Minstrel of the Mist is the story of achieving one's potential, of learning about love and acceptance. Travis Hazzard is a forty-year-old singer/songwriter who has unused talents and no ambition to change. That is until he gets an offer that is literally out of this world. The question is, does he have a ghost of a chance at success?
About the Author: Note-the author information has been added to the end of the manuscript.
About the Author
As a child of the rural South in the 50's and raised by a single mom, Stephen Pell had ample opportunity for a free range childhood. They had a few neighbors and there were a few kids roughly his age on their gravel country road. They were okay to play with but he was more at home in the woods next to their property. Some of his earliest friends were rabbits and squirrels. At least in his mind. As an only child for twenty years, he had the unfortunate opportunity to grow up thinking anything he thought of was automatically correct. It took several lessons both in and out of the classroom in elementary school to see the error of his ways.
In junior high Pell discovered the power of words when he talked a large classmate out of beating him up at their eighth grade picnic. Pell literally calmed him enough that he sat back down at their table and they all finished their meal and he did not wind up in the hospital.
Ever since then he has considered words his friends. They are powerful and can induce feelings of joy or bring on despair. Pell respects words but believes bigger is not always better. He prefers the minimalist approach so readers won't spend an inordinate amount of time reaching or clicking for the thesaurus.
Writing is not a full time job. He waits on inspiration, a spark, and when a story idea comes, he listens. If he is really lucky, the story will agree to tell itself through him. There are a million new writers out there doing some great work. Once you have read one of Pell's stories, he hopes you enjoy it enough to include him in that group.
His resume includes radio announcer, public relations director, professional photographer, serving in the USMC during Vietnam, graduating UT Knoxville with honors, small business owner, Chairman of the Board of his local Chamber of Commerce, and quality engineer at a Textron subsidiary in his town. He has been married fifty-one years at this writing. He and his wife had two sons, but lost the youngest in a car accident in 2012. He is currently in remission from lymphoma. Writing, both stories and song lyrics, is his refuge and a major source of strength. He is a member of the Chattanooga Writers Guild where, in 2016 he won both first and second place in their spring writing competition in fiction.