Robert is an award-winning author of over a thousand published articles and short stories. He is currently a contributing editor for New Man magazine. His work has appeared in Reader's Digest, Travel & Leisure, Modern Bride, Consumers Digest, Chief Executive, and The Arizona Daily Star, among other publications. In addition, he previously worked as a celebrity journalist, interviewing Stephen King, Tom Clancy, Charlton Heston, and others for magazines such as Rocky Road, Preview, and L.A. Weekly.

Robert is an avid scuba diver, swimmer, reader, traveler, and a law enforcement and military enthusiast. He lives in Colorado with his wife and four children.

Robert's first novel painted a scenario so frighteningly real that six Hollywood producers were bidding on movie rights before the novel was completed. His acclaimed debut novel, Comes A Horseman, is being made into a major motion picture by producer Mace Neufeld and his short story "Kill Zone" was featured in the anthology Thriller, edited by James Patterson.

Bob has sold the film rights to his second book, GERM. And he is writing the screenplay for a yet-to-be-written political thriller, which sold to Phoenix Pictures, for Andrew Davis (The Fugitive, The Guardian) to direct!

He is currently working on his fourth novel.

DeadFall: My Review

Robert Liparulo’s DeadFall is on the very edge of Christian Fiction. As a thriller, this book exceeded my expectations. From the beginning, I was drawn in and rapidly turning pages to find out what happened next. Liparulo has truly mastered the art of suspense, and thrilling is an adjective anyone would use freely when describing this book. This would make an awesome movie! It would be R-rated for violence, but awesome in the seat-of-your-pants thrill ride that it provides!

Bob Liparulo believes every sentence he writes should move the plot and build his characters. He offers a fine example of this skill in DeadFall. Unlike his previous two novels, Comes a Horseman and Germ which offered a more global storyline, DeadFall is a more intimate story set among a smaller group of people in a tightly confined time period. This change offers the reader a chance to get to know the characters better and to explore the thoughts and intents of both the good and evil points of view. Liparulo does not want to undermine the nastiness of evil, yet he wants to write in such a way that his readers will not have to endure over-the-top language (there is NONE in this story) or gratuitous sex scenes. (none of that either!) DeadFall is exactly what the cover advertises – THRILLER!

Bob Liparulo graciously agreed to a phone interview with me, and I am excited to share our conversation here on my blog. God’s hand was evident in all of this, because there was a scene in the novel on page 141 that I thought was inappropriate for a book with Thomas Nelson’s name on the spine. This caused me to contact Thomas Nelson, and I was given a chance to speak with Allen Arnold and better understand their publishing philosophy. I learned a great deal.

Because of my initial contact with the publisher, when I asked Bob for an interview, he agreed! (He’s so nice, he would have agreed anyway, I think!) I learned a GREAT lesson in what it means to follow God’s will in your life, and that sometimes others will not understand. I missed the point initially, and I regret that. However, I think if you’ll read my interview, you will understand, as I do, that Robert Liparulo is doing exactly what God asked him to do. For that, I am deeply grateful! Come back tomorrow for my interview!

It's coming!!! It's almost here! Don't miss it!!

DEADFALL by Robert Liparulo tours tomorrow! I will be posting my first review for the Christian Fiction Blog Alliance as well as a personal interview with Bob Liparulo!! What an exciting and wonderful journey I was able to enjoy last week! I now look forward to sharing it with you! Please, join me!!

OK. Here is what God is showing me......

I've been wrestling with the "what is Christian fiction" question. I've talked to a lot of folks and read a lot of opinions. However, when asked the question, "What do I think?" I wavered. Part of me wants all Christian fiction to have an overt message, but I personally love the more thriller-type books that are in the market right now. So, where did that leave me?

Philippians 1: 14-17 reveals Paul facing similar reports of vast differences in preaching styles due to his imprisonment. His answer? Look at verse 18!
"What then? Notwithstanding, every way, whether in pretence, or in truth, Christ is preached; and I therein do rejoice, yea and will rejoice."

And check out verse 27 of the same chapter!
"Only let your conversation be as it becometh the gospel of Christ,...(that) I may hear of your affairs, that ye stand fast in one spirit, with one mind, striving together for the faith of the gospel."

If Christ is the focus and we seek Him in our work...then HE will bless it no matter what others think.

I made some pretty harsh judgements about a book - I was offended. I complained. And I asked questions. You know what God did? He made me look deeper.

