a typewriter almost identical to the old Underwood on the cover of Hollywood via Orchard Street. I felt like a writer when I got my first byline, which wasn’t easily obtained in those days. Years later, I began writing for magazines and working with people who had written books. We talked about writing all the time. To me, the writing demands of magazine journalism brought me closer to what I thought of as “real writing.” As time went by, I attempted, if memory serves, four novels of my own, but I ended up hating them. It wasn’t until 2013, at the age of 67, that I wrote a book that I was truly proud of. It was called he & She. Even though I’d been writing all my life, I think it was only then that I finally considered myself a writer.
Award-winning author Wayne Clark was born in 1946 in Ottawa, Ont., but has
called Montreal home since 1968. Woven through that time frame in no particular order have been interludes in Halifax, Toronto, Vancouver, Germany, Holland and Mexico.
By far the biggest slice in a pie chart of his career would be labelled journalism, including newspapers and magazines, as a reporter, editor and freelance writer. The other, smaller slices of the pie would also represent words in one form or another, in advertising as a copywriter and as a freelance translator. However, unquantifiable in a pie chart would be the slivers and shreds of time stolen over the years to write fiction.
