A couple of years ago, on my 50th birthday, one of my best “Jaws” buddies presented me with a photograph from “Jaws 2” autographed by one of the film’s then-teenage stars, Tom Dunlop. Less then a year later I had the great opportunity to meet Mr. Dunlop while on a visit to Martha’s Vineyard, where he lives. In our brief conversation I learned that he had followed his love for writing into adulthood and had written a couple of books related to the Vineyard and was finishing up a third. This summer I visited the island again and picked up his latest book, an in depth and entertaining look at the Chappy Ferry, the barge/boat combination that takes pretty much anything you could imagine the short distance from Edgartown to the small island of Chappaquiddick. While celebrating the release of the book Mr. Dunlop took the time to chat with Media Mikes about acting (he’s Julliard trained), the island he loves and how piloting the Ferry isn’t as easy as it looks.

Mike Smith: You originally began a career as an actor — what made you pursue writing?
Tom Dunlop: In a way, I began doing both at about the same time, but writing actually came first.

As a summer kid on Martha’s Vineyard in the early 1970s, I took an interest in the Vineyard Gazette, the weekly paper not far from my home in Edgartown, and when I was fourteen I got my first summer job cleaning up the back shop after printing days. I made five bucks a week! I told Dick and Jody Reston, the publishers, that I liked reading newspapers – the Gazette especially – and wanted to learn how to write for it. They started giving me press releases to re-write and actual stories to cover. I got my first front page by-line in the Gazette when I was fifteen. It was a story about the Edgartown Regatta. Never in my life had I known a thrill like holding a paper with my story on the front page, and my name at the start!

Though I wanted to act very much, I only started performing in plays during my sophomore year in high school, because the schools I went to before that had almost nothing in the way of drama programs. My father was an English teacher at a boarding school in northern Virginia, and every six weeks or so the whole student body would travel by bus into Washington, D.C. to see plays at Arena Stage and what is now known as the Shakespeare Theater. My mom, dad, and I went on these theater trips too, and I fell in love with those great city theaters. Everything I did in school after that – and I was fortunate to go to some very good schools: Taft, Brown, the Juilliard Drama Division – was meant to prepare me to be a member of an acting company like Arena’s.

“JAWS 2” was something of a detour. I just lucked into that part. Though I was at Taft, my home was now Edgartown, and as school was coming to an end that spring, the “JAWS 2” company was looking for a kid who could sail an old-fashioned sailboat called a Herreshoff 12½. My stepfather owned the first H-12½ in the harbor. So I’d had some practice sailing it, and convinced Shari Rhodes (the casting director) and Dorothy Tristan (the screenwriter at that point) that I was the only kid in town who knew the boat well enough to do the job. It wasn’t true, but I was a good enough actor to convince them! As much of an adventure as shooting that movie was, it didn’t dissuade me from wanting to act full time on stage. So that’s what I studied and trained for, and those were the sorts of acting jobs I pursued for about twelve years after graduating from Juilliard in 1988. I loved the theater work when I landed it. But while I was preparing for a life in a repertory company, going from play to play to play within one theater, the theaters themselves were disbanding their companies, hiring actors only on an as-needed bases. Under those circumstances, I never worked as consistently as I wanted or needed to.

So it was a really lucky break that I never lost my love for journalism, because when I decided to close out my acting career in 2000, all sorts of new opportunities were waiting for me on the Vineyard: the managing editorship – and briefly the editorship – of Martha’s Vineyard Magazine, feature stories to write for the paper and the magazine – and now, incredibly, books about the most amazing businesses on Martha’s Vineyard!

MS: What was it about the Chappy ferry that made you want to write about it?
TD: I fell for the Chappy ferry when I was four years old. On a stormy June day, my parents took me down to see it, and I remember rounding the corner on Dock Street and seeing this matchbox sized ferry – the original ON TIME – shoveling its way across the harbor entrance, white water spraying over its deck. (NOTE: Fans of the film “Jaws” will recognize the ON TIME as the ferry on which Brody is browbeaten into keeping the beaches open for the Fourth of July) You know how some people fixate on rockets when they first see them? Or muscle cars? Or thrillers about a shark menacing an island off the coast of southern New England? Right there and then, I fixated on the Chappy ferry pretty much like that.

To me, it’s an utterly unique enterprise – more than two hundred years old as a service, yet doing pretty much exactly the same thing it was doing the first time a guy rowed some other guy across the harbor for a penny or two. That sense of a history living on into my own time thrills me completely. I also admire the seamanship of the captains and deckhands, who drive these things at right angles to all the traffic they encounter at one of the narrowest, busiest, and most tide swept places in the whole harbor. You just can’t believe some of the weather they sail through, especially in the winter. Imagine a blizzard. And imagine that ferry sailing through it all day or all night. Because that’s what it does, almost no matter the weather. It takes a huge, truly dangerous storm to stop the ferry from running.

Most of all, though, I wanted to write about it because I knew from a very young age, exploring the files at the Vineyard Gazette and the Martha’s Vineyard Museum, that no one had ever told the whole story before. The fact that I’d get to be the very first guy to do that for a ferry I adore simply blew me away. I often say I’m the luckiest writer on Martha’s Vineyard for the stories I’ve gotten to tell. But sometimes I think I’m the luckiest writer anywhere.

MS: This is your third book centered around/on Martha’s Vineyard. What is it about the island that inspires you?
TD: A wonderful question!

Some of it is obvious. If you watch “JAWS,” and if you’ve visited it before, you know that nothing else looks quite like it. Not even Nantucket or Cape Cod, which are both right next door. There’s a powdery quality to the light that softens and deepens everything it touches on the Vineyard, a phenomenon I notice every day. Even when it’s stormy, or brisk and cold, there’s something about the light over the Island that I’ve never seen anywhere else.

I love the history of the Vineyard. Outside of a city like Boston or New York, you’d be very hard to find anyplace else in the continental United States with an older or better-documented history than Martha’s Vineyard. The white men and women who settled this place in 1642 were compulsive record keepers and historians; they wrote down everything — in letters, journals, whaling logs, deeds, wills, club minutes, store ledgers, diaries, weather records, newspapers. You get to see the history of this place from all these parallax views, so that it feels as alive and present-day as any history can possibly be.

Finally the answer comes down to the stories I’ve gotten to tell. If you look at the book I wrote with photographer Alison Shaw about Morning Glory Farm, or the one about the building of the schooner REBECCA at the Gannon and Benjamin wooden-boat building yard in Vineyard Haven, or the new ferry book, you come to the very quick and certain conclusion that there’s no place on earth quite like this one. There’s no other place with a collection of businesses quite like these, which – to the people who run them – amount to causes. These are callings that most people would never feel, let alone dream up, establish, invest in and run with everything they’ve got, unless they realized that they were already fortunate enough to live in the only place on earth that could welcome and support them all.

MS: Have you ever had the opportunity to pilot the Ferry?
TD: Another great question!
Yes. Three or four times with an increasingly cocky belief that nothing could be easier. And then, just once, with such incompetence and fright that I vowed never to try it again. Some years ago, I wrote a feature story about the ferry for Martha’s Vineyard Magazine…in fact, the idea to write a book came from reporting and writing that story in 2007. The editor of the magazine, Nicki Miller, and the art director, Alley Moore, challenged me to try skippering the ferry myself, and we ran that story as a sidebar headlined “How Hard Could It Be?”

The captains were very kind to let me try it. It was winter, so we held off until those crossings when there were no other passengers or cars aboard and no other boats sailing into or out of the harbor. I stood up on the platform at the helm, the console right in front of me, looked left and right, saw no traffic, and pushed the throttle down. The ferry left the Chappy slip smoothly and growled her way reliably across the channel toward Edgartown. The only trick to it, really, is that there is a toggle rather than a steering wheel. You goose it left or right to turn the boat. And though the toggle snaps back to an upright position when you let it go, the rudder below you stays where you angled it. So the ferry keeps turning until you toggle the rudder back to center.
I confess this took a little getting used to. The first time, approaching the Edgartown slip, I noticed the bow swinging off to one side at the last minute, and though I reversed hard, I pretty much T-boned the end of the bulkhead on the right side as you face the ramp. But even though the slip appears to get narrower and narrower as you glide toward it, I began to get a feel for it. As I say, on my third or fourth crossing, I was sure I had the whole thing down. Really… How Hard Could It Be?

Until. . . .

Until one windy night at the end of April of that year, after a storm tore through South Beach at the far end of the harbor, opening it to the Atlantic. It was the first time I tried driving the ferry at night, and the first time I’d attempted to drive it in the ferocious, tsunami-like currents that had begun rolling through the harbor entrance as a result of the second, new opening to the ocean.
The captain let me take her out of the Chappy slip and the second we got into the channel, I felt the tide bang into the hull, almost like we’d hit a wall. Leaving the slip, I had a good sense of what the lights looked like over on the Edgartown side, and thus what to aim for. But as I gunned the engine and looked ahead, I realized that those weren’t the lights I was seeing, because the tide had pushed the bow of the ferry almost 45 degrees to the right, toward the Harbor View Hotel.

Further off to my right, I caught a glimpse of the flashing Edgartown lighthouse – that couldn’t possibly be right! The ferry never pointed in that direction except in “JAWS: THE REVENGE,” and we know how that turned out. I felt a wave of fear rise up – where were we exactly? What was I pointing at? I had millions of dollars of ferryboat beneath my feet. Was I about to hit something? I’d lost my bearings, and in my confusion, I pushed the toggle in the wrong direction. Instead of swinging back in the right direction, we kept turning . To make a very long story short, had you been standing on the upper deck of Memorial Wharf that windy night, looking across to Chappy, what you would have seen was the ferry leaving the Chappy slip, sailing properly toward you for perhaps three seconds, and then veering away toward the lighthouse. And then continuing to turn. Inexplicably, you’d have seen the ferry make a complete circle in the middle of the harbor entrance before finally putting her nose back in the general direction of the Edgartown slip. And finding her way there, against all odds.

I say with the deepest gratitude imaginable that Maddie LeCoq, the captain at the time, took over and put the ferry in the slip for me. Had she not assumed command, the headline would have read something like this: AMITY KID WRECKS CHAPPY FERRY / WELDON BOY “NOT GOOD ENOUGH” RIGHT TO THE VERY END. (NOTE: while some of you are reading this headline and scratching your head, fans of “Jaws 2” are giggling uncontrollably. “Weldon” was Dunlop’s character’s last name in the film).

MS: What are you working on now?
TD: Peter Wells, co-owner of the ferry with his wife Sally Snipes, wants to build a third ferry so that he always has at least two in the water, ready to work at a moment’s notice, all year-round. Peter is a far-sighted, environmentally conscious guy, and it’s his ambition to build and run the third ferry on an electric motor only. This would be a huge development in the world of commercial boating – very few operators have dared to make that leap. If Peter does this, John Wilson, who produced “THE CHAPPY FERRY MOVIE,” a wonderful short film of the ferry that comes with the book on DVD, wants to make a documentary about the building and launching and operation of this new ferry. And I want to help him do it. We think such a film would go a long way to showing how far electric motors have come, and how reliably clean, efficient, and durable they can be, even when put to the test that the ferry would surely give them.

Also, for the Vineyard Gazette, John and I are working on another project, whereby we’re finding old movies of the Vineyard – mostly home movies, but some commercial ones too – and converting them to digital files. We’re going to tell the stories of what these movies show of the old Vineyard, show clips from them on the new Gazette web site, and begin to create an archive so that these irreplaceable films are not lost to neglect or ignorance.

If the above interview has whetted your appetite for the magic of Martha’s Vineyard, Media Mikes recommends the following books written by Tom Dunlp and featuring illustrative photographs by Alison Shaw:

· MORNING GLORY FARM AND THE FAMILY THAT FEEDS AN ISLAND (Vineyard Stories, 2009)
· SCHOONER: BUILDING A WOODEN BOAT ON MARTHA’S VINEYARD (Vineyard Stories, 2010)
· THE CHAPPY FERRY BOOK: BACK AND FORTH BETWEEN TWO WORLDS – 527 FEET APART (VineyardStories, 2012)

They are available at www.VineyardStories.com, your local book store and Amazon.com

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Brandon T. Snider is the author of best selling “The Dark Knight Manual”, also one of my favorite Batman books. It has recently been featured in Entertainment Weekly, Time, Forbes and Wired. Brandon has also done writing for Comedy Central’s “Come Inside with Amy Schumer” and contributed humor to the Huffington Post. Media Mikes had a chance to ask Brandon a few questions about his new book and his favorite comic characters.

Mike Gencarelli: What was your biggest challenge with your book “The Dark Knight Manual”?
Brandon T. Snider: The deadlines were quite challenging, actually! The turnaround was very quick so I didn’t have a ton of time to second guess myself and the direction we ultimately went in. At first I approached the material with a slightly more personal take but it was decided to make it more cut and dry so I had to rethink how I wanted to do it and plow ahead. I wrote it in about a month which was kind of insane. I usually like writing something, taking a breather and then returning with fresh eyes. In this case I had to finish parts and then get them in quickly while wading through the material for the next part. And somehow it all came together in the end.

MG: The design of the book literally feels like a pop-up manual for the series, why did you decide that route for the book?
BTS: That format was already in place before I signed on. Insight Editions has cornered the market on cool, coffee table-sized booksthat are filled with fold outs and fun stuff. I was approached to write the book based on my previous experiences with my editor Chris Cerasi. As far as the interactive features, I wasn’t as involved in their selection but I did give suggestions based on the material I included. Process-wise we decided early on what weapons and characters to feature and then the designer, Jon Glick, would pull the appropriate artwork and create the beautiful visuals. Christopher Nolan and his team had a true vision for Batman and his world and thankfully we were able to incorporate the best pieces of that vision into the book.

MG: How much research did you have to do in order to complete this book?
BTS: I did a fair amount of research but I never strayed from what was established in the Nolan trilogy. I didn’t use the comic books or any other version of Batman than the one you’ve seen in the recent films. My main resources were Batman Begins and The Dark Knight which I watched more times than I can count. For each viewing I’d look for different things; broad themes, embellishments and sometimes just straight up information. I wanted the entirety of the films to inform my work so it was important for me to absorb as much as I could. I had ancillary resources for the more specific details and incorporated real world factoids to enhance the idea that much of Batman’s arsenal is rooted in established technology.

MG: Based on your work, is it safe to say that you are DC Comics fan over Marvel?
BTS: I don’t think it is safe to say that, my good man! I’ve not yet had a chance to work with many Marvel characters as of yet. Had I the chance, I might just take it as I think they have a great stable ofproperties. Don’t get me wrong, I love DC Comics characters. Hopefully more opportunities will come my way to do stuff with them in the near future but that’s not for me to decide. And, truth be told, I think the Marvel and DC universes are quite different. I know fans love to compare the two but the reason they’ve both been so successful are because they’re not like one another. There are parallels but overall their mythologies are unique. It sounds diplomatic but it’s true.

MG: Who would you say is your favorite superhero/villain?
BTS: I’ve always had a soft spot for Lex Luthor and I love all the versions of him; the mad scientists, the jerk capitalist and everything in between. A man with unlimited money and resources who chooses to pursue the selfish agenda of destroying the one person who he believes is a spotlight-stealing fraud? I mean…that’s pretty great. And the parallels to politics that can be drawn fascinate and scare me.

MG: Who would be your dream character to do a book on?
BTS: I suppose my answer depends on the type of book but in general terms I’d love to write a Justice League story. If we’re talking about a manual-style book I think there’s a lot of potential in Superman’s world for that type of informational ledger.

MG: What do you have planned next after “The Dark Knight Manual”?
BTS: I recently worked as a staff writer on a Comedy Central pilot that just got picked up and stars comedian Amy Schumer. I’m also working on a few books for Harper Collins featuring The Annoying Orange. Everything else is too soon to talk about but I’m lucky to have been given a range of opportunities in my writing career and I hope to continue working on as many diverse projects as I can get my hands on.

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Justin Halpern is the man behind the Twitter feed @ShitMyDadSays.  This Twitter feed was not only turned into a very successful book but also a television series starring William Shatner.  “I Suck at Girls” is the second book from Justin Halpern.  Media Mikes had a chance to chat with Justin about this new book and of course what are his father’s thoughts about it.

Mike Gencarelli: What was the biggest pressure with the follow up to “Shit My Dad Says”?
Justin Halpern: I just wanted to write a book that was as entertaining as the first and that people liked just as much. There is a lot of pressure in that since you want the people who liked the first book to like the latest one as well. I wanted to write something that was self organic and that people would like.

MG: What did you enjoy most about the writing process of “I Suck at Girls”?
JH: I think being able to stretch out a little bit more. The first book I wanted to be very brief similar to the Twitter feed. I didn’t want people to have to read 500 pages. I felt I could spend a little more time developing the stories with the second book.

MG: Tell us about your inspiration behind this book?
JH: Before I proposed to my wife I had told my dad about what I was going to do and he told me to take a day and think about what I was doing and, to also think about my past relationships. When I was doing that I realized I had some funny stories that I think everyone probably goes through. I thought it would make a good book.

MG: What are your father’s thoughts on the new book?
JH: He really likes it. He originally told me he hated it. (Laughs) He said that this second book needed to be better than the first or else people were going to shit all over it. I told him people will have a tough time shitting on this book.

MG: What are your thoughts on the television rights to “I Suck at Girls” being sold already?
JH: I just need to be more careful this time. Things with this are still quite a long ways off. I am excited even though the first one didn’t work out so well. Hopefully with this one we can do things right.

MG: What do you think caused the “$#*! My Dad Says” to not last on television?
JH: CBS has some of the highest rated shows and I don’t think the show was doing all that well. You have to be a big hit to stay on the air there.

MG: Have you thought about writing a direct follow up to “Shit My Dad Says”?
JH: The current book has a lot of my dad in it so I consider it the follow up to the first book. This new book just has a lot more in it.

MG:So on a side note, I’ve always wondered why do you only follow LeVare Burton on Twitter?
JH: When I first signed up for Twitter they gave you 20 default people to follow. I was un-following all of them until I got to LeVare. I thought it would be funny if I only followed him.

MG: Are you a big “Star Trek” fan?
JH: No not necessarily. I did use to like “Reading Rainbow” though. (Laughs)

MG: What other things do you have coming up?
JH: I am out promoting the book right now and that is about it. Things are going really well.

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To most of us, our idea of a private investigator is based on watching such television shows as “The Rockford Files” and “Magnum P.I.” Smooth guys who were able to blend in even though they were the best looking guys in the room. And, in Magnum’s case, they were wearing a loud Hawaiian shirt! Philip Kline has managed to “blend in” for almost three decades. And that’s saying a lot about a man who stands 6’5” tall!

Internationally renowned for his investigative skills, as well as providing protection for some of the country’s biggest celebrities and politicians, Kline and his team undertook a project brought to them by “Dateline: NBC.” The network was curious about the mysterious disappearance of Patrick Kim McDermott, whose claim to fame was being the boyfriend of singer Olivia Newton John. Declared dead by the Coast Guard, as well as investigators hired by Newton John, something in the case file raised a red flag in Mr. Klein.

Klein has authored and just released the book “LOST AT SEA: The Hunt for Patrick McDermott.” In it he recounts the many hours, days and even years it took him to find a man who didn’t want to be found. Mr. Klein recently took the time to speak with MediaMikes about the case.

Mike Smith: How did this case compare to others you’ve had in the past?
Philip Klein: Well you know I do a lot of investigative work and body guard work for some of the most influential people in the United States. I’ve got to tell you, when NBC approached me about this I was kind of skeptical at first. But it turned out to be a real “who done it.” Actually more of a “why did they do it.” It wasn’t really “who” did it because we know…it was the man who was missing. But it was “why” he did it. Most investigators will tell you that the motive is the most important thing of the case. And when we found the motive of this case everything pretty much fell into place pretty quickly.

MS: Since the book has been published have you been contacted by McDermott or any representative? (NOTE: In the book Mr. Klein tracks McDermott to Mexico, where he later negotiates with a representative of Mr. McDermotts )
PK: No we haven’t. And the reason why is that we made a promise that if he provided a DNA sample…what we refer to as “proof of life,” we wouldn’t bother him anymore. His position, through his legal counsel, is that he just wants to be left alone. He has not committed any crimes, there are no warrants for his arrest and there are no, what we call in the business BOLOs, be on the lookout for in his name. So what we did was take a step back and decided that we needed to end the case. We asked his rep to send us a proof of life and we got just that.

MS: I remember in the book that you had agreed to not bother him once the proof of life was provided. I was just curious if maybe you had gotten a phone call or email saying “you were right…that’s exactly what happened!”
PK: (laughs) No, it doesn’t work like that. As much as I’d like it to work like that. I think what happens in the real world is that he is expecting an onslaught of press because the book has been released. And because he’s expecting an onslaught of press he’s probably gone back under. He’s very good. He’s learned the system down in Mexico. He knows how to disappear. He knows how to blend in. That’s what he’s probably done at this point. If I was consulting with him I would tell him that’s what he needs to do at this point.

MS: There almost seemed, not on your part but on your team, to talk directly with Olivia Newton John. Was that an outlet you really wanted to investigate but just didn’t feel it was right?
PK: Well, not necessarily. Well, you may be right in some ways. In every case there is a victim and in this case we considered Olivia Newton John one of the victims. Do we believe that Olivia Newton John knew anything about his disappearance? No. We believe that Patrick McDermott…we know that Patrick McDermott…went to her two weeks before he disappeared. He gave her some flowers and a funny card and said goodbye. They were going to break up. Olivia’s idea of the break up was…she felt that it was going to be a temporary break up. He’d done this before. In the police reports she called it a small “time out.” We believe that McDermott made the decision that that was it. He was going down to Mexico so he said his goodbyes. It’s very unusual that when someone takes off like that they say goodbye to the things they love or that they know that are common to them. And I think in Patrick’s case that he did have fond feelings for Olivia. You don’t date somebody for that long and not have some kind of feelings for them. But in the end I don’t think he wanted to hurt her. He just wanted to go on with his life. Of course Hollywood is a very, very tough place to survive. And I believe he decided he just couldn’t do it anymore. Especially in the fast lane with an “A” list star. He was always the nice looking man on Olivia Newton John’s arm. And so I think he said goodbye to her in the way he knew how to say goodbye. He bought a gun. He emptied his bank accounts down to zero. He got as much money as he could off his credit cards and he took off.

MS: Has the popularity, and the easy access of, the Internet made your job easier or harder? There is so much information out there that often you don’t know what’s true and what’s not.
PK: We have a big sign in our office for all of our investigators to read. It says “Don’t Believe What You Read on the Internet!” The Internet is a great tool, especially for investigators like us. That is one of the things we were able to do, use the Internet. We created what they call a “spider” web site…a trap site…where we could watch the IP addresses come in. One of the things you learn very quickly is that when people are running or trying to hide they’re always looking over their shoulder. So we used that concept and created the website “Find Patrick McDermott.com” We set that up as a “spider” site and we were able to trap IP addresses. We released the web site only to relatives and close friends of McDermott, including the Olivia Newton John camp. Then we sat back and watched. We blocked it from Google. We blocked it from Yahoo. And we just watched it for two weeks. And, sure enough, we started getting hits from Mexico. There’s nobody in Mexico that knew we were doing anything. So we figured at that point that he was down in Mexico. And we also knew the bigger piece of the puzzle…somebody was communicating with him down in Mexico.

MS: Do you know the status of McDermott’s life insurance policy?
PK: The insurance policy was not honored because of our report. We do know that Ms. Nipar (NOTE: Yvette Nipar was Patrick McDermott’s former wife. Despite her claims otherwise she has tried to undermine Mr. Klein’s investigation almost from the beginning. She has even gone so far to write Jeff Bezos, the founder of Amazon.com, a letter asking him not to sell Mr. Klein’s book) was paying the insurance policy and keeping it active. It was a $100,000 life insurance policy. Of course the insurance company has a policy of not releasing any pertinent information except to family members. However when we did send them a formal 1702 notice, a notice saying we wanted to know who was paying the insurance policy and if the policy was active, they did copy Yvette Nipar. I think that was their way of saying, “no, we’re not going to tell you who’s paying on the policy but we’re going to copy our letter to whoever is paying on the policy.” That’s where we got that connection.

MS: I know from your emails with Ms. Nipar regarding your request to test your DNA sample with a sample of her son she refused and told you that the Coast Guard had samples of Mr. McDermott’s DNA. Did they?
PK: We did. And the U.S. Coast Guard advised us that they did not have any DNA. They didn’t understand where she was getting that information from. There was a hat found on the boat. There was also some other items found…fishing tackle, a wallet which was empty…what was missing were his two passports. So we asked them directly “what about this green hat that was supposedly left behind, was there any DNA on it or did you find any DNA in his apartment when you did the search?” There answer was “no, we did not keep any DNA. There was no reason for us to keep any DNA.” That’s always been a confusing thing for us…that the Coast Guard did not keep any DNA. The Los Angeles Police Department had immediately dropped the case. They felt, number one, that there was no foul play. Number two, it wasn’t there jurisdiction. And number three, they felt that he was probably running due to his issues with Ms. Nipar and the amount of money he owed the state of California for child support.

MS: I just pulled up the book’s web site and I see the letter she wrote Jeff Bezos asking him to pull the book.
PK: We were surprised. If you go through that letter you will see that Ms. Nipar results to name calling…she resorts to intimidation. And if you read the book you will notice that this is the same behavior she showed when we were trying to investigate. You’ll also see that she tried to use the Los Angeles Police Department to shut the investigation down. This is atypical of someone that really wants to know what happened to their loved one. It’s totally the opposite of what we’re used to as investigators. Usually when we come in and investigate the family bends over backwards. They give interviews…they say, “look, this is what we know…this is what we have.” They want to share. She has done completely the opposite. In fact, she has attempted to block the investigation at every turn. And once again, when we start talking about the case in the form of a book she begins to start trying to block it again. So all of the investigators in this office raise our eyebrows, as do some of my friends over at the Los Angeles Police Department. They raise their eyebrows and say she’s acting quite abnormal.

MS: One thing that really struck me in the book was when you relate that your father told you the three important things in life: Truth, Honesty and Faith. You then add that there is a difference between truth and honesty. What is that difference?
PK: Well, if I’m putting my investigator hat on, truth and honesty are two different things. You can say the sky is blue, and that’s the truth. But, honestly, if you’re looking at the sky and the sky has clouds in it, you don’t want to just say the sky is blue. Honesty means the sky is blue with some clouds. And I think that sometimes people, when they are scared or trying to give only the half-truth, they’ll stand up and just say the sky is blue. When they perfectly know that it’s blue and white. It’s blue with white clouds. They hold things back. And I saw a lot of that on this case. I’d get the typical Hollywood “yeah, I knew Pat…this is the way he was.” But they’d hold stuff back. And I think people in Hollywood are so shell shocked by the media…so shell shocked by the press and how hungry the press is to get a story…that they sometimes hold things back. Or, if they have something to hide, they hold things back. I think that’s what I was talking about when I mentioned that with my father. There is a huge difference between truth and honesty. The honesty is that the sky is blue with beautiful white clouds. It’s not just blue.

MS: Now that he’s 19 years old, if Chance (Mr. McDermott’s son)were to come to you and say, “Phil, can you show me what you’ve got,” would you share it with him?
PK: You know, that’s a great question! Not only with this case, which is a missing persons case. I do about 100 missing person cases a year. And I can tell you this. For each of the families I always keep what we call “the Box.” It’s the case box. Sometimes there are five or six boxes and sometimes only one box. And I keep them for the family members. Especially the young people so they can go through them when they turn 18 years old. And if Chance McDermott wants to come to our office and if he wants to sit down and dig through all of the evidence…read everything that we did, all the way back to day one when we started with NBC to when we closed with NBC to the writings of the attorneys down in Mexico City…he is perfectly welcome with open arms. And you’d be surprised. Young people come to us often and say, “you know, our parents didn’t really tell us everything Mr. Klein…would you please sit down with me and tell me what this is and show me the documents?” And we show them. We have seen it as a very emotional event…as a very spiritual event. And a very relieving event for these folks. With this case…and I’m NOT calling Ms. Nipar a liar…I’m simply saying that Ms. Nipar is holding stuff back from her son. There’s a reason and a motive for that. Maybe someday she can look him in the eye and tell him that motive.

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Rick Goldschmidt is the current Rankin/Bass Historian and Biographer. He is a lifetime for an Rankin/Bass’ work. He has published three books to date about their work including his latest called “Mad Monster Party”, which focuses solely on that film. Rick is also a musician and has worked with members of the band Gin Blossoms. Media Mikes had a chance to chat with Rick about Rankin/Bass and also his book.

Mike Gencarelli: What was the first Rankin/Bass production that made you a lifetime fan and their current historian and biographer?
Rick Goldschmidt: I think it would probably be “Rudolph”. That is still probably my favorite of the bunch. I like the simplicity of it especially the design work by Tony Peters. I really think it’s their crowning achievement. “Mad Monster Party” runs a close second as I am a big Jack Davis fan. I like the classic monsters.

MG: What was your most challenging part making your first book “The Enchanted World of Rankin/Bass”?
RG: Rounding up as many images as I was able to get was probably the hardest part. Rankin/Bass really didn’t save much. A lot of their stuff went into dumpsters. Years later I found out from some friends that the Rifkin/Bass office used to be above I think the TV museum in New York. I actually got a Jack Davis painting from a friend of a friend who stated he garbage picked it. They really didn’t hang on to a lot of their artifacts. I had to go out and search conventions and toy shows.

MG: The book is currently out of print, any idea when another printing will be released?
RG: I still do a print on demand type of thing. They are still available but on a very limited basis. I think going into Christmas of this year we may go in and update the book and do more of a mass printing. It will probably be similar to what we did with the “Mad Monster Party” book. I am going to try and do an Easter book and cover “Here Comes Peter Cotton Tail”. Vincent Price was a big part of that as Evil Iron Tail. I think that had a big influence on Tim Burton. That was a very gothic type character.

MG: Tell us about your latest book “Mad Monster Party”?
RG: I have been collecting a lot of stuff related to “Mad Monster Party” and “Rudolph” especially as they are my favorites. The Jack Davis aspect was a big part for me. That’s sort of how I found Rankin/Bass by talking about “Mad Monster Party”. Jack was still doing odds and end for them and in fact he even did a newer version of “Mad Monster Party” with Arthur Rankin not that long ago. They tried to do something with CGI however I never got to see it because Arthur is pretty protective about things that don’t see the light of day. I am always trying to find out more about the classic holiday specials because I really enjoyed those works the most.

MG: What do you like most about stop-action animation compared to CG which is commonly used today?
RG: I think the stop motion stuff has a completely different feel. Arthur Rankin describes it as a warmer style of animation. The CGI stuff comes across colder. 85-90% of what’s being done in CGI these days is not looking unique. There is a lot of it out there that doesn’t have any particular style or finesse. Even thought they were CGI assisted I prefer Tim Burton’s work on things such as ”The Nightmare Before Christmas” and “The Corpse Bride” over a lot of the CGI films that are out. I did like Pixar quite a bit because they focused on the story over the CGI however, when I saw “Cars 2” the story went completely out the window. I think Disney’s involvement with the company has hurt it more than helped it.

MG: Do you still keep in touch with Arthur Rankin Jr. and Jules Bass today?
RG: Yes. Jules is not as open to doing discussions about Rankin/Bass and his previous work. He is not very involved in that kind of thing but Arthur still talks about that stuff and I talk to him on occasion. Arthur has sort of always been the voice of Rankin/Bass. Jules was more involved with the voice actors and songs. He has moved on and written books for children. He recently had one of his novels “Monte Carlo” adapted into a movie. I was surprised that that film finally got made as I had heard some time back that Nicole Kidman had bought the script and that she was going to star in it with some other big name actresses. I have heard before that “Mad Monster Party” was going to be made into a motion picture also but I don’t know how you would do something like that. The charm of that movie is the puppets.

MG: What is next for you and Miser Bros. Press?
RG: I am definitely going to do the Easter book and have it ready to come out on Easter. I have some cool things that I want to put in it. I want it to look very Easter candy basket. Their specials for Easter make the holiday for me as they really capture the spirit of the holiday. We will probably also being doing some updates to the first two books and release them in mass printing form.

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John P. Locke is the 1st self-published author to sell a million eBooks on Amazon Kindle. He is among one of the fourteen authors have sold more than a million eBooks on Kindle. Media Mikes had a chance to chat with John about his success and his plans to release his Donovan Creed series into print media.

Mike Gencarelli: First off how does it feel to be one of the fourteen authors have sold more than a million eBooks on Kindle?
John P. Locke: Well the first answer of course is that it feels great. You thought it would…and it does [laughs]. It feels great. Then the next step is what is important for me, I hit that goal and now I am focusing on the next which is to be successful in print media.

MG: When you became the 1st self-published author to sell a million eBooks on Amazon Kindle; have you since been contacted by publishers?
JPL: Oh absolutely. I had an opportunity to have a bidding with some publishers, who were interested in bidding on the next four book in the series. I worked differently and I didn’t want to go with a traditional publisher. For them the first step is to maximize profits and I would most likely have to tone my character down or tame him to make him more widely accepted. If I was under pressure to do that, I am afraid that I would lose the audience that I worked hard to build up so far.

MG: You placing above authors like Stephenie Meyer and George R.R. Martin, tell us what that feel like?
JPL: It is lofty company…it really is, of course. Without having any publishers or dollars behind me, it startled a lot of those people. The funny thing is that until I hit number 1 with my book “Saving Rachel” and “Wish List” at number 2 at the same time, I didn’t really get any attention. The day “Saving Rachel” hit number 1, I got 24 offers over two days from very well-respected literary agents. I just chose the first one Jane Dystel from Dystel & Goderich in New York, since they were the first to ask.

MG: Almost selling two million eBooks in 2011, what can we expect for 2012?
JPL: We are getting ready to launch a big collaboration with Simon & Schuster. I am using them as a distribution arm to get the books into mainstream retailers. They are going to be in Barnes & Noble, Wal-Mart, grocery stores and pretty much anywhere books are sold in retail markets. The first print run authorized by Simon & Schuster is 750,000 in mass market paperback. As far as I know this is the first time anything like this has ever been done. I am working with a major publisher and the content belongs to me and the distribution belongs to them. I am hoping that the public is going to discover my Donovan Creed character and embrace the series the way they have in the e-books.

MG: What suggestions do you have for inspiring authors out there to achieve the same success?
JPL: I would say to have confidence. In self-publishing, if you believe in yourself and willing to put up your own money, you can compete against the big publishers and even the playing field where you can make deals with these people. I think that this is the start of that. Also I do not do any editing until I am completely finished. Then I go back and edit that way you are fixing something that you had instead of fixing something along the way. So it takes confidence and patience.

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Jack Ketchum is the pseudonym for author Dallas Mayr. He has written over twenty books, including novels, short-stories and contributions to anthologies. He has had several of his novels turned into films over the last five years including “The Lost”, “Red”, “The Girl Next Door”, “Offspring”and the most recent “The Woman”. Movie Mikes had a chance to chat with him about his numerous film adaptions and also what he has planned upcoming?

Mike Gencarelli: What is your process for writing a story, do you have film adaption if you mind when do it?
Jack Ketchum: No, I just write the story. But movies have influenced me greatly over the years, so I think my stories often have a cinematic feel to them.

MG: Some of the content in your novels are pretty intense, are you weary of how they can translate into film?
JK: Well, the movies which have been made based on my books have pretty much kept most of the intensity. So I don’t see why that shouldn’t continue.

MG: How has it been working with Lucky McKee on “The Woman” and “Red”?
JK: Lucky’s great to work with. I’d only collaborated on a handful of short stories before with Edward Lee and P.D. Cacek, so I was a little leery going into writing “The Woman” with him, a much longer project, and I think he’d never worked with a novelist before so he probably was too. But we’d been completely in agreement as to how RED should work, so we were optimistic. And even though I’m old enough to be his father, we might have been exact contemporaries — that’s how much we thought alike.

MG: How do you feel that the adaption for “The Woman” has turned out?
JK: I love it. I’m proud of it. I was on-set for most of the shoot and saw how well it was going so I’m not surprised. We knew we had something special all along.

MG: How would you put the film adaptions, “The Lost”, “Red”, “The Girl Next Door”, “Offspring” & “The Woman”, ranking from most liked to least?
JK: Sorry, I’m not going to do that. It’s like picking your favorite kid. All I can say is that in each case the filmmakers have tried their best to stay faithful to the source material, and for that I’m quite grateful.

MG: How much input have you had with the film adaptions of your novels?
JK: Some more than others, but everybody’s asked me for some, particularly in the scripting stage. As I said, I was there for most of the filming of “The Woman” and that was cool, because if something wasn’t going right Lucky and I could fix it right then and there together. I was also on the set of “The Girl Next Door” a lot, because it was shooting quite near me, in New York and New Jersey. On “The Lost”, I saw three drafts of the screenplay and commented on them. I even worked with some of the actors, discussed their parts. Chris Sivertson, the director, was very open to that. In fact he even bought copies of the book for all the cast and crew to read! Unheard of!

MG: You have appeared as a cameo or role in most of the film, are you trying to follow Stephen King with his films?
JK: Alfred Hitchcock.

MG: How do you film you work has changed or evolved since your first novel?
JK: I think my characters are much richer. “Off Season” mostly sketched in the characters, which was necessary because I wanted the shit to hit the fan early on. But you take “Red” or “The Woman”, and there’s a much more gradual build. I think my writing’s grown more assured too.

MG: Do you have novel you have always wanted to get made into a film?
JK: I’d love to see “Ladies Night” filmed. I think it’s a natural. Stuart Gordon had an option on it for quite a while, wrote a damn good script which contained elements of a script I’d written long before. But the option’s lapsed, alas.

MG: What is your next novel that you are working on?
JK: Right now, no novel. A screenplay. But I’m not going to tell you what it’s about. If I talk about a story I generally won’t write it. I wind up talking it to death.

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Terry Brooks is a fantasy fiction writer and has had 23 New York Times bestsellers and over 21 million copies of his books in print. He is known best for his book “Magic Kingdom for Sale…Sold!” in his “Magic Kingdom of Landover”, which is a six book series.  His other well known series for the “Shannara” series, which currently is a 24 book series with 3 more on the way.  Terry’s latest book in the “Legends of Shannara” series is called “The Measure of the Magic”, which was released August 2011. Media Mikes had a chance to chat with Terry about his books, his movie adapation plans and his process for writing.

Mike Gencarell: Let’s start with the “Measure of Magic”, which just came out. Tell us about how you came up with the idea for the second book in that series?
Terry Brooks: Well it wasn’t too difficult. I write in groups of books anyway. They’re all historical sagas so they take place in different time periods.  I’m in the midst now of working on a set of what will be probably 9 or 10 books on the pre-history of the Shadow World. So when you sit down to start a project, you sort of plot out what the story is gonna be and as you work on it it tells you before you even get started on your writing, for the most part, how many books it’s gonna be. So, I’ve actually known that this was gonna be a two book set for about three years. It helps if you think ahead on these things, otherwise you spend a lot of time trying to play catch-up.

MG:  So you mentioned that you have the next chapter for the trilogy coming up. Can you tell us a little bit about that?
TB: Anybody coming in to this series will take one look at this thing and say “Wait a minute, this guy has 18 books that take place in 15 different time periods, and he is still writing? What the heck! I won’t live that long.” And it is confusing, and part of what I do to make it easy is to list all the books on the front and put them in chronological order and also put them in groups.  So every new reader can say “Well I can start with book number one of any set.” And it wouldn’t be a problem. It doesn’t matter if you read all the stuff that went before or all the stuff that is gonna come after, you just want to not be reading in the middle of a set. So with that said, I have been writing with “Bears in the Black Staff” last year and now “Measure in the Magic”.  In that two book set I’ve been writing in the pre-history of Shadow Realm which takes place long before Sword, which was the seminal book because it was the first one published. Now with “Legacy”, I am writing in the future of that world, many hundreds of years in the future, and I am working on a three book set that basically plays off of the work that I did in about six books before that. Although they are not directly connected, they work off of that history and it’s going to run for a three book set.  I’m going to publish in 2012 and 2013.

MG: What would you say would be the most difficult part of writing “Measure of Magic”? Anything that stands out?
TB: You know, I will tell you…I have been around long enough that I mercifully forget most of what is difficult from one book and the next. All I can tell you is that there is two things that happen with every book. There is a period in there where you come up against something you weren’t expecting and you have to thrash your way through it. It doesn’t matter how much you plan…doesn’t matter how much time you put into it ahead.   Somewhere along the line you will come up against a wall and you’re going to have to figure out what you are going to do about it and how you are going to get through it. The other thing that happens at some point, maybe half way to three quarters through the book, I become convinced that I have written the biggest piece of crap in all humanity. I’m just sure of it! I look at it and I think “This is not only no good, it is beyond being bad. No one is going to buy this, this is the end of my career right now!” So I go out and I settle down after a couple days and things get back to normal. But it never fails, at some point I’ve just decided “I took a wrong turn, this is not working out, I don’t like it” You know, one of those. You know I am trying to think about what it is about “Measure” that was difficult in particular…and I can’t. The problem is that I am publishing the book today that I wrote two years ago, and I’ve already written two new books since then so I am thinking about the books where I am today, so answering questions about the specifics of this book requires a lot of brain activity and I don’t have much to offer [laughs].

MG: That is funny, because us talking about the books is like the time line in the books, how they span across different time lines.
TB: I am always amazed when I get these kids, 13 or 14 year old kids, sometimes younger, and they say “You know, I’ve read all your books!” Well you know, everybody says that, so I said “Oh, ok.” And they insist they have. So then I ask them a couple questions, and they have everything memorized. They will proceed to tell me this thing in book four on page 300 I wrote this thing. I’ve learned not to argue with it because they are always right and I am never right [laughs].  I’ve decided that is the future and to just let it go.

MG: One of my favorites is “Magic Kingdom for Sale: Sold!”. Do you ever see that being made into a feature film at all?
TB: God did someone pay you to ask me that question? I mean jeeze, this is great! I’ve had that particular series of books under option on and off over the past 20 years and it has just gone under option again. I can’t talk about the specifics of it because it is right at the crucial final few points of negotiation and contracts, so I have to wait for that first. But what I can tell you is that it will be options by a major motion picture studio and production company and that they are saying they want to do a series of movies based on that whole series. I’ve talked to people from both the production company and movie studio and they seem to be real fans of the books.  So I am trying to get used to the idea that everyone in Hollywood grew up reading my books, which is hard for me to accept because I don’t like the idea that everyone is so much younger than I am but they seem to be committed to it.  So we’ll see and  that would be great. I have always figured that “Magic Kingdom” would be made into a movie because it’s the easiest book I’ve written to get made into a movie. I think with all the stuff with “Harry Potter” and “Lord of the Rings” using CGI that it is much easier these days to figure out how to do special effects than it was, say 10 or 15 years ago.

MG: Do you think once they make “Magic Kingdom” into a movie that you will write a sequel to “Princess”?
TB: Oh yeah. I will probably write the sequel anyway at some point but I would like to hold off until they actually get the point where they are doing the movie to help push the book. I also have so many projects on the board that “Magic Kingdom” at the moment isn’t the most pressing one.

MG: Who, or what, inspired the design for the main characters in “Magic Kingdom for Sale: Sold!”? Is there anything specific?
TB: I don’t normally base characters on real people, they are usually combinations of different people I know or different characteristics, that sort of thing. “Magic Kingdom” is different though because it is very autobiographical in a way. That whole series is about my transition from being a lawyer to being a writer. If you can read between the lines you will see what some of that is about. I based the main character, Ben Holiday, on myself. He is very much like myself, except the part about boxing because I don’t box. Abernathy, the dog who is a character that was a man that was turned into a dog by the wizard by a mistake, that dog was my dog. That dog used to come in there every day while I was working and it would lay there on the floor and nap while I was working and I thought “You know, this dog is worthless, there must be some way to get something out of this dog.” So finally I decided I would have a character based on this dog, that was also a soft coated wheaten terrier. I figured that way maybe I could make some money off of him anyway.

MG: So who do you think you identify with, out of all of your characters, the most?
TB: Well you can certainly say I am closer to Ben Holiday than any other characters, but I think when you are a writer, there is some part of yourself in all of your characters. You have to understand how they think and how they work. Even the really bad ones. You have to have some sense of what they are all about, so there is some piece of you in all the characters to a certain extent. I guess Holiday is the one who’s pretty much closest to who I am.

