I taught at San Lorenzo Middle School in King City, California for thirty-six years before retiring in June of 2006. Phyllis, my wife of 36 years, and I still reside in King City. We have two sons – Jeremy, thirty-one and Jon, twenty-five.
I am a life-long rock-climber and mountaineer. I’ve made numerous ascents in the Sierra Nevada and Yosemite. Three of my short stories about climbing were published in the Sierra Club’s Ascent. Others appeared in “High” magazine, “Loose Scree” and in “The Climbing Art”. I converted a story named “Three’s a Crowd” into a radio play and it was broadcast on KUSF on November 22nd, 2006. It was later broadcast several more times on PBS.
Three of my books for children have been published. “Joel in Tananar” and “Flower Tumbles” were produced by local publishers Lachlan MacDonald and Karen Reinecke. I participated in the Long Beach School Distirct’s Authors Festival for fifteen years. I took part in many other children’s literature festivals including, Huntington Beach and Elk Grove. I have visited dozens of schools and hundreds of classrooms across California in the capacity of visiting author.
My writing has won numerous awards. They include the Deep South Writers’ Conference 1995 Contest, first place in Fantasy/SF; the Shenandoah Valley Writers’ Guild 1995 Contest, first place in children’s literature division; the Los Angeles Quarterly 1998 Screenplay Competition, first place. A story of mine also placed first in the Monterey Herald’s short fiction contest and another won the 1981 John Steinbeck short fiction award.
Most recently, my short story “Feelin’ Cheap This Morning” won the Central Coast Writers’ Club 2007 spring contest.
Robert’s contributions:
