Anthony Fanning

I was standing on the beach on Ocracoke Island and looking out over the ocean and considering that Edward Teach, aka Blackbeard, once sailed along those very shores. A series of stories came into my head as if on the wind - The Adventures of Natalie Brennan. Tales of a young girl during the Golden Age of Piracy with an ample supply of swash-swash-buckle-buckle, starting with "Natalie's Good Fortune."

Another time I happened upon a video of a man out firing a Lewis machine gun, holding it up like a rifle. I wondered if a woman could handle that thing as well, and thought she woud have to be strong. The next thing I knew I was writing a futuristic sci-fi dystopian adventure entitled "The Cyclone Wars."

One of hobbies is photography, and my favorite thing to do is outfit people and photograph them. Recently, I've been doing a lot of 'old west' style photos. However, one day I saw a photo of a young woman in a summer dress and cowboy boots sitting in an old truck. I thought I'd do a similar shoot, and so wrangled one of my favorite subjects to throw on a beat up bull rider hat, some cowboy boots, cut-off jeans, and a plaid shirt to sit in my old truck. I added a bottle of bourbon and a pistol and we had fun with the shoot. My sister saw some of the photos and asked me, "Is that a prelude to another book?" All of a sudden I was writing "The Thin Gray Line."

After a photoshoot with six of my favorite young women, I had a poster sized photo made, framed, and hung on my wall. Every day I saw that photo I thought of the women in the photo, their character, and how they would fare in the old west. The series of old west novelettes practically wrote themselves.

And so it goes. Being an Indie author, I'll not be quitting my regular job anytime soon since the book sales are just enough that I can justify to my wife that I spend the time writing and not painting the house. I also tend to like to leave copies of my books here and there when I travel, especially when we go back to the OBX, which is almost every year. If you happen to vacation at the Outer Banks of North Carolina, and stay in a house on the oceanside beach, check the book shelves for copies of my books. It'll give you something to do if it's raining.