Did you ever see a girl throw a baseball?

Writing styles are just as distinctive. They reflect the life of the writer; also their gender. That’s right. There are four distinctive styles I can determine by reading only three pages of a novel. Sometimes I can tell by just by looking at the cover. A great number of female writers disguise their gender by using only initials. JZ Knight is a good example. She is a very successful mystery writer from the Southwest and Seattle. But if a male reader didn’t know she was a girl, it would become obvious with a chapter or two. JA Konrath. Once you start one of his books, it’s obvious he’s a guy right away.


Guys seldom write about bedspreads, curtains, décor, and dust ruffles unless it’s germane to the story. Women writers normally do. (Shirley McClain in “Out on a Limb – gag me with a spoon!) Conversely, men will write a lot more details about tools, guns or car engines. For example; “…was driving a customized old pick-up with a 327 ci Chevy small block bored .40 over, balanced and blueprinted. Most women writers wouldn’t write that kind of description. They are hard pressed to check their oil!

Okay, that’s the first two styles…simple – guys and gals.

The other two take a while to spot. The done that myself, been there, and have the t-shirt. Then you have the research & fake-it with well turned phrases, style. The writers who research everything and seldom leave his/her word processor. I fall into the first category. I write from experience. Many best sellers are written by people who are excellent writers (can really turn a phrase) but know nothing firsthand about their subject matter. I read part of a best seller (#1 for 10 weeks on the NY Times list) a few years ago that was written by a professor from a university in New England. “……character X was suddenly afraid as the silence of the jungle night enveloped him like a cobweb.” ARE YOU KIDDING ME? Silence of a jungle night? Jungles aren’t quiet in the night! Screeching monkys, bats, owls, various chirping crickets that will drive you nuts, lizards, night birds, and much more. The closest this guy ever got to a jungle was a Tarzan movie! I pitched the book out the porthole of my boat. What a crock!

I was questioned by a reader one time about the scene in PARTNERS where the two cowboys take a bull that is caught in a tree trunk and sew his eyes closed. The reader thought that was farfetched. In reality, years earlier, my ranching neighbor and I were contracted by the Park Service to remove feral cattle from their mountain park near Tucson. We spent over a week in those badlands, trapping the cows and bulls by building a brush corral around a spring and placing a salt block nearby. We finally captured twenty head. We roped them – head and heels and sewed their eyelids closed. They could eat, drink and shit…the things cattle do. We eventually led them off the mountain only to be met by a firestorm of animal activists. To this day I take pot shots at those ignorant imbeciles.

That was the real life drama that produced the scene in PARTNERS

I fished commercially in Alaska – ALASKA BE DAMNED

I lived on Guam and went through typhoon Karen – THE LAST FRUIT STAND ON GUAM

I lived and worked in Mexico. – EXPAT

I’ve participated and have been associated with Rodeo for many years. -- CRYSTAL COWBOY

I’ve owned several ranches and made a decent living breaking and training horses. SCREENPLAY’S -- NO WAY!, UP NORTH, PARTNERS, and TRUST ME.

I lived in southern Arizona for some time so period western, BOOMER and the novel I currently writing, HALF-BREED are authentic as to locale.

I’ve lived in Panama for a long time. First in the Canal Zone with my folks and now as a retiree/writer. – SCREENPLAY’S, GAVIOTO’S GOLD & EMPTY KAYAK.

I guess the point of this exposition is to enlighten. My books and screenplays reflect my past. My style is to write tight and be a story teller. If it’s in the book it either happened to me, a close friend or I witnessesd it happening. Except for the romance – that’s all bullshit!

CRYSTAL COWBOY ONLY 99 CENTS

As many of you know, I have several books written and residing on Amazon.com and Barnes & Noble. They are for sale but not selling well. I recently donated three months of my royalties to a local charity and was ashamed of the results. Therefore I need to start promoting my work. I don’t think my books are horrible, just undiscovered. Remember the Daisy chain? I’ve chosen one novel and priced it so low it’s ridiculous. However, if I can move one novel to the top 1000 in the Amazon rating system, perhaps some of the others will follow. If you’re interested, it will cost you a bit of time and 99 cents.


Daisy chain Instructions:

This is a simple way to extend the purchase/readership of one of my eBooks. We are going to start a Daisy Chain. This Daisy Chain is not illegal or expensive.

