Two New Special Readers for Crazy About You

Crazy About You continues to find new readers and I learn about it in the most unusual and delightful ways. One reader, Sandi Roper, asked to be my Facebook friend, and when I visited her page I found this:


"Just began reading Crazy About You  by Randy Atwood. The more I read, the story became eerily familiar. I took another look at the book's setting, synopsis and author and then I knew why. Mr. Atwood was telling MY story as well as his own. I also lived in Larned KS, and graduated four years after him. My dad was a minister, and part of the revolving clergy sent into the asylum to try and comfort its miserable inmates. I often accompanied him and came to know many of the higher functioning patients. They were my friends, but to my shame, I told as many sensational horror stories as anybody else about the big brick compound which swallowed up our little town. My first job was at the drugstore Atwood described the druggist's wife, it was surreal, because he described her spot-on! I later went to work for the old "Tiller & Toiler" he mentioned. Ironically, I later bought that old drugstore building and opened a gift shop there. After this remarkable trip through my memories, I will buy and read every book Atwood puts out. He is a remarkable writer and every Larned-native is sure to enjoy this book. I will now be "following " him on FB, and am anxious to read the rest of his books. Hope to become a friend on FB.

"And all you (Larned) natives, pick up this book . It's good a great read!"

And then the other day came this pleasure jolt.

We get a yearly termite exam and the guy who came today I recognized from the past. He greeted me and said "I really enjoyed your book" and I remembered from last year he had seen my books in a box in the basement and asked if I was a writer. Ended up selling him a novel. So I asked him what book he had read "Crazy About You. I couldn't put it down." How neat is that? This time around he bought SPILL.

Like Novels That Creep You Out?

From time to time I pick one of my novels to promote. Decided I'd spend some time on Blow Up the Roses. I have to admit I was surprised when the small press Curiosity Quills accepted it for publication. I believe it was one of their first choices. It's a very dark work, but the CQ founder thought it also the kind of gem a small press could discover.

Here's what one reviewer had to say:

Blow Up the Roses is a very dark story about murder, kidnapping, rape, pedophilias, and a variety of other human conditions of the most debase, debauch, perverted and deplorable nature. While this story is very, very disturbing . . . it is no more so than many movies that touch on the same themes. So, a reader should be aware of what you are getting into before you take up this book. Yet, Mr. Attwood is a master storyteller and his characters are genuine and authentic, even when they are monstrous. But, within this hellish, perhaps even demonic cast of characters, love literally blooms, and a story of hope, comfort, renewal and healing emerges in the midst of a nightmare. The story takes the reader to places you cannot begin to imagine and leads to an outcome that is terrifying, yet satisfying, too.

I have never known the end of a book when I start it. I always felt knowing the end was a fraud upon the reader. The characters should discover their own ends. In Blow Up the Roses, I didn't know why Mr. Keene deserted Mrs. Keene. I didn't know the horrible truth about Mr. Brown, who rented the other side of the duplex from the Keenes. I didn't know why Mr. Califano had this recurring nightmare of a rose garden blowing up around him. I didn't know why I didn't trust Mr. Griswald and his Amway sales program.

When I found out, I almost stopped writing the book. But sometimes characters demand their lives be put on paper. And sometimes it is far easier to create characters than destroy them -- until they destroy themselves.