Location: United States
Member Since: July 05, 2011
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Randy Attwood


Biography

I grew up on the grounds of Larned State Hospital, where my father was its dentist. That was interesting. I went to The University of Kansas during the tumultuous 1960s. That was interesting, too. For the first half of my adult career I worked in newspaper journalism. You couldn't call that boring. I won my share of honors, twice winning the award for investigative reporting from the William Allen White School of Journalism at KU. For the second half of my career I was Director of University Relations at The University of Kansas Medical Center. There were some boring times, but the exciting episodes made up for it. I retired at the end of 2010 from The Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, Kansas City, where I was its media relations officer. You see, my degree from KU was not in journalism, but in art history. Unfortunately, my father died when I was 21 so I couldn't make him eat his words about that art history degree not being worth anything. I've had stints living in Italy and in Japan.

During all this time I've been putting words on paper, creating fiction. My works don't fit into neat genres, unless that rather new genre "quirky" applies. And each work is quirky in its own way. What that means for me is that in each work is evidence of a deep search within myself. Sometimes it's scary what you find in there.

I'm semi-retired now in Kansas City, keeping busy with a lot of things, among them promoting my fiction and creating new works. That search within yourself never ends.

Where to find Randy Attwood online

Twitter: attwoodrandy
Facebook: Facebook profile
Blog: http://www.randyattwood.blogspot.com

Books

By Pain Possessed    by Randy Attwood
Price: $1.99 USD. 4010 words. Published on July 18, 2012. Fiction.
Can the weakest human save us all?
A Match Made in Heaven    by Randy Attwood
Price: $2.99 USD. 11200 words. Published on June 9, 2012. Fiction.
The Mormons have left the Earth to populate the planet Moroni, finding their destiny among the stars and themselves. Mormonism explored, in a sci-fi sorta way.
Downswing    by Randy Attwood
Price: $0.99 USD. 2340 words. Published on April 15, 2012. Fiction.
A short story about fusion: the mechanics of golf and the feelings of the soul. A lone golfer finds a new freedom during his best round ever.
One More Victim    by Randy Attwood
Price: $2.99 USD. 23080 words. Published on December 7, 2011. Fiction.
The most important summer of my life began with a house-shaking thunder-boomer that woke me up on a Thursday night in 1958 near the end of my fifth-grade school year. I walked out of my bedroom to the living room and saw Dad, in his brown pajamas, standing at the window looking out and up at the fury in the sky. On a nearby table, the transistor radio was playing softly so he could hear the news
The Saltness of Time    by Randy Attwood
Price: $2.99 USD. 10680 words. Published on November 29, 2011. Fiction.
0.25 star(4.25 from 4 reviews)
A Kansas snowstorm forces a car of college students returning home for the holidays to take refuge in the hotel of a small town where they encounter a fellow traveler, who also seeks shelter, and has a story to tell about the consequences of another snow storm decades before when a hideous truth is revealed about an old woman.
Then and Now: The Harmony of the Instantaneous All    by Randy Attwood
Price: $2.99 USD. 49340 words. Published on September 29, 2011. Fiction.
0.5 star(4.50 from 2 reviews)
Stan Nelson, in his forties, is mired in nostalgia for the 1960s and the woman he lost then. He figures his only way out is to write about why he is so frozen. He creates in words the times and characters of then. He locates those characters in the now so they can comment on the veracity of his words about then. Except for the Chinese woman who first introduced him to the Tao.
The 41st Sermon    by Randy Attwood
Price: $4.99 USD. 61780 words. Published on September 25, 2011. Fiction.
(5.00 from 1 review)
When a 45-year old Episcopal minister suffering from mid-life and mid-faith crisis gets involved in a phony kidnap plot with his sexy blond parishioner, the result is a supercharged novel of sex, payback for decades-old double-dealing, and despair, which only God can cure. Satan's complications are never easy; God's grace is never free.
Spill    by Randy Attwood
Price: $4.99 USD. 64050 words. Published on September 12, 2011. Fiction.
(5.00 from 2 reviews)
SPILL, in which a fired English teachers scams the political system, gets the girl, the money and a killer skaterboarder video game. Big Oil + Sex = Game On
Blue Kansas Sky    by Randy Attwood
Price: $2.99 USD. 4370 words. Published on September 2, 2011. Fiction.
(5.00 from 1 review)
A tale of snooker on the Kansas Prairie
3 Very Quirky Tales    by Randy Attwood
Price: $2.99 USD. 16780 words. Published on August 11, 2011. Fiction.
(5.00 from 1 review)
3 Very Quirky Tales Tell Us Everything It Was Me (I) The Notebook
Crazy About You    by Randy Attwood
Price: $4.99 USD. 59280 words. Published on July 18, 2011. Fiction.
(5.00 from 6 reviews)
Service brats grow up on military bases. Asylum brats grow up on the grounds of mental hospitals where their parents work. Both juveniles and adults will be riveted by the story of high school asylum brat Brad's week in 1964 that tests his sanity and grows him up faster than he ever wished.
Rabbletown: Life in These United Christian States of Holy America    by Randy Attwood
Price: $4.99 USD. 39950 words. Published on July 17, 2011. Fiction.
0.75 star(4.75 from 4 reviews)
America has a pastor president, the states have pastor governors and they rule with a Bible in each fist.
The Strange Case of James Kirkland Pilley    by Randy Attwood
Price: $2.99 USD. 9720 words. Published on July 6, 2011. Fiction.
0.25 star(4.33 from 3 reviews)
A Lovecraftian style tale of the horrors that surround the simple draining of a park pond and the modern day research that leads back to the Civil War and the discovery of an undead zone.

Randy Attwood’s tag cloud

1960s    1984    alien invasion    big oil    christian fiction    christianity    civil war    comedy    coming of age    confederate    crazy    divorce    dukes    episcopal    erotica    evangelical    freud    future history    genre defying    golf    golf course    heart breaking    hippies    holocaust    horror    humor    immortality    insane    intense pain    interstellar travel    jewish    jewish childhood    joseph conrad    juvenile    kansas    kansas author    larned    literary    lobbyist    love    lovecraft    lovecraft horror    lovecraftian    mainstream    mental    mental hospital    mormon    mormonism    peace movement    philip k dick    politics    pool    pool hall    prairie    quirky    religion    right wing    romance    schizophrenia    science fiction    skateboard    snooker    sports    suspense    suspense thriller    tao    teacher    teen    tornado    twilight zone    walker percy    weird    womens fiction    young adult   

Smashwords book reviews by Randy Attwood

  • Spring Water Haven on Aug. 02, 2011
    star star star star
    Shawver's Spring Water Haven is an intriguing read with wonderful scene setting in which a nostalgic return to the former Naval base that was their home 30 years ago when newlyweds turns not only into guilt-ridden jaunt down memory lane but an object lesson that paybacks are really hell.
  • Gonna Buy Me a Dog on Nov. 27, 2011
    star star star star star
    Gonna Buy Me a Dog, is a wonderful manual for new dog owners, and, I think, new dog owners who think they know it all because they had a dog when they were a kid. I had an aunt who raised miniature Schnauzers and my care and raising of a puppy was important to the raising of myself as a person. By golly, we even won a blue ribbon at a dog show. It's really good for children to learn how to care for an animal. And adults need to know, too. Gonna Buy Me a Dog is the manual you should have for the latest information on choosing a dog, understanding its diet, how to train, teach it to socialize, and the myriad of activities and duties needed when you take on the serious responsibility of owning a dog. Myself, I think I'm going to print out the chapter on "Excessive Barking" and stick it in my neighbor's mailbox! Please, don't be that kind of dog owner.