I will gift you my eBook, Crystal Cowboy. The gift will come from Amazon.com. You do NOT need a kindle to accept this electronic file. Mac, PC, Android, any tablet and even a blackberry can accept this gift. Note: I said gift. All I ask is that you go to Amazon.com and gift it to someone else.



http://www.amazon.com/s/ref=nb_sb_noss?url=search-alias%3Ddigital-text&field-keywords=Robert+Hatting&x=14&y=22



The price of CRYSTAL COWBOY IS only 99 cents. Make certain recipients either have or can obtain an Amazon account – a debit or credit card is required.

The daisy chain needs to perpetuate itself to make this work. Please help if you can. You don’t even have to read the book. Just pass it on. You have the option of reading the book later. The secret of this program is timing; the sooner, the better.



Thanks for your efforts,

Robert Hatting

Price changes and promotions:

Starting next week, most of my novels will have a higher price. My books featuring my screenplays will be priced at .99 as will my novel Crystal Cowboy. I get a lot of advice from other writers; some successful and some not. Most agree that .99 for an 80,000 word novel is criminal. Most of my books encompass that many words or more. They are all bargains but the deal on the tray is TRILOGY; three full length movie scripts for ninety nine cents. (a series featuring the same characters) Crystal Cowboy is another deal. I’m leaving it at .99 in the hopes it will somehow reach the top 1000 in the Amazon Kindle rankings. Over the next weeks and months I’ll be experimenting with the marketing and promotional side of this business, as well as completing the two novels I have on my hard drive, HALF BREED and MURDER IN PANAMA.

SORTA BACK ON TRACK

Yesterday, my Doctor drove me out to Nutre Hohar so I could deliver three months royalties from book sales as promised. It wasn’t a big deal, financially, but every dime counts toward the care of those tykes. It was my pleasure and I hope to contribute more next time.

WHY I CANCELLED MY AIP MEMBERSHIP.

WHY I CANCELLED MY AIP (Americans in panama) MEMBERSHIP. I’m usually too busy to read -- let alone engage in all the chat groups that feature Panama. Since my doctor relegated me to a post- vegetative state while I recover, I spend more time on the computer. So I started reading the chat sites and the blogs. Reading AIP gave me gas. There’s a tourist named LLOYD posting long discourses about his freshman tour and sophomoric impressions of Panama. It’s posted in volumes and it’s TOTAL POLYANNA! I interjected that his long missives are better suited to a blog or a long letter home. Well, that scrambled the egg. Members jumped all over me. Not just one or two but a horde. Well, LLOYD, retrace your steps. We’ll take a different tour; one which is real and not misleading to the folks back home or the recent arrivals. First, when you get off the plane, don’t rent a car. Take a taxi or bus. That’s how 85% of the people in Panama travel. Have the taxi take you from the TOCUMEN airport, to the village of Tocumen. Then tell him to skip the corridor and the coastal strip and take you through the city to the Albrook bus terminal. Make a side trip to La Boca and see how the fishermen live. Once at the bus terminal, take the Panama – David bus. It’s pretty nice, unless it breaks down. When you reach the terminal in David, transfer to the Boquete bus…a school bus of unknown vintage with no air conditioning, hard seats, and stuffed with folks going to work. A lot of them getting on along the way and having to stand the entire trip. ARE YOU GETTINGTHE PICTURE, LLOYD? Okay, let’s skip the part where you enjoy the quaint B&B, the fine cuisine, beer and wine, the coffee tour, looking at gated communities and the like. I’ll pick you folk up in my car and we’ll spend some time exploring Chiriqui. Not far out of Boquete, situated near all those nice gated communities is a small complex called Casa Hogar, Trixer. On any given day there could be fifty to eighty orphan kids living in near poverty. Wanna stop in for a visit? Further down the hill, past Dolega is los Algorrobos. Here’s my old house, where I was robbed twice in one year. Let’s go across the hiway to the house when another gringo was murdered. We could spend several days viewing these crime scenes, but let’s move on… Here we are in David. First let me show you Nutre Hogar, a special home for malnourished children – under the age of five. Oh, look, there’s over forty of them. Shall we take the tour? Next stop the Regional hospital. Looks pretty good from the outside, right? What are all those people doing standing in line? Oh, gee, they’re trying to get in…let’s take the tour. Walk single file, the halls are crowded with sick and injured folks. Once in a while you’ll see a gurney parked with a dead person in a body bag. Oh look, there are sixty people in this ward and only two attendants. “I’m sure conditions will improve once the new subway is completed in Panama City” “LLOYD, you look pale. Maybe we should leave here and go have a drink at TGIF.” As we drive down the Inter-American I point to the taxi stand where I was almost stabbed and mugged in broad daylight. I show them the turn off to Villa Mercedes, an upscale community where another gringo was murdered. We get to the restaurant and we review the tour. “What? You didn’t like it?” This is just a small sampling. (The other side if the tourist brochure.) The entire population of Panama is 1/3 that of Chicago, USA. The difference is there is no safety net; no one to step in and keep you from starving to death. There’s no food stamps here. No welfare checks and an extremely low consideration for the working people. I doubt our waitress makes $300 a month. It’s been that way since I first arrived in 1951. “The rich get richer and the poor get poorer.” A lot of us old time gringos try to help…and we do in a small way. The applause you’re getting on AIP is from naive people looking for Shangri-la or local folks that have something to sell you…bank on it! “Okay, here’s what we can do… there’s two more orphanages we can visit, a large special needs school, a few more crime scenes and we can check in at the local prison and say howdy to Wild Bill. OR, I can drive you to the airport and you can GET THE HELL OUTTA HERE! Robert Hatting

