Written by Hand

Where my imagination comes to live.

I have created this site to offer my fiction writing to the world. Currently (2026), I am working on a series of short stories about The Breakaway House—a magical, tiny, two-storey house out at the end of a long, oyster-shell drive, on a spit of land on the edge of the salt marsh behind Sullivan’s Island, South Carolina. People who come to rent this place invariably have something they need to let go of, whether they know it or not—a relationship, a fear, an emotional burden, or the opinions of others.

Metaphorically, the Breakaway House is built to be intentionally temporary—easy to blow away or wash away when the storms are just too harsh.

I created the idea of this place years ago when a dear friend, Irene Lofton, and I were talking about hard times, and when sometimes it is best to just let things go. Irene had lived through Hurricane Hugo and was one of the lucky ones whose home did not completely blow away. But she knew many neighbors who lost everything. She went on to publish a book of poetry called The Broken Bridge, A Year After Hurricane Hugo.

Over 35 years later, I recently lost a lot of personal treasures in Tropical Storm Helene, here in Asheville, North Carolina. I did, however, rescue my copies of Irene’s books of poetry and a few stories and poems of my own. From seeds of ideas planted in 1992 with Irene, fertilized by the mud and destruction of Hugo and Helene, Irene and I are finally building our Breakaway House through these stories. I type while Irene muses in spirit. She really is an angel, you know.