MG: Other then “Magic Kingdom”, do you have any plans to get any of your other books made into films?
TB: “Shannara” has been under option too, on and off over the past 20 years, and it was an option up until about a year ago. It is back out there. There is still interest, there are people that still talk about it. The big thing is that because I’ve been around so long and because I’m getting old and mean [laughs], I’m not going to give anybody anything unless I am happy with what I am hearing. If the studios come around and show interest I will ask them to tell me something different…tell me something good about what they will do. If I like what I hear I will be more interested in thinking about making a movie. A long time ago I said “What’s going to happen to me is exactly what happened to Tolkien; It’s going to get jacked around and 30 years after I’m dead it’s going to get made.” Then my kids will benefit and I won’t be there but that’s the way it goes.

MG: So who or what are you currently reading now? Are there any favorite artists or inspiration?
TB: Oh yeah, I read all the time. That’s pretty much all I do. I’m kind of a boring person. My sister is a writer too, I am reading her latest book right now what she is presenting to a division of Random House. At the moment I’m reading Lev Grossman, “The Magicians” sequel. I’m going to read “The Last Werewolf.” My publisher keeps me well supplied in a lot of books that are new because everyone wants a quote. So I get to read a lot of science fiction-fantasy that comes from all over the place that is new. I like to read new writers and see what is new that is out there, and what is interesting. I read a lot of mysteries, contemporary fiction and a lot of history.

MG: Do you find that your writing process has changed?
TB: Oh yeah, it changes. I always thought it would not change when I started out, I don’t know why I thought that. I figured I would keep working the same way. But when you get older it changes. I used to work night and now I work from 6am in the morning until noon or  2pm in the afternoon. That time frame that I work is all together different. I used to work every day, I don’t do that anymore. What used to take twice as long I can do in half the time now, and that’s just because I’m more experienced. You write 35 books and you learn something. That’s one of the good things about it because I’ve become more comfortable with it. I don’t spend a lot of time agonizing over stuff like I did in the past because and I don’t have to since I know what the process is. The main thing that you have to do is stay hungry, and it’s hard after 35 books in 35 years. I have to spend time thinking about stories that interest me and plots and themes that will interest me for a whole year if I sit down to write them so I don’t get bored halfway through. That really is the thing I have to work the hardest at these days in order that the books stay fresh and interesting and they don’t put people to sleep.

MG: Are there any projects that you scrapped because you got bored with them?
TB: The trick is if I am starting to get bored…it’s time to make a change. That’s the main rule. If I get to the point where I am working on something and that’s the way I’m feeling about it then I have to get rid of it and start over and find out where there is a better place to be. But it happens to every writer in some point in every book. You write your way into a place where it’s not very interesting and you need to get yourself out of it.

MG: Do you have any advice for any aspiring writers on how to get published or write their own novel?
TB: You know I am so far removed from that. I probably don’t have a lot of good advice on how to get published. In the old days I had lots of advice on it because I was closer to the subject matter and I knew a lot of writers getting published. What I kind of know is because the publishing landscape has changed and everything is getting published through ebook and online publishing. There are a lot of new avenues for people to get published these days. You have to kind of think outside of the box. The traditional approach still works but it’s not the only approach anymore. There have been a lot of very successful authors that have simly offered their stuff free online. They develop a following and then took all of that to a publisher and said “Look, I have 100,000 people out here who will read my stuff, how about we do a book?” The publishers are looking for that sort of thing. I guess the biggest piece of advice for people who are trying to write a book is that if you don’t love the process more than you love the money, or the idea of the money, or the idea of being famous, or the idea of whatever, then you are in the wrong business. This is a job like any other and you should really love this job. You should be really fascinated by what’s involved in doing it if you want to be successful for more than one book or in the long run. It’s the thing that’s kept me going more than anything else. It’s fun to sit there and look at the books on the shelf once in a while but mostly I don’t care. I’m mostly interested in what am I going to write next, or how am I going to make this next book work, or how am I going to make this next book better then anything I have ever done before. That is kind of what I think you need to feel that you’re going to do every time out.

MG: Do you have anything you might want to announce exclusively to us?
TB: Well I will tell you what, the first news I get about the movie, I will make an arrangement and we will have another interview and we will talk about it in more depth.

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Ridley Pearson is the author behind Disney’s “Kingdom Keepers” series. He has also co-written the “Peter and the Starcatchers” series with Dave Barry, the latest being “Bridge to Neverland”. Ridley is currently hard at working writing his fifth novel in the “Kingdom Keepers” series. Media Mikes had a chance to chat with Ridley about his books as well and what is planned upcoming.

Mike Gencarelli: Can you give us some background on how your started the “Kingdom Hearts” series?
Ridley Pearson: The first book came out of a visit I took with my family to the parks. On the way out I looked back and saw all these people leaving after the fireworks but none of the characters were leaving. It occurred to me that what do those characters do during the 12/13 hrs that the park is closed? I had kind of a “Toy Story” moment…where the door to Andy’s room closes and the toys come to life. I thought that since the characters didn’t come out with us that they could be in this protracted twenty year battle for whether the villains or the good characters controlled the park. I talked with Disney about the idea and they had some legal concerns about not wanting anyone or thing to be harmed in the park. I totally understood that and through a series of coincidences I ended up one day seeing this holographic disk that worked when light was shined on it. I thought then that the kids in the story could be these holograms and that anything that happened to them would hurt. The attorneys at Disney thought it was a great idea and we went with it. I generally do a lot of research for my novels and after about a month of trying I was granted full access to the Disney Park. It was and continues to be a really fun experience. Some of the things in the book were real experiences I had while touring the park when it was closed.

MG: Do you have a favorite book from the series to date?
RP: It would have to be book five, which I am working on right now. (Laughs) Recently I have been on four Disney cruises and on two of those they let me down into the engine room, crew quarters and several other off limit places so that’s what I am trying to bring to life in the new books.

MG: When can we expect the new book?
RP: The first of the cruise books will come out April 2012. We are currently discussing moving the publishing date of the second cruise book up to Oct. 2012 or April 2013.

MG: Have you been approached about a movie version of the books?
RP: Disney and I have been in discussion on that for seven years. Things have been hot and cold depending on who has the throttle at that time so right now he are hearing that there are discussion of a movie being made where the rides come to life with kids in the park. That’s good news but the bad news is its probably not going to be based on the books. Disney makes great movies but it’s sad that it’s not going to be based off the book. Maybe things will change so you never know.

MG: Can you tell us about your latest novel with Dave Barry titled “Bridge to Neverland”?
RP: There is some great news with about this series, as the first book “Peter and the Starcatchers” was turned into a stage play this winter off Broadway.  It was so successful that it is being considered for a Broadway run as well as the possibility of a film version of the book as well, which would be way cool. The fifth book “Bridge to Never land” isn’t really a Starcatcher’s book as it’s a new set of characters and it takes place in present day time. What Dave and I did was we based the book off the idea of what if some kids discovered something that led them back to our “Peter and the Starcatchers” book series and they find that it’s all real. It’s a heck of a story and I think readers will find it fun. In a away it’s an extension of “Peter and the Starcatchers” however rightfully so Disney Books are looking at it as a standalone novel. I think anyone who enjoyed the “Starcatcher” series will get a big jot out of this book.

MG: What has been your involvement with the play?
RP: Lucky for the play we had no creative involvement in it what so ever! (Laughs) I’m a big theater buff and I asked for access to their process which they gave Dave and me. We got to sit in on the meetings with Rick Elice, who co-wrote “Jersey Boys”, as well as with the producers for Disney Theatrical Productions. They have done an amazing job. So often in the adaptation world the original creator is often disappointed with how their work is adapted. That is usually because a 500 page book being shrunk down to 40 pages is going to have things left out. In this case Rick Elice is way smarter and way funnier than Dave or I. In this case we are both standing back wishing we could put our names on that. We are very very lucky.

MG: How do you split your writing between adult writing and young adult writing?
RP: Creatively there is very little difference. I think that if you try to write down to kids they will sniff you out and throw you across the room every time. Dave and I…and when I write alone, we try to write engaging books with real life characters. In my crime novels I write more in an R-rated manner than when I am writing for young adults. You have to write a book where people care about the characters and in my opinion a plot that pulls you along. There really is no difference other than the content differences.

MG: What can you tell us about the “Rock Bottom Remainders”?
RP: That’s where Dave and I met now 20 years ago. It’s a goof ball band of authors that get together and raise money for charity. We are really bad on stage but Bruce Springsteen played with us one time and he told us not to get any better because if we did we would just be another lousy garage band. We are below a lousy garage band that’s how bad we are. It’s a lot of fun and we have met so many great people. The band is made up of me, Stephen King, Dave Barry, Mitch Albom, Roy Blount Jr., Greg Iles, Kathi Kamen-Goldmark, Matt Groening, James McBride, Amy Tan and Scott Turow. We do the band for good causes and we have a great time doing it.

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Jennifer Grant is the daughter of late Hollywood legend Cary Grant. She recently released her memoir called “Good Stuff: a Reminiscence of My Father, Cary Grant”. Media Mikes had a chance to chat with Jennifer about her father and her new memoir.