A TRIBUTE TO DOBE HARDING

This is a good summary of a good man; my friend and hero. Gerald (Dobe) HardingApril 16, 1941 – April 1, 2011 Dobe Harding of Bend passed away on Friday, April 1 in Crane while hunting with friends. He was 69 years old. He was born in Aberdeen, WA on April 16, 1941. His parents were Milford (Mel) Harding and Kittie Barbara (Wendorf) Harding. As a child, Dobe attended school in Arlington, OR, then attended high school in Stayton, OR, and graduated in 1959. After moving to Central Oregon from Stayton in the 1970’s, Dobe had a plumbing and heating business in Sisters. Over the years, he lived in many places, including Maui, San Jose, CA, Redding, CA and Lapine. Dobe enjoyed fishing, hunting and was talented in fabricating metal and welding. He was witty, and had the ability to make people laugh, and was a great conversationalist. He also loved music. He is survived by his wife and partner of 32 years, Toni; daughter Lisa Davis of Bend; son Brad Harding of Bend; stepson Dude Aylor of Sisters; and 11 grandchildren. He was preceded in death by his son Rick in 1995. Dobe will be missed so much by everyone who knew him, loved him and enjoyed his company, family and friends alike. He was a very special person.

A TRIBUTE TO DOBE HARDING by Bob Hatting.

Dobe and I went to high school together. We played sports, fished, hunted, and later we were in business together. One time we even swapped houses; his in Stayton for mine in Sisters. Over the years we developed that special bond of trust. My book “Partners” is dedicated to him. His character, wit or stature is featured in almost all of my stories. Dobe’s stature was “Chief” in THE LAST FRUIT STAND ON GUAM. His character is Sheriff Boomer in my novel BOOMER, and I used not only his stature but his fine unwavering character as Sergeant Bell in ALASKA BE DAMNED . In 1973, Dobe and I entered the “Wild Cow Milking” event at the Sister’s Rodeo. My job was to rope the cow. Dobe was supposed to “Mug” the old girl, remove the loop and hold her while I dismounted and milked her to obtain enough liquid into a stubby beer bottle to run to the judge…at least a drop or two was required. This was a three day event. The first go…I roped a fence post. (Obviously I was a lousy roper). The second go, I roped the hind legs of my horse and was bucked off. The third go, I got lucky and roped a cow right off. Dobe rushed from the bucking chutes, grabbed that cow and pitched her to the ground. He was so Bull strong, he removed the lariat held her 900 pounds of kicking and thrashing while I rushed to her udder – being cow kicked several times, to milk perhaps two ounces of moo juice. We won the event. Mert Hunking, the producer of the rodeo presented us a trophy buckle and fifty bucks. Neither of us wanted the money, we wanted the buckle. We flipped and Dobe won. It was the only rodeo award he’d ever won. A couple of weeks later, Mert had another buckle made for me. It was the ONLY roping event I ever won. I have the buckle to this day and I’m sure Dobe kept his. I have a hundred stories like the above. Why choose that one? Because every time we reunited after a long absence, that was the story that was rehashed. All who knew him at least liked him. Most loved him. I’m one of the latter…gotta stop now, I’m getting’ tears on my keyboard. SO LONG, DOBE – SEE YA SOON!