We are not all called to read or write the same thing. For some, anything that is not overt in its Christian message is falling short. For others, an overt message simply disallows them to write what God has laid upon their heart. If a person is saved, and belongs to Christ, and seeks the message HE wants, then writes and shares that message, they do so in obedience. I think that is the point.

There is nothing new under the sun when it comes to human conflict. We live in a world that goes a little crazier with each passing day. The Bible has a lot to say about that too. But if we stay in the Word and ask God for understanding, He is FAITHFUL to answer!

I am rejoicing in the journey I have had this week. I am very excited for next week to get here so I can share what I've learned with you!!

Have a terrific weekend!

PS to my Gathering Information Post

God answers prayer in the most unusual ways!! I had the honor and privilege of interviewing one of Thomas Nelson's authors yesterday. (the source of my complaint) I am humbled at the testimony of this man, and I am very sorry I ever made such a hasty judgment! God is working in a mighty way in so many lives, and I will have a LOT to tell you next week that is exciting and just plain AWESOME!! Stay tuned! Things are about to crank up here on Window To My World!!

My Review Hollywood Nobody

One thing I’m beginning to learn as I do these book reviews is that publishing houses have personalities. Navpress is edgy, and so is Lisa Samson’s new book Hollywood Nobody. I’ve not read much in the current teen fiction genre, so this book was a stretch for me. However, once I got used to the non-stop chatter of the main character, Scotty, I couldn’t put it down! I had to keep reading to find the answers!

I mean, this girl has got it going on! I’m just sayin’! It’s like having a 15-year-old computer nerd take over your brain for a few hours. She’s smart, very insightful, and trying to make sense out of her very unusual lifestyle! Lisa Samson realistically inserts her search for Jesus and spirituality and leaves you, realistically, with no real answers at the end of the book. However, the first chapter of the next book in the series is also at the end, so you are left hungry for more and wondering what’s next for our endearing Scotty!

So, even if you normally read adult fiction – and I’m telling you, Hollywood Nobody qualifies as adult in some areas – but I guess modern teens know more about a lot of things these days…Anyway, if you want a radical change of pace and you want to explore a chatty teenager’s mind, pick up a copy of Hollywood Nobody…it’s pretty cool! I’m just sayin’! (Mercy! This book has made me ramble!)

It is November 1st, time for the FIRST Day Blog Tour! (Join our alliance! Click the button!) The FIRST day of every month we will feature an author and his/her latest book's FIRST chapter!

This month's feature author is:

LISA SAMSON

and her book:

Hollywood Nobody

Th1nk Books (August 30, 2007)

ABOUT THE AUTHOR:

Lisa Samson is the author of twenty books, including the Christy Award-winning Songbird. Apples of Gold was her first novel for teens. Visit Lisa at http://www.hollywoodnobody.com/

These days, she's working on Quaker Summer, volunteering at Kentucky Refugee Ministries, raising children and trying to be supportive of a husband in seminary. (Trying . . . some days she's downright awful. It's a good thing he's such a fabulous cook!) She can tell you one thing, it's never dull around there.

Other Novels by Lisa:
Straight Up, , Club Sandwich, Songbird, Tiger Lillie, The Church Ladies, Women's Intuition: A Novel, Songbird, The Living End

AND NOW...THE FIRST CHAPTER:

Hollywood Nobody: April 1


Happy April Fool’s Day! What better day to start a blog about Hollywood than today?

Okay, I’ve been around film sets my whole life. Indie films, yeah, and that’s all I’m saying about it here for anonymity’s sake. But trust me, I’ve had my share of embarrassing moments. Like outgrowing Tom Cruise by the age of twelve — in more ways than one, with the way he’s gotten crazier than thong underwear and low-rise jeans. Thankfully that fashion disaster has run for cover.

Underwear showing? Not a good idea.

Fact: I don’t know of a single girl who doesn’t wish the show-itall boxer-shorts phenomenon would go away as well. Guys, we just don’t want to see your underwear. Truthfully, we believe that there is a direct correlation between how much underwear you show and how much you’ve got upstairs, if you know what I mean.

I’ve seen the stars at their best and at their worst. And believe me, the worst is really, really bad. Big clue: you’d look just as pretty as they do if you went to such lengths. As you might guess, some of them are really nice and some of them are total jerks, and there’s a lot of blah in-betweeners. Like real life, pretty much, only the extremes are more extreme sometimes. I mean honestly, how many people under twenty do you know who have had more than one plastic surgery?

So you’ll have to forgive me if I’m a little hard on these folks. But if it was all sunshine and cheerleading, I doubt you’d read this blog for long, right?

