Frequently Asked Questions

The family story was that my grandfather on my mother's side, Abraham Z. Gordon of Holyoke, Massachusetts, fled Russia as a young man and came to America to avoid induction into the Tsar's army. I wondered what that difficult choice must have been like for him and decided to begin a bit of research. To my surprise, a lot of fine academic work exists on topics ranging from the history of Russia's military to Jews in the Russian Army. While The Tinker's Son has no grounding in my grandfather's experience, I hope it captures some of the cultural and political context of his motivations.

I have a Bachelor's degree in Government from Harvard. My professional career consisted of writing and editing for several newspapers, including the Minneapolis Tribune, The New York Times, the Philadelphia Inquirer, and the International Herald Tribune, based in Paris. I also was a senior editor at Bloomberg Markets magazine and wrote and edited for a nonprofit investment management firm. 

During my years in Paris and Washington writing and editing about politics and economics for the International Herald Tribune, I began outlining a concept for a novel. Years later, after I retired, I discovered my notes in a dusty file. I needed to update the story to take into account massive changes in technology. Transitioning from journalism to fiction is not a simple task, and my initial work, Agent of Intrusion, has many flaws. But I loved researching and writing it.