David Housewright

1 - What's your latest?

David Housewright: THE TAKING OF LIBBIE, SD

2 - Assuming I haven't read it, why should I?

David Housewright: LIBBIE deals with the slow death of the Great Plains. North and South Dakota, Nebraska, Kansas, Oklahoma, Wyoming, and Montana have been losing population for decades. Look around and all you'll see are empty churches, abandoned farms, closed schoolhouses, shuttered businesses - there are six thousand ghost towns in Kansas alone. In fact, several hundred thousand square miles of the Great Plains have a population of fewer than six people per square mile. In some cases it's two people per square mile. The last time that happened was 1893 when many historians, including Theodore Roosevelt, who later became president, declared that the frontier was closed. Now imagine that you are 45 years old, married with children, and living in one the small town that you grew up in, a town that most likely will be dead and gone decades before you are. Think that might make you a bit desperate?

3 - What can you tell us about your main character that you hadn't realized until you answered the question?

David Housewright: He's losing faith. For seven books now he has been doing "favors" for friends because he believed he was helping to make the world a better place. Now he's not so sure. Now he's wondring if he's not making it worse.

4 - What's your favorite scene and why?

David Housewright: The first scene in the book when McKenzie is kidnapped by bounty hunters and transported to Libbie because he's helpless and he realizes fior the first time just how vulnerable he is.

5 - What's next?

David Housewright: My 11th book - and eighth in the McKenzie series - is nearly completed. I call it HIGHWAY 61 - or THE CHILDREN'S CRUSADE - or SNAFU. Actually, I'd be curious to learn which title your readers like best.