Mike Gencarelli: What made you decide to write your memoir?
Jennifer Grant: My whole life people have asked me to do something on my dad, since my father passed away actually. About five years ago people very close to me started recommending I do something and that is what got my attention. We were always a private family especially my father, so I never really considered the idea of doing anything. I brought the idea to my step-mother and she said it was a wonderful idea and that I must do it. I thought wow this is something that my dad may have actually welcomed and maybe it was just me that’s been sort of greedy with my memories. So I decided I should open up and speak.

MG: How long did the process take from the initial idea to completion?
JG: Once I had the idea I had to sit down alone and write in a notebook to see what I was doing. That took awhile and then it came to writing a book proposal and meeting with publishers. Once that I happened then I was into writing the book so from conception to having the book on the stands was about a five year process. There was probably two and a half years of writing and nine months of legalese and then another nine months waiting till press.  My father left me a tremendous amount of archives about our personal history together including audio tapes that he made. He retired when I was born and I think that all of his time on movie sets was ingrained in him that he was used to recording life. He took slides, photos, super 8 videos and audio tapes. He kept every letter and card from me, so I had boxes and boxes of material to go through while I was writing. It was a wonderful, cumbersome and cathartic process all at once.

MG: The title of the book is “Good Stuff” can you tell us how you came up with that and the back ground behind it?
JG: It’s something my dad used to say when he was happy. It could have been the simplest day where we were sitting outside on the patio eating coffee cake and listening to classical music and my dad would look around and say “Good Stuff isn’t it.” It was his way of expressing happiness.

MG: What would you say was your most challenging part in the writing process?
JG: I think it was allowing me to commit to making things public. It is one thing to write stuff for yourself or to share with friends, which I hadn’t really done. I sort of closed this stuff off to myself because I had some repressed grief about it. Going through the archives was incredibly cathartic but then to really realize that I was going to share this with the world. My manager used to joke with me because when we had our initial meeting with my wonderful book agent Dan Strone I think I had twenty pages of writing to show him. I had it in manila envelope which was quite literally clutched to my chest. I think throughout our meeting I let go of the pages and that was very much what the process was like holding those things very dear to my heart and finally letting them go.

MG: Growing up for you was it spending time with Cary Grant or was it spending time with dad?
JG: It was very much spending time with dad. He retired when I was born, so I never saw dad on a movie set. Dad and I went to baseball games and he would wake me up in the morning and we would have breakfast together. We spent our time together. He would drive me to school and pick me up. He was really ready to be a dad because he had already reached iconic status with his acting career. I was very lucky.

MG: In today’s Hollywood who do you feel resembles his tremendous presence?
JG: I don’t think there is one person who embodies dad’s qualities. There are two people who come to mind that have aspects of dad. One is George Clooney as he has some of that charisma and he is a bit mysterious as dad was but his comedy is entirely different. George Clooney is very left of center with his comedy and dad was very mainstream in his comedy. Then there is also Hugh Jackman, but not the Wolverine side, that also reminds me of dad. There is something about the way he carries himself. He has this elegant side that is like dads.

MG: How do you feel when you watch your father’s films? And do you watch them often?
JG: Since writing the book it’s been easier for me to watch his films. I think I missed him more and now that I have been through this whole process.  It’s not that I didn’t miss him…I just really indulged myself and gotten in there. Now the memories are a lot cooler, so to speak, so to watch his films are more of a pure viewing experience. I just enjoy them and I am awed by his talent as he was so unique. He worked with so many amazing people. The stars and directors he worked with were just phenomenal. I am just in awe of his talent and very proud of him.

MG: Do you have plans to do anymore writing in the future?
JG: Absolutely!

Steve Alten is the author responsible for the amazing novel “Meg”. In case you are not familiar with the series, “Meg” is not about a girl is it about a Megalodon, a prehistoric giant shark that is believed to be extinct. The novel was released in 1997 and since then has spawned three sequels,”The Trench”, “Meg: Primal Waters” and “Meg: Hell’s Aquarium” and a fourth on its way. Steve has been trying to get a movie version of “Meg” made since before the book was published and may finally be seeing a light at the end of the tunnel. MovieMikes had a chance to chat with Steve about his novel series “Meg”, its possible movie adaption and his other series as well.

Mike Gencarelli: You have been trying to get “Meg” made into a feature since 1996, what has been the hardest challenge?
Steve Alten: The biggest challenge with Hollywood Pictures and New Line Cinema was getting a good script. At the time I was a new writer and I could have written the best script in the world but they weren’t going to look at because they wanted to hire an A-list writer. After the deal with New Line Cinemas didn’t work out in 2007, we re-obtained the rights to the film. I decided to use our own producer Belle Avery who was very good at putting together independent financing. Belle was able to secure around $150 million based on my new script. We took my script and a script from another writer and after taking our names off both we sent them to about 25 people in the industry and all 25 picked my script. We were pretty convinced from there that we were on the right track.

MG: According to your June 2011 newsletter, you believe we might be seeing “Meg” in summer 2013?
SA: The paperwork on the financing is being completed right now and should be done by next month. Hopefully sometime in July we will have a formal announcement. We will probably start pre-production in January followed by some major announcements of a director and cast. We are targeting summer of 2013

MG: The “Meg” series is my favorite, you are currently working on “Meg: Night Stalkers” and a “Meg” prequel, what can you tell us?
SA: The prequel is done and it’s really a bonus for those who have been following the series. The story goes back Jonas’s original story about how he came across the Megalodon seven years prior to “Meg”. The back story delves slightly into “Meg” and it’s about an 80-90 page book. It’s going to sell as an eBook for around $1.99. It’s really just something for the readers to get them into the series. As far as “Meg: Night Stalkers” I haven’t started that yet. I won’t do that until we have an official greenlight on the “Meg” movie. I don’t want to jinx it. Once I get the green light I will know how much time I have, as I would like to release the book a couple weeks before the film.

MG: The Domain Trilogy is also continuing with “Phobos” this fall, tell us about that novel?
SA: “Phobos” is great because Domain is a series that I never really understood the full impact of until I started writing “Resurrection” which led into “Phobos”. “Phobos” was an opportunity to take the story where it left off in 2046 and send it back to the pre 2012 days. I was really able to explore the characters of Julius and Michael Gabriel which also allowed me to give them an alternative ending. At the same time “Phobos” deals with a situation that is actually happening and could be a threat to both humanity and to the planet it’s self.

MG: What is your process when you are preparing to start a novel?
SA: I am sort of doing now as we speak. Since finishing the “Meg” prequel, I am free to move onto my next novel which I have been planning for a few years titled “The Omega Project”. I don’t really understand the book yet so I have starting reading a lot of material that has to deal with the story which then allows me to figure out the story from the research that I am doing. I have a stack of book on my desk to help me get into my lead characters and the overall story.

MG: Unlike most authors, you are very connected with your fans and welcome ideas and suggestions, do you enjoy their feedback?
SA: Absolutely! I have received newsletters from other authors and they always seem to be just an advertisement for their upcoming book. I think there has to be a portion of promotion, but I find it’s more interesting for me if I put living tips and jokes in my newsletter which are things people can use along with information about my upcoming books. It’s kind of egotistical if I just put out a newsletter about me. I don’t think people really would want a newsletter just about me. I don’t even want to right something like that as I would run out of things to say pretty quickly.

MG: What would you say has been your most rewarding series so far and why?
SA: I would probably say it was “Grim Reaper: End of Days” which took me two years to write and was an absolutely exhausting process. When I read the book the payoff is definitely there with all the layers. I don’t think it’s my most widely appreciated book yet but I think it will be over the years though. I really enjoyed writing “Phobos” as well it was very satisfying and a great wrap up of the first three novels while opening the door for a fourth.

MG: Do you have any plans to turn any of your other novels into films (hint, hint: “The Loch”)?
SA: I think every book I write is written for the cinema. The ideas are all pretty big tent poll ideas. We have optioned “Domain” and hope it makes it to the movies because there are some really great people behind it. “The Loch” has also been optioned by the same people who are involved with “Meg”. I think they all really have potential to films and hopefully this first one will be the domino that needs to fall and get everything rolling.

MG: Tell us about your Adopt-An-Author program, which is just fascinating.
SA: Adopt-An-Author started almost on its own after “Meg” came out. I started to get an influx of emails from teenagers who hated to read but read “Meg” and loved it. I also started getting emails from teachers who were telling me that they were using the book in their teaching curriculum’s. I had then found out that “Meg” had been named #1 book for young adults who were reluctant to read. I realized then that I needed to get involved and with my back ground in education I was sort of putting my degrees to work. We provide free materials to teachers that want to adapt this into their curriculum’s. Youth who are involved in the program can email me and I reply just as I would with any other reader but at the end of the unit the teachers can contact me and I will do a conference call with the class or if it is local I will go to those classes and speak. We started the program in 1999 with about 10 teachers and this past year we surpassed 10,000 registered teachers. The best part is it’s all free!

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June 2005. On the island of Martha’s Vineyard I meet Jim Beller at JAWSFest. As a fellow “Jaws” fan I have been well aware of the man they call Jimmy Jaws for the better part of a decade. But we hadn’t met face to face until that summer. During our conversation Jim tells me an idea he has. A coffee table book consisting of behind the scene photos telling the story of the making of our favorite film. “Good idea,” I say.

