The following is the prologue of my unpublished first novel, EDGE OF CALIFORNIA. If you are with a publishing company and would like to read more (for consideration for publishing), contact me.

This is possibly the best way to spend those late, lazy blue sky afternoons: I’ll waste my life away, gaze into the horizon at the bright sun peeling across the blue summery sky, cool rosy twilight ready to drink it all up down the road. I’ll lose myself in the panoramic California scene, the distant mountains silent, forever unnamed. I’ll wonder what’s beyond the landscape, since I’ve never really traveled that far, or if I have, I cannot remember. One day I’ll realize that wasting away along the southern curve of this state is a fine way to spend late afternoons. One day I’ll realize just how precious everything is.
     Sometimes I drive around because the constant motion helps me think about what I need to do with my life in order to save it. I drive around Mission Bay and Balboa Park; on Highway 52, which is nice in April; on Sunset Cliffs Boulevard, where you can glance over and see the ocean in all its wonder; etc., etc., I can go on and on about the beauty of this fine city.
     At lunch, I sit outside Downtown Johnny Brown’s, a decent burger joint in Civic Center Plaza usually catering to business execs and lawyers, watching people; no one fascinates me, though. The occasional cute girl passes by, but I never follow. Not that I’m interesting myself; I just sit and wait until I have to return to work. Sometimes my friends sit with me, but I’d rather lone it there, anyway. Downtown’s lost its magical effect; I can’t stand it.
     Sometimes I go to the beach. I sit there alone, writing down what I see—the birds and surfers in the ocean, far away, obscured by sunshine, you can’t tell which is which. Girl-watching is nice, but when I’m alone there, I’m there for escape. Sometimes I’ll stay there all day. I’ll lie back and gaze into the blue washboard sky and imagine a girl—the girl—just a foot away, getting a tan, reading Shakespeare, or picturing the wonders beyond the ocean. “Now to act aloof,” I’ll murmur to myself. “Now I wear the listless smile of a madman, the quiet façade of a hapless fool, the bleak sad eyes of a hopeless romantic, all that jazz, etc.…” You understand. If you saw me, I’d seem normal, but you’d wonder what sins I’ve committed, or my stance on certain issues, even my thoughts on life itself. Questions without answers.
     I can be there today. I can be anywhere.
     I used to be a writer but gave it up, partly by choice, but mainly because there’s just nothing interesting to write about these days. It may all very well be a writer’s block, and tomorrow I’ll start writing again, but for now I’m set on not being a writer. I just have no time for it, what with work and all. I stay up late sometimes, writing whatever I can think of until I can’t think anymore. I used to write about Connie a lot, which soon became tedious. Now I make observations on life—“searching for nuances”—and scribble them on Post-Its and put them on the window near my desk. It helps if you want to be a writer. I think Yeats did it; I find it stimulating.
     I think the best times of my life are those late afternoons stuck in the most beautiful edge of America—watching the ocean reflect the sad colors of the sky, LIFE ITSELF passing me by.