I don’t place my books in Texas because it’s the only place these stories can take place. I place them in Texas because I live in Texas. I feel comfortable describing its gulf shores, its expanding cities, its vast planes, and its craggy rivers and hills. The ordinary people in my stories are Texans. However, if you expect to see many cowboys, oil barons, or cheerleaders, you won’t find many of them in my stories. There are a few. It wouldn’t be Texas without them. My experience with Texans is with the everyday Texans. These are the people who work, buy homes, raise families, and leave their own legacies in the Lone Star State.
That being said, I have to admit that several of my stories, born in Texas, are natives of Texas and wouldn’t exist if I was not in Texas. Like my stories, I am a native Texan, and like some of my stories, I moved around before settling in my current city.
The City of Galveston basks in history. Local historians expound on the native Americans who first fished along the shores of the island, the pirates who hid from royal bounty hunters, and the great race with Houston to build the nation’s largest port. The big storm of 1900 put an end to that competition, but it didn’t stop the city from growing. Its century old buildings weaving in and out of modern homes proved the perfect backdrop for Midnight Victories (formerly Shadows of Victory). Waves of tourist rolling on and off the island to experience the culture of the little city that could allowed me the perfect camouflage for characters plotting and counterplotting to remain hidden.
The capital city of Austin provides many of the same features as Galveston for weaving speculative characters in and out of the shadows. As an open campus of intellectual shenanigans and political players, Austin cannot help but become a story of itself.
Houston and Dallas also provide backdrops for good stories; however, these cities pride themselves on the shiny and new. An exciting prospect for beings older than the ages. They can’t wait to weave in and out of the traffic of these cities.
I will not forget my roots in deep East Texas. Perhaps it is because my roots grow deep there that I have not included stories in these areas. Everyone there is family, and I promised mother I would put not vampires in our family tree.