Today’s Rant: Straightening irons. We’ve had enough of them, Little Stars, okay? It was bad on Helen Hunt at the Oscars, worse on Demi, yet worse on Madonna, and it’s still ridiculous. Especially on those women who are trying to hold onto their youth like Gollum holds onto that ring. Ladies, there’s a reason for keeping your hair at or above your shoulders once you hit forty, and ever after. Think Annette Bening. Now she’s got it going on. And can’t you just see why Warren Beatty settled down for her? Love her! According to The Early Show this morning, curls are back, and Little Me ain’t going to tell why I’m so glad about that!

Today’s Kudo: Aretha Franklin. Big, bold, beautiful, and the best. Her image is her excellence. Man, that woman can sing! She has a prayer chain too. I’m not very religious myself, but you got to respect people who back up what they say they believe. Unless it’s male Scientologists and "silent birth." Yeah, right. Easy for them to say.

Today’s News: I saw a young actor last summer at a Shakespeare festival in New England. Seth Haas. Seth Hot is more like it. I heard a rumor he’s reading scripts for consideration. Yes, he’s that hot. Check him out here. Tell all your friends about him. And look here on Hollywood Nobody for the first, the hottest news on this hottie. Girls, he’s only nineteen! Fair game for at least a decade-and-a-half span of ages.

I don’t know about you, but following the antics of new teen rock star Violette Dillinger is something I’m looking forward to. Her first album, released to much hype, hit Billboard’s no. 12 spot its third week out. And don’t you love her hit single "Love Comes Knocking on My Door"? This is going to be fun. A new celeb. Uncharted territory. Will Violette, who seems grounded and talented, be like her predecessors and fall into the "great defiling show-business machine" only to be spit out as a half-naked bimbo? We’ll see, won’t we? Keep your fingers crossed that the real artist survives.

Today’s Quote: "Being thought of as ‘a beautiful woman’ has spared me nothing in life. No heartache, no trouble. Beauty is essentially meaningless." Halle Berry

Later!


Friday, April 2

I knew it was coming soon. We’d been camped out in the middle of a cornfield, mind you, for two weeks. That poke on my shoulder in the middle of the night means only one thing. Time to move on.

"What, Charley?"

"Let’s head ’em on out, Scotty. We’ve got to be at a shoot in North Carolina tomorrow afternoon. I’ve got food to prepare, so you have to drive."

"I’m still only fifteen."

"It’s okay. You’re a good driver, baby."

My mom, Charley Dawn, doesn’t understand that laws exist for a reason, say, keeping large vehicles out of the hands of children. But as a food stylist, she fakes things all the time.

Her boundaries are blurred. What can I say?

Charley looks like she succumbed to the peer pressure of plastic surgery, but she hasn’t. I know this because I’m with her almost all the time. I think it’s the bleached-blond fountain of long hair she’s worn ever since I can remember. Or maybe the hand-dyed sarongs and shirts from Africa, India, or Bangladesh add to the overall appearance of youth. I have no idea. But it really makes me mad when anybody mistakes us as sisters.

I mean, come on! She had me when she was forty!

My theory: a lot of people are running around with bad eyesight and just don’t know it.

I throw the covers to my left. If I sling them to my right, they’d land on the dinette in our "home," to use the term in a fashion less meaningful than a Hollywood "I do." I grew up in this old Travco RV I call the Y.

As in Y do I have to live in this mobile home?

Y do I have to have such an oddball food stylist for a mother?

Y must we travel all year long? Y will we never live anyplace long enough for me to go to the real Y and take aerobics, yoga, Pilates or — shoot — run around the track for a while, maybe swim laps in the pool?

And Y oh Y must Charley be a vegan?

More on that later.

And Y do I know more about Hollywood than I should, or even want to? Everybody’s an actor in Hollywood, and I mean that literally. Sometimes I wonder if any of them even know who they are deep down in that corner room nobody else is allowed into.

But I wonder the same thing about myself.

"You’re not asking me to drive while you’re in the kitchen trailer, are you, Charley?"

"No. I can cook in here. And it’s a pretty flat drive. I’ll be fine."

I’m not actually worried about her. I’m thinking about how many charges the cops can slap on me.

Driving without a license.

Driving without a seat belt on the passenger.

Speeding, because knowing Charley, we’re late already.

Driving without registration. Charley figured out years ago how to lift current stickers off of license plates. She loves "sticking it to the man." Or so she says.

I kid you not.

