I aim to tell stories that I would want to read: fun, page-turning, and filled with characters I care about. I have no strong allegiances to genre; my writing is a mix of mystery, suspense, and literary. I prefer to write novels but I enjoy writing and reading short stories as well as non-fiction histories.
My life’s work is not writing, but as a clean energy entrepreneur building Carbon Lighthouse.
I believe, as Faulkner said, that the problems of the human heart in conflict with itself alone make good writing.
My most recent novel, Sink, draws heavily from my professional and personal experiences. I have worked at hedge funds and small businesses for a decade, and I spent a year in 2007-8 living in Buenos Aires, at the time Sink is set. I published several articles on Argentine politics and I keep abreast of its ceaseless train of scandals, and as a result the pulse and beauty and shame of Argentina live in full color in my memory. My daily work experiences make me well attuned to the pressures of running a business as well as the hubris of large financial institutions, fundamental features of the novel. Ultimately, I wrote this novel out of: 1) a love and sadness for Argentina and 2) the pleasure that came from imagining my own adventures if I found half a million dollars in a former boss’s bathroom.
My favorite novels, in order, are:
- The Great Gatsby
- The Catcher in the Rye
- One Hundred Years of Solitude
- Grapes of Wrath
- When She was Good
- The Adventures of Augie March
- Lolita
- Anna Karenina
- Norwegian Wood
- A Farewell to Arms