If you click on the image above, you’ll get the beginning pages of my new thriller. Currently, I’m almost two-thirds through the first draft. Fingers crossed! I’m trying to achieve a sometimes delicate balance: I want to portray my protagonist, a Catholic priest, fairly and without stereotypes. He’s a mature man, struggling with his faith in the light of the failures he has made in his life and the failures of the Church he serves. At the same time, I don’t want to give the impression that this is “Christian Fiction” despite its main character. The journalist who dogs his heels is an atheist, refusing to believe in God after her parents were killed when she was only ten years old. One of the detectives investigating the murders has been trying to extricate herself from Catholicism ever since she was a late teen, but it’s woven into her Irish DNA. Her partner is happy his parents raised him without any religion at all. So it’s complicated, to say the least. My overall goal is to try to examine faith the way I examined identity in Persona.

Meanwhile, I continue to be hopeful that a streaming service will pick up Persona to make it into a movie or a limited series. The online company Litnix Journal is spearheading that effort for me. They have produced what’s called a cinematic trailer for the book, demonstrating to streaming services what it might look like as a movie. Click HERE to see it. Litnix interviewed me earlier this week for about thirty minutes. Once they’ve edited the interview, they’ll make it available on Spotify, so I’ll keep you posted.

I’ll close with a picture I took at Willamette Valley Vineyards this week. It’s been amazing to watch the progression of the seasons week-by-week over the past year. The grapes are all harvested now, sequestered away in the dark to begin their journey into becoming world class wine. We are so blessed!