Oh, the travails of a teenager with an old hippie for a mother. Charley is oblivious as usual as I continue my recollection of past infractions thankfully undetected by the state troopers:

Driving while someone’s in the trailer. It’s a great trailer, don’t get me wrong, a mini industrial kitchen we rigged up a couple of years ago to make her job easier. Six-range burner, A/C, and an exhaust fan that sucks up more air than Joan Rivers schmoozing on the red carpet. But it’s illegal for her to go cooking while we’re in motion.

"All right. Can I at least get dressed?"

"Why? You’re always in your pj’s anyway."

"Great, Mom."

"It’s Charley, baby. You know how I feel about social hierarchy."

"But didn’t you just give me an order to drive without a license? What if I say no?"

She reaches into the kitchen cupboard without comment and tips down a bottle of cooking oil. Charley’s as tall as a twelve-year-old.

"I mean, let’s be real, Charley. You do, in the ultimate end of things, call the shots."

I reach back for my glasses on the small shelf I installed in the side of the loft. It holds whatever book I’m reading and my journal. I love my glasses, horn-rimmed "cat glasses" as Charley calls them. Vintage 1961. Makes me want to do the twist and wear penny loafers.

"Can I at least pull my hair back?"

She huffs. "Oh, all right, Scotty! Why do you have to be so difficult?"

Charley has no clue as to how difficult teenagers can actually be. Here I am, schooling myself on the road, no wild friends. No friends at all, actually, because I hate Internet friendships. I mean, how lame, right? No boyfriend, no drugs. No alcohol either, unless you count cold syrup, because the Y gets so cold during the winter and Charley’s a huge conservationist. (Big surprise there.) I should be thankful, though. At least she stopped wearing leather fringe a couple of years ago.

I slide down from the loft, gather my circus hair into a ponytail, and slip into the driver’s seat. Charley reupholstered it last year with rainbow fabric. I asked her where the unicorns were and she just rolled her eyes. "Okay, let’s go. How long is it going to take?"

"Oh." She looks down, picks up a red pepper and hides behind it.

I turn on her. "You didn’t Google Map it?"

"You’re the computer person, not me." She peers above the stem. "I’m sorry?" She shrugs. Man, I hate it when she’s so cute. "Really sorry?"

"Charley, we’re in Wilmore, Kentucky. As in Ken-Tuck-EEE . As in the middle of nowhere." I climb out of my seat. "What part of North Carolina are we going to? It’s a wide state."

"Toledo Island. Something like that. Near Ocracoke Island. Does that sound familiar?"

"The Outer Banks?"

"Are they in North Carolina?"

Are you kidding me?

"Let me log on. This is crazy, Charley. I don’t know why you do this to me all the time."

"Sorry." She says it so Valley Girl-like. I really thought I’d be above TME: Teenage Mom Embarrassment. But no. Now, most kids don’t have mothers who dress like Stevie Nicks and took a little too much LSD back in the DAY. It doesn’t take ESP to realize who the adult in this setup is. And she had me, PDQ, out of the bonds of holy matrimony I might add, when she was forty (yes, I already told you that, but it’s still just as true), and that’s
OLD to be caught in such an inconvenient situation, don’t you think? The woman had no excuse for such behavior, FYI.

My theory: Charley’s a widow and it’s too painful to talk about my father. I mean, it’s plausible, right?

The problem is, I can remember back to when I was at least four, and I definitely do not remember a man in the picture. Except for Jeremy. More on him later too.

I flip up my laptop. I have a great satellite Internet setup in the Y. I rigged it myself because I’m a lonely geek with nothing better to do with her time than figure out this kind of stuff. I type in the info and wait for the directions. Satellite is slower than DSL, but it’s better than nothing.

"Charley! It’s seventeen hours away!" I scan the list of twists and turns between here and there. "We have to take a ferry to Ocracoke, and then Toledo Island’s off of there."

"Groovy!"

"Groovy died with platform shoes and midis."

"Whatever, Scotty." Only she says it all sunny. She’s a morning person.

"That phrase should be dead."

Honestly, I’m not big on lingo. I’ve never been good at it, which is fine by me. Who am I going to impress with cool-speak anyway? Uma Thurman? Yeah, right. "Okay, let’s go."

"We can go as long as possible and break camp on the way, you know?" Charley.

I climb back into the rainbow chair, throw the Y into drive, pull the brake, and we’re moving on down the road.

Again.

Sample from Hollywood Nobody / ISBN: 1-60006-091-9
Copyright © 2006 NavPress Publishing. All rights reserved. To order copies of this resource, come back to www.navpress.com.