June 2007. Back on the Vineyard and moments after I propose to my future wife in a room filled with “Jaws” fans, I am introduced to Matt Taylor, who Jim has told me will be writing the coffee table book.

April 2011. I am as giddy as a school boy as I am given the first look at the new book, “Jaws: Memories From Martha’s Vineyard.” Did I mention that I thought it was a good idea?

Over this past 4th of July weekend I had the unique opportunity to shadow book author Matt Taylor and conceptualist Jim Beller on Martha’s Vineyard as they met with film fans and discussed their new project. During some rare down time in their whirlwind schedule, as fans gathered for a screening of the film, they took a few moments to sit down with MovieMikes and talk about the book.

Mike Smith: Why “Jaws?”
Jim Beller: Why not “Jaws?” (laughs)

MS: What is it about that film that, 36 years later, you and I and all of the people standing in line behind us still love it?
JB: I think it’s because it’s a movie that still holds up today and will still hold up 20 or 30 years from now. People will always have that fear of not knowing what’s under them when they’re swimming in the ocean. It’s a movie that has everything: great directing, great acting…editing, score, art direction, great writing…it’s a film that has everything. It’s a comedy, it’s a drama, it’s a horror movie, it’s a thriller. It’s a movie that will go on and on. Like (“Jaws” production designer) Joe Alves says, it’s like “The Wizard of Oz.” Years from now other generations are going to watch it and love it.

MS: Matt, you spent three years traveling across Martha’s Vineyard and discovering stories that even serious “Jaws” fans had not heard. Was it an easy task tracking down people?
Matt Taylor: It was an easy task tracking down the people I knew. Islanders are very set in their ways. They may not do things the same way that off-Islanders would. Often times it was very difficult to lock them down for a time to talk or to show up. They might say “yes” to something then keep you waiting for five months. It was either very easy or extremely difficult.

MS: Did the fact that you yourself are an Islander…you’re family has lived here for 15 generations…did that give you an advantage that another author might not have had?
MT: I think so. I didn’t think Hershel West was even going to answer the door. So I dropped my grandfather’s name and after about 20 seconds I heard him undoing the latch. (NOTE: Mr. West played Quint’s first mate early in the film) It helped that I could drop the name of a family member that they were familiar with. Lynn and Susan Murphy have been friends with various family members from way, way back. Susan told me that as soon as Lynn realized who my relatives were he really opened up. So yes, it definitely worked to my advantage.

MS: Is the book your first writing project?
MT: Actually I’ve written a lot. I’ve had three screenplays read by major studios, though nothing yet has seen the light of day. But the book is the first thing that’s been published.

MS: Jim, what is your rarest “Jaws” item?
JB: I have a “Bruce” tooth. It’s not really rare but it’s up there as far as collectibles go. I really have two very rare items. The first is a standee that stood in theatre lobbies in 1975. For years I had no idea it even existed…I had never seen one. But then I saw a photo of another fans collection and I was like, “what is THAT…where did you get THAT?” (I should note here Jim was talking about MY collection and finally did track down the standee in question). The other item is a hard back copy of the novel, “Jaws,” which spent the summer of 1974 on board the U.S.S. Loreno, which was the name of one of the sea sleds that carried the sharks used by the crew during filming. The crew member that had it would have everyone that came aboard sign it. There are probably close to 75 autographs in it, including Bob Mattey, who created “Bruce.”

MS: Matt, what are you working on now?
MT: I have a film that I have to go back and finish. I shot it in 2007 and was assembling a rough cut when I decided to drop everything and concentrate on the book full tilt. I put it on the back burner but now I’m going to go back and finish it up. It’s a documentary on the history of agriculture on Martha’s Vineyard.

MS: I know that the book was a roller coaster ride for you both, with lots of ups and downs. Now that you’ve climbed that last hill it should be all fun on the way down. What do you hope for next?
MT: Money.
JB: [Laughs]
JB: For me it’s knowing that I can finally talk with fellow fans about stuff I’ve known for years but couldn’t talk about because of the book. It’s great to finally have this book out…with over 1,000 never-before-seen photos and probably as many unheard stories…that “Jaws” fans will be completely blown away by. It will be great to talk with fellow “Jaws” fans about their favorite new stories. [Laughs] And money.

MS: Any chance you two will collaborate on another project?
JB: We’ve talked about a couple things. There are still many photos…and stories…that the fans haven’t seen or heard.
MT: I had to cut about 50 pages out of the book. Two months before we turned it over to the publisher it was 50 pages longer. I had to trim a lot of it and find a way to rearrange the photos after all of the cuts had been made. There are still completely edited stories and photos that were once part of the book that we didn’t use because we had to get it down to 300 pages. And they were great stories!

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Lisa Ann Walter just released her first book titled “The Best Thing About My Ass is That It’s Behind Me”. Lisa has also appeared in films such as “”Bruce Almighty”, “The Parent Trap” and “War of the Worlds” to name just a few. Movie Mikes had a chance to speak with Lisa about her book and what it was like working with Richard Gere and Tom Cruise.

Adam Lawton: Can you tell us about your book that came out recently?
Lisa Ann Walter: The book is called “The Best Thing About My Ass is That It’s Behind Me” and it’s been described to me as kind of the best girls night out with the widest conversation you could ever have. It’s not any kind of self help book or anything its’ much more of a self maintenance type book. (Laughs) The attitude I had behind the book was that I had not only experienced but also witnessed among every American woman that it seemed like their birth right was a life time of self loathing. It seems as though woman have to be sexy until they are dead! Now you not only have to be a member of the PTA but you also have to be a pole dancer! (Laughs)

AL: What made you decide to write the book?
LAW: I live in a town I like to call “the land where prom queens go to die”. Beauty is very skewed where I live as it seems once a girl has a crown popped on her head she moves out here to become an actress. Maybe 3 out 5 make it and the rest end up in Hugh Heffner’s grotto swimming with the diseases or they are working at Denny’s. There are really just a bunch of gorgeous people out here and that is what is presented to women in America as to what they are supposed to look like. I wanted to show how hard it is to keep up with this type of thinking while still being ok with yourself.

AL: What was it like working on “War of the Worlds”?
LAW: That was probably production wise the biggest movie I have ever done. It was extremely exciting! The first day on set I got to meet Steven Spielberg and he was giving me direction for my scene and referencing Tom Cruise. I turn around and there was Tom with that “Risky Business” smile. Well after Steven was finished I told him he would have to tell me again what he wanted because I was just so taken back that I was on a set with him and Tom Cruise. (Laughs) Steven laughed and told me everything again. Tom Cruise was delightful! He was my own personal hero because Spielberg had asked me to bring one of my kids with me to be in the scene. During the scene there were so many people running and moving that my daughter got hit and had a bloody nose. Tom Cruise comes across the set after scaling this wall to check on my daughter. He was there in like 30 seconds. I don’t know how he got there so fast? He asked her what happened and then started taping it saying it was going to be for the lawsuit. (Laughs)  He also let me video tape him for my daughter’s birthday and after we were finished he reached into my purse for the camera to reshoot himself because he thought it wasn’t good enough. Tom is really a great guy. I have been lucky and had some really great experiences with everyone I have been able to work with.

AL: You also worked with Richard Gere correct?
LAW: Richard was very helpful and kind to me. I worked with him for over 3 months and within like 30 seconds of meeting him we were touching naughty bits to naughty bits. (Laughs) I was blushing from head to toe and Richard was telling me to be relaxed as I had the gig, but I knew it wasn’t true because the job really hinged on whether or not he liked me. I couldn’t believe I was meeting an Officer and a Gigolo with the ass that ate Tokyo! They made me get fat for “Shall We Dance” and I had a scene where I would lose the bottom half of my skirt and I was mortified. I actually ran off set the first time we did that scene and it just so happened that Ben Affleck was there visiting Jennifer Lopez which made matters worse as I have a lifetime of ass issues! I must have been green when I got back as Richard asked me what was wrong. Now at the time I was having trouble with my husband which didn’t help matters. So I told Richard that not only do I have to show my ass to the same guy I had a poster of on my wall when I was in high school, but also Ben Affleck and the crew for Extra was there to interview Richard. I was thinking why don’t we get every hot leading actor guy in Hollywood to come and look at my gelatinous ass! Richard was great and told me he would take care of it. Within one minute everyone was gone. Richard is just really a great guy.

AL: You have done a lot of different role in the movie making business is there one that sticks out as a favorite?
LAW: I really enjoy directing. I think I have always been a director even though I used to get in trouble for it. From getting sent out of class when I was in school to when I had a sitcom, I just wanted to be part of the process. When you are directing you get to piece the movie together into the film you want to make. I also really love to do stand-up comedy and most recently I started doing a radio show two times a week which I am really enjoying. I just really like to work and to stay busy.

AL: Do you have any other projects in the works you can tell us about?
LAW: I can’t tell you too many specifics but there are 3 projects that I am working on as an executive producer that are reality driven. I also have another project we are setting up for that is very chick centric. I am really excited for this project!