A graduate of Georgia Tech, R. Allen Downey worked for over thirty years at a Fortune 500 company as a marketing manager where he was a technical writer and contributing editor of Switchgear and Control Handbook published by McGraw-Hill. Serving in the U.S. Navy in the Far East provided background for his first novel Kwatee and the sequel Pirate Queen: The Curse. He is currently working on his third suspense/thriller novel, The Remains. He lives in Asheville, North Carolina with his wife Branwen.
When I was in the Navy I started to write a humorous novel about life aboard a tanker, but then Mr. Roberts and Caine Mutiny came out - who could top those? Decades later after I took early retirement, the writing bug hit again. My wife is an avid reader of horror books such as Stephen King, Dan Simmons, et al. so I changed course - what if my tanker was a supernatural ship on an evil mission? I decided to write the novel without her knowledge and give it to her as a Xmas present. I figured if she thought it was crappy, she'd let me know! She was surprised by the manuscript and I was surprised when she said it was good enough to be published and encouraged me to write another one.
The inspiration for my sequel came from a short paragraph in Kwatee that referred to my main Chinese character as the "Dragon Lady" and went on to explain that the name Dragon Lady came from a 1940's radio program and comic strip Terry and the Pirates. The creator, Milton Caniff, based his character on a real-life lady Chinese pirate, Lai Choi San, who mysteriously disappeared in 1939 without a trace. Pirate Queen: The Curse is my speculation on what might have happened to Lai Choi San and her ultimate fate.
Being a history buff, I have made historical fiction the underlying theme of these two suspense/thriller novels and painstakingly researched all background events and items to make sure they were accurate - and to verify (or correct) my memories of many personal experiences.
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If you have any questions or wish to pass on comments or feedback, contact the author at skyfyre6@hotmail.com.
