Members Salon
ASJA Members Discuss Their Lives as Writers

Bruce Henderson

Was there a particular moment when you knew you were a writer?

It snuck up on me. I started out as a newspaper reporter, and at some point, amid all the interviews and deadlines and stories filed, I realized that I had become a writer. Newspaper articles led to magazine pieces, which led to books -- now close to 30 titles and counting. Each step along the way was a natural progression.

Career high point and career low point?

High point: When my book, And the Sea Will Tell, went No. 1 on The New York Times hardcover bestseller list. I kept calling the recorded message to hear the bestseller list, over and over... "And No. 1 is..."

Low point: Whenever I deliver a book and go more than a few months without a new deal, it always feels as if I'll never work again in this town.

Most unforgettable character you've encountered through your writing?

Vintners Ernest and Julio Gallo, and Mercury 7 astronaut "Gordo" Cooper are right near the top. If I had to choose one person, however, it would be the subject of my new book, Hero Found. Dieter Dengler was a U.S. Navy pilot who was shot down during the Vietnam War, and became the longest-held American POW to escape captivity in that war. Against seemingly overwhelming odds, he made it out alive. I was his shipmate, and came to know him well. Bigger-than-life and unforgettable, he was my true hero.

From what work would you most like to remove your byline, and why?

Probably one of my articles in the National Enquirer, where I worked for six months in the late 1970s before quitting and writing an expose about the place. A strong candidate for denial: "Benjamin Franklin Forged All the Signatures on the Declaration of Independence!" by Bruce Henderson. Was there a book that changed your professional life?

There were two: In Cold Blood and The Right Stuff. Capote and Wolfe opened up to me the world of narrative nonfiction, which they almost single-handedly made commercial.

Tell us about all your books that have sold for film, and how it happens.

And The Sea Will Tell was a four-hour CBS miniseries. I presently have three other books under option and in various stages of film development. Movie folks are always looking for good material, and they particularly like true stories. Also, this brings us back to narrative nonfiction, in which nonfiction writers freely utilize the tools of a novelist. More than one filmmaker has commented that a book of mine is easy to see as a movie because I place characters in vivid scenes with lots of dialogue. Also, you need to have a separate and specialized agent or subagent -- and a good one -- to represent your work to Hollywood.

What have you read recently that you couldn't put down?

True Compass: A Memoir by Edward M. Kennedy.

What's sitting in a drawer?

Bills.

What does it mean to you to be a writer?

That I have a platform from which to tell stories, which I love doing -- not only in writing, but anyhow, anywhere, anytime. A writer is a storyteller.

What's new and/or upcoming?

My new release, Hero Found: The Greatest POW Escape of the Vietnam War, a July release from Harper. This is a story I have wanted to write since Vietnam, and which I've spent the last three years researching and writing. Hot off the press: a new book proposal (55 pages) about the early, exciting days of the U.S. space program.

Melissa Gaskill

Was there a particular moment when you knew you were a writer?

The Oprah version? In seventh grade, when I wrote a short story for the school paper and the sponsor, Mr. Peterson, told me I had real talent. But truthfully, I didn't feel comfortable calling myself a writer until I received that first check for an article.

Career high point and career low point?

High point: a nine-day kayak trip in Baja California on assignment with Nature Conservancy Magazine, having the time of my life, writing about efforts to save a beautiful place, and getting paid for it. Close second, scuba diving at the Flower Gardens Banks National Marine Sanctuary for the Texas Parks & Wildlife Magazine special issue on the Gulf of Mexico.

Low point: much of last year, when several publications I'd written for regularly stopped assigning, others cut their pay rates, and several more folded.

Oddest person you've ever encountered through your reporting?

Seems like writers encounter a lot of odd people, if by odd you mean apart from the ordinary. That's part of the appeal! But no single individual comes to mind.

Most memorable story?

Actually several versions of the same story for a few different publications, about the Kemp's Ridley sea turtle recovery project on the Gulf of Mexico coast. In the process, I saw my first hatchling release at dawn at Padre Island National Seashore, personally released a logger head hatchling, and watched a ridley nest hatch in the wild (something few people have seen) on a remote beach in Mexico. That beach had been the sole nesting site for the Ridleys before the project re-established nesting in Texas.

From what work would you most like to remove your byline, and why?

A story about a plastic surgery practice for the local business journal. The editor expected a positive, promotional piece but the surgeon, and the entire operation (no pun intended), struck me as slightly creepy. There are probably worse examples, but I've blocked them from memory.

Was there a book that changed your life?

Many! I expect that nearly every book I've read changed my life, and I'm a voracious reader, so the list is long. But after reading Tales of the South Pacific in fifth grade, I decided I wanted to be a writer like Michener, sat down and wrote my own historical novel. In pencil, in a spiral notebook. Using The World Book Encyclopedia for my "research." In high school, I discovered biology and scuba diving, so changed my plans a bit and became a science and travel writer instead.

What did you do when you received notice of your first publication?

Called my dad (always my biggest fan). And sent a copy to my grandmother.

What does it mean to you to be a writer?

That I can hardly go anywhere or talk to anyone without story possibilities popping up in my mind. That I read scintillating prose or sentences beautifully put together and feel uplifted and edified (and also a bit jealous). That when significant things happen, I need to write about them. Not-so-significant things, too. Writers write, about everything. Nothing else really worked for me professionally, either, and I tried quite a few things, so I know.

What's new and/or upcoming (writingwise)?

I currently have a lovely agent shopping a proposal for a non-fiction book on sea turtle tourism, a real conservation success story and a heck of a fun way to take a meaningful trip. I'm about to take a nature writing course taught by a fellow science and na-ture writer, just to keep me on point with a few story ideas. And I hope to try again for an Alicia Patterson fellowship for next year (assuming I'm not busy writing the sea turtle book). More at http://melissagaskill.blogspot.com

Margaret Engel

Was there a particular moment when you knew you were a writer?

Every year when I help evaluate the extraordinary proposals that come to the Alicia Patterson Journalism Foundation, I know how special it is to be a writer, helping to push serious journalism forward. I learned from my father, Jack Engel, that writing was the best profession, and from my first editor, Irving Leibowitz, that writers could move mountains. After my first investigative piece -- discovering silicosis among quarry workers -- I never wanted to do anything but write.

Career high point and career low point?

High: Watching and listening to Kathleen Turner speak lines I wrote on the stage.

Low: Finding out that handicapped men working in an Iowa turkey plant were still being exploited financially and living in an abandoned school 30 years after I co-wrote a front page story about the abuses.

Oddest person you've ever encountered through your reporting?

A suburban Maryland college professor living two other lives in Pennsylvania cities, with multiple wives and careers. There also was the evil doctor with the phony cancer cure who had patients hooked up to IVs hung from the porch ceiling of his bungalow.

Most memorable story?

Finding out that one Iowa county's taxpayers were paying for teenage girls to be sterilized simply if their parents felt they were out of control. It was a lesson in how secrecy allows truly awful events to occur.

From what work would you most like to remove your byline, and why?

A Lorain (Ohio) Journal story on a girl with two tongues. It was an assigned feature story on a surgical procedure at the local hospital. Still way too tabloid for my tastes and it was the subject of much newsroom teasing.

Was there a book that changed your life?

Robert Caro's The Power Broker about Robert Moses. It's about three inches thick and I read it straight through. It's so compelling that I cried over neighborhoods that were ruined by Moses' ruthless plans. Caro did a spectacular job bringing zoning issues and political power to life. His research was jaw-dropping.

What have you read recently that you couldn't put down?

Kitty Kelley's new biography of Oprah Winfrey. Fascinating and compelling.

What did you do when you received notice of your first publication?

My twin sister and I hugged each other, as I recall, after we found out that HarperCollins wanted to publish Food Finds.

What's sitting in a drawer?

A screenplay for a beloved children's book from the 1950s, Mr. Pudgins. It took years to track down the rights to this book, which has elements of Mary Poppins and Harry Potter. It's now out of the drawer and a major studio is considering it.

What does it mean to you to be a writer?

To care about others' stories, histories, and struggles. Most writers can't wait to communicate, to tell the world about the astonishing truths they've discovered.

What's new and/or upcoming (writingwise)?

My twin and I are working on a play about humorist Erma Bombeck. She made everyone in our family laugh as we grew up, along with the rest of America as she was in 900 newspapers. I'm also been gathering string for five years on a play about the four college freshman who started the national sit-in movement after demanding to be served at a Woolworth's in Greensboro, North Carolina.

If you volunteer for ASJA, please tell us what you do, what committees you're on, etc.

I have spoken on ASJA annual conference panels.

Ben Kamin

What made you realize you were a writer?

I fell in love with the mixture of words, ideas, images, and the sound of an old woman's voice at the age of 14. It was on my grandmother's porch in the hamlet of Kfar-Saba, in Israel, where I was born. We would sit together in the biblical air and she read me stories from the Bible while I gazed at the Samarian Mountains, the sunflowers, the nearby minarets of the neighboring Arab village. The wind brought us the sweet scent of the orange groves between the two towns. It was the smell of rebirth and hope. From this, I understand now that I've retained not so much a religious legacy but the heritage of stories. Telling stories, in newspapers, magazines, and books nourishes human memory and brings on the peace.

What is your most memorable story?

Unquestionably, that of my troubled friendship with Clifton Fleetwood, my whimsical, black high school chum in the marching band. I have written about him, our fallout and journey back to each other as middle-aged men, in op-ed essays and now in my new book, Nothing Like Sunshine: A Story in the Aftermath of the MLK Assassination. He excluded me from the black kids' outside protest the morning after Dr. King (my spiritual mentor) was killed. I looked for him for 36 years, after we graduated; finally found him and asked him why.

What question about writing do people most frequently ask you?

(Laughing): "When do you write?" They are genuinely curious about regimen and pattern. But the truth is, I write all the time, morning, afternoon, some late evenings, and I don't recall any instance of writer's block. I wrote the first four of my seven books while working full-time as a senior rabbi in a large congregation. The thing about writing is that it comes easily when you simply merge it with your experiences as a human being and it becomes the running transcript. Who was your true mentor as a writer? I shall always be indebted to Ron Powers, a great critic of the media, an authentic advocate for writers, a man with a Pulitzer who has suffered egregiously in his personal life but continues to turn his pain and experience in favor of hard work and better writing. Eons ago, he saw one of my earlier op-ed pieces in The New York Times and just contacted me out of the blue. He became my teacher and necessarily rough censor. He taught me to drop all the veneers and the vanities and just tell the story.

So are you a rabbi or a writer? Can't I be both? And a husband, father, friend, citizen, and intensely passionate baseball historian and fan. I am a person who writes. Whether I am blessing a fresh grave, remembering the heavy shoulders of the 1976 Cincinnati Reds, or teaching a university course about the speeches of Martin Luther King, I am gathering up sensibilities about which to write.

How do you define "success" as a writer? It really is subjective—this is the answer people both pine for and despise. Some of the younger writers at Examiner.com, where I maintain an ongoing national spiritual life column, think I have succeeded because I am agented, have written hundreds of essays for a variety of big papers, have several books, a talk show, and a contract with a movie producer. But I succeeded back in 1984, when The Times published my first op-ed and my then-little girls knew what it meant to me, deep inside. More at www.benkamin.com.