Some of you may have seen the pictures I posted of some of my artwork---I also am a writer. I do freelance stuff mostly---I did work for a community newspaper chain up in the Dayton area and also do some freelance work for the Dayton Daily News covering meetings of school boards, city councils, township trustees, etc.

That work can get boring, but it is still something that is vital and necessary stuff.

I am in the planning stages of doing a non-fiction book with major work commencing in the new year--specifically once the weather gets warmer.

The book's working title is "River Rats: Modern Tales of Life on the Ohio River"

My plan is to find interesting people to interview who live or spend time on the Ohio River in the Greater Cincinnati area---I already am going to do a chapter on some people who lived with their families at the old Army Corp of Engineers wicket dam that once existed at the village of Chilo in Clermont County. The Clermont Park District has created a nice park at the site along US 52 and I have already been in touch with the people at the park about this.
I am going to interview some folks who lived at the site when their fathers worked at the dam.

I also have other ideas that include interviewing Karin and Linford about what role the Ohio River has played in their lives and music. I got the idea about including them when I saw them peform at Tall Stacks back in October. During the intro to a song, Linford talked about how there was a time when he and Karin were starting out and had first come to Cincinnati---they did not have much money to go out much. He talked of how they would come down to the river and build a fire and just sit on the banks of the river, enjoying the scene.

I talked with them at one of the Canal Street shows about this and they said they would be willing to be interviewed for the book when the time comes---

I plan to interview people who do things like work for BB Riverboats in Cincy--a company that runs excursion boats in the Cincy area; operators of either the Meldahl or Markland USACE dams near Cincy; perhaps take a short trip on a river tow through the area showing what that is like for captain and crews of such a boat; interview Coast Guard, local law enforcement and fire rescue personnel who work on the Ohio about what they experience in their jobs on the river; among others.

Beyond covering the working aspects of the river---I want to actually concentrate a large portion of the book on people who don't work on the river but spend time recreationally on the river---I have found one family via MySpace who are from Indianapolis who have a summer get-away on the river down in Vevay, Ind. They have some great pics posted on MySpace of many of the riverboats as they made their way up to Cincy for Tall Stacks. These folks seem to really enjoy using the river.

If anyone here spends a lot of time on the river during the summer months or knows someone who does with some good stories to tell of time spent on the river-I would like to interview you or those folks----send me a message via this site and I will get back to you.

I'm betting our own captsomer has a few good stories to tell!

hey this writing project plan for 2007 sounds pretty fantastic... do you have any plans to make any of it available serially?

I haven't decided about that at this point--I have taken my first formal steps today to get things underway on this project--I have begun to make contacts to begin the process of arranging interviews including sending an email to Linford and Karin --I hope they do decide to respond to my query at some point---

I also wrote an informal proposal which I sent via email to Orange Frazer Press of Wilmington, Ohio---this is an incredible little publishing company here in SW Ohio that specialiazes in non-fiction books mostly about Ohio.

The books they produce are very high quality and if I could get them interested in this--that would be quite a coup----

If anyone has any pull with Karin and Linford on here---put in a good word for me--I had sent them an email about this a few days after the Canal Steet shows back in November but never got an answer---I hope they don't think I am simply somebody trying to run a scam on them--I would really like to interview them and I hope they will at least let me know one way or the other if they are really interested in being interviewed by me.

It would be an honor to me if they did decide to take part---hopefully the good folks at Orange Frazer liked what they read in my email to them and offer to at least give me a shot on their end----it does help to have a legitimate organization behind you when you approach someone for an interview as opposed to being some free lance schmuck!!!!!

It was so easy when I would call someone when I worked full time for my original paper and later when I did free lance for The Dayton Daily News--being able to use the names of a paper was very powerful--but call and say--"well--I am a free lancer and I am just doing this by myself and I don't know where or if this is going to get sold and published" Lots of times you hear the line go "CLICK" in those instances!!!!!

It is kind of a Catch-22 situation at present---I am starting out this project flying without a net so to speak and there is no guarantee that what I am working on gets published---but you need to have some work done in a publishable form in order to submit to a publisher to get a yeah or nay from them---

I laid out to the Orange Fraze people, my basic game plan for this book, some of what I have done in terms of professional writing in the past and what work I have done , am doing presently and plan to do for this book as I get more into it.

I did not particularly follow protocols regarding a query, so I hope that did not piss off the editors there---I basically asked them---if what I have sounds like something they might be interested and if so---will they be willing to to look at some completed work once I get some interviews completed and done in the format they set forth in their submission guidelines?

If I can at least get them to say---"hey, we like what we hear--send us your stuff when it's ready and then we will make our determination then"

Simply having that much interest from a publisher would be great and when I schedule my first interviews--- I can legitmately say to them------when this interview and a few others are done--I will be submitting the work to a publisher who has already expressed an interest in the book-----so that should help get me the interviews in the first place-----no one wants to waste their time for something that may never see the light of day.

Wish me success with the editors at Orange Frazer......and with Karin and Linford.

Best of luck, I should think a small publisher specializing in locally oriented non-fiction would jump at that project! Are you sure a similar book hasn't already been done?

I have lots of stories for you! I also know some other River Rats that you might want to talk to. PM me sometime and we'll get together and I'll show you around. I know most of the people you are talking about interviewing.