I want to thank all of you who have kept up with my novels over the years. Many of you have written me or have sent me books to autograph, and while I've always been faithfully prompt in signing and returning the copies you've sent, I haven't been as trustworthy in responding to correspondence.

But now with this web site I have the opportunity to communicate with you more efficiently. And I'm looking forward to taking advantage of the opportunity. Over the years I've often met readers with whom I would have liked to spend more time. Their observations and questions were provocative and insightful, and I've wanted to respond to them with more thoughtfulness than the time on the road would allow. Now this will be easier to do.

I've always said that a writer's greatest secret asset resides in the imagination of his readers. Invariably readers surprise and delight me. Again and again you demonstrate that you're reading creatively by reading between the lines. (A wise, elderly friend once told me: "If you don't read between the lines of a book, then the book has lost its purpose.")

So I hope that you and I will be able to use this web site to shorten the distance between us, and to lengthen the time that I have to answer some of your questions.

For those of you who aren't familiar with my novels, I hope you'll take the time to browse through this site and get to know my work. Nothing would delight me more than for you to encounter stories here that will engage your mind and ignite your imagination.

The way we write and read our stories is not unlike the way we live our lives. Much of its value lies in that narrow, but deep, domain between the lines.