Q: What made you want to write a novel?

A: I’ve always loved good stories. I like hearing them and telling them. Whether the story’s spoken or written, long or short, it’s in the artful telling that it becomes a good story, or not. I think life is better if we make the effort to be interesting and entertaining when we say something. It is for me. It doesn’t matter if it’s everyday conversation or a business meeting, a friendly note or an email, it’s better heard or read if we take the extra moment to make it original, our own. For me it’s important and fun. It even goes to the music I enjoy most. I like the great storytellers - Springsteen, Dylan, Tom Waits, and some of the older folk and country singers. And like Joseph Napolo in The Grandfather Clause, occasionally I find myself listening to the newer country songs because there are too few good rock ‘n’ roll storytellers getting record deals and radio time these days. Even my favorite jokes are those that are a bit long and story-like.

Q: When did you decide to finally write a book?

A: We bought our first family computer for Christmas in 1996. One Sunday afternoon the next February, I sat down and put the first words on the screen. I’m not a good typist nor am I usually satisfied with my work. I make dozens of revisions and each time I think of all the writers before me who worked on typewriters and the hundreds of hours I would have had to spend retyping entire chapters. So, in a way, technology enabled me. God bless Bill Gates and Hewlett-Packard. I am concerned, though, that the same technology may culturally disable us from being good listeners and good tellers of good stories. You know, with all the instant gratification available to us 24/7 – will we become impatient and too lazy? I don’t know. But, I do love being able to get whatever information I want, whenever I want it. So I guess this is the hating what we love, can’t live with - can’t live without conundrum. My sweet conundrum . . . I love that word.

Q: February 1997 was eleven years ago. It took you that long to write The Grandfather Clause?

A: About five years, actually. I have a demanding day job, a career that pays the bills and supports my family. I write on Sunday afternoons and vacations. Of course, not every Sunday afternoon can be for writing nor is every Sunday as productive as I’d like it to be. Just like you’re not always in the mood for a party just because you have one to go to. So, yes, five years for the first draft and five more of revisions and trying to get published.

Q: The Grandfather Clause . . . given your name, your grandfather having been Vito Genovese, a notorious Mafia Crime Boss, is this a bit exploitive?

A: Yes.

Q: That’s it . . . ‘Yes’?

A: Well . . . okay, I worked hard and long to make sure that the story and the characters would stand on their own. I wrote the kind of story I’d like to read and one that I’m proud of. My grandfather? He left my family his name and his infamy. No good has come from that. In fact, it’s been directly responsible for my family’s greatest pain and the cruelest moments in our lives. If I choose to use it now, use him, to create some good, to get people to read this book and they like it, and it makes them want to read my next book and so on, well . . . then he’s done his job. Read it – you tell me.

Q: Okay. So, who do you think would enjoy reading your book?

A: Everyone, I hope. Seriously, this book’s been a long time coming. Over the years, dozens and dozens of people have read the manuscript. Regular people. Men. Women. From the most serious readers, people who read all the time, to those that haven’t read a novel in years. People who know me and people who don’t. I know from their feedback that a lot of people will enjoy my book.

Q: What will surprise your readers?

A: How much fun they’re having.

Q: What’s the next book about?

A: It’s called The Termination Clause. I won’t tell you too much now, except that a couple of the characters from The Grandfather Clause will return and they may surprise you.

Q: Who returns?

A: I’m not telling, but there aren’t many survivors of The Grandfather Clause so read that first . . . maybe you’ll figure it out.