Why interviewing Moon Chin is like interviewing a jazz riff…
As my understanding of CNAC improved, so did my ability to extract maximum value from my Moon Chin interviews, but even though I was getting more and more out o...
Category: Reading, Writing, and Research
Posts related to reading and the writing and research process
Ceiling 500 feet, intermittent drizzle
In 2004, I approached Moon Chin with great trepidation. My experiences at the CNAC reunion made it obvious that he had incredible standing and “face” among the ...
All roads led to Moon Chin
I’ve been focusing on whipping the China’s Wings manuscript into shape with Tracy Devine, my editor at Bantam Dell, and I’m thrilled with the ...
The Douglas Dolphin, Moon Chin’s favorite airplane
“The only overpowered seaplane I ever flew."
The Future Revealed Itself…
The people in this story knew as much about tomorrow as we do today. Which is to say, very little. The future revealed itself to them the same way it reveals it...
What was, at the time, the world’s most exciting undertaking – flying
The romance of those beautiful airplanes flying against the backdrop of 1930s China set a hook in my heart. Shirley’s stories and her father’s photos cracked op...
The first hints of something much more substantial…
I had one of my life’s best 24-hour pushes in New York: at Bantam, I lunched with John Flicker, my acquiring editor (thanks, John!), and Nita Taublib , who mig...
I staggered upstairs, collapsed on my bed, pulled a blanket over my head, and sobbed tears of relief.
For the next year and a half, I failed to land another book project, and it wasn’t for lack of trying. Amidst the magazine writing and the part-time gig, three ...
The lowest I’d ever been
I came home from the reunion, thrilled to have bumbled into such an incredible story, invested three months researching and writing a book proposal about the ma...
“Where were you ten years ago, Mr. Writer, when I had twice as many members?”
On the last morning of the reunion, the hospitality room again filled with CNAC people and their wives. I sat to the side and watched them socialize, the conser...