Sometimes I think being a writer is a blessing. Sometimes I'm certain it's a curse. But writing is something I have always felt compelled to do.
I started when I was about ten years old. The first story I remember writing was a knock-off of C. S. Forester's Hornblower novels. I don't remember how many words it was, or even where that manuscript is. Throughout my teens I wrote dozens of short stories. I was an avid reader, since I was not allowed to watch much television. I graduated from college and went to law school -- for one year. Then I worked as an investigator for a security firm based in Houston, Texas. While working there I wrote a western entitled Killer Gray and sent it to several New York publishing houses. To my astonishment it was published, by Manor Books.. (Shortly thereafter, Manor Books went out of business; I didn't receive a dime for Killer Gray.)
Ten years passed, and then I sent another western novel to New York, this time to a few of the top literary agents of the day, hoping one would consent to represent me, since this time I wanted to get paid! Again I was amazed when I heard from a couple of the agents. I chose one, and it was a very good choice. For the next seventeen years I more or less made my living as an author, with 52 books published from 1989 to 2006 (53 adding 1979's Killer Gray). I suppose I could have continued for a while, but I was burned out. And then there was the isolation. They say writing is the loneliest profession. I decided to get a job in the 'real world' and assumed that eventually I would return to writing books worthy of publication.
I didn't stop writing. I turned my attention to constructing websites on various subjects of interest to me. A decade later I returned to novels in 2016 when St. Martin's Press contacted me about writing a Christmas western. The experience stoked the fire and I began producing a book a year. The decision by my agent to make the backlist available in Kindle produced a considerable revenue stream, which allowed me to take all the time I needed to craft a good story, and I like to think that my recent books are just that.
I would love to hear from readers or writers. There are contact forms throughout the website.
Please bear in mind that this site is an ongoing project -- and probably always will be.
NEWS
June 2020.
CUTTER'S REACH, the sweeping saga of a frontier family caught up in a clash of empires, the French & Indian War, will be published soon.
A COWBOY'S PRAYER
Lord give me a clear sky above me tonight Please give me a fair chance in my next fight Let me die in the saddle, a good horse beneath And I to Your keeping my soul bequeath.
Lord give me the wide plains and mountains so high And give me the rivers that run deep and wide Please give me wild places that no man has seen And give me blue northers that blow sharp and clean Give me the mustang and longhorn to herd For this is the life a cowboy does yearn.
Lord give me the trail town with all its delights And get me away with at least one dollar tonight Lord give me some rope with the ladies in waiting And a fair hand at poker 'cause i sure do hate losing.
Thanks, Lord, for the clear sky above me tonight And thanks for the fair chance in my last fight Let me die in the saddle, a good horse beneath And I to Your keeping my soul bequeath.
JASON MANNING 1986
NEWEST ADDITIONS TO THE SITE
6.23.20 COMING SUMMER 2020 CUTTER'S REACH
2.22.19 LOBO RILER debuts on Amazon.com.
2.12.18 THE TOWN KILLERS debuts on Amazon.com.
1.10.18 Updated the release date for The Town Killers.
11.29.17 The cover for The Town Killers, the first book in The Remingtons series, unveiled! (SEE BELOW)
3.7.17 WILLOW'S MOUNTAIN debuts on Amazon. com. Have added a page to Published Novels.
2.8.17 Introducing a brand-new frontier adventure -- WILLOW'S MOUNTAIN -- coming any day now!
11.14.16 Christmas in the Lone Star State is now available.
THE LATEST NOVEL!
LOBO RILER An Amazon Exclusive
Words of Wisdom on Writing
Don't loaf and invite inspiration; light out after it with a club, and if you don't get it you will none the less get something that looks remarkably like it. ~Jack London
.Writing a book is a horrible, exhausting struggle, like a long bout of some painful illness. One would never undertake such a thing if one were not driven on by some demon whom one can neither resist nor understand ~George Orwell
We are all apprentices in a craft where no one ever becomes a master. ~Ernest Hemingway
Plot is people. Human emotions and desires founded on the realities of life, working at cross purposes, getting hotter and fiercer as they strike against each other until finally there’s an explosion—that’s Plot. ~Leigh Brackett
Don't tell me the moon is shining; show me the glint of light on broken glass. ~Anton Chekhov
Do not put statements in the negative form.
And don't start sentences with a conjunction.
If you reread your work, you will find on rereading that a great deal of repetition can be avoided by rereading and editing.
Never use a long word when a diminutive one will do.
Unqualified superlatives are the worst of all.
De-accession euphemisms.
If any word is improper at the end of a sentence, a linking verb is.
Avoid trendy locutions that sound flaky.
Last, but not least, avoid clichés like the plague.
William Safire
SOME KINDLE VERSION COVERS (Cover art by the very talented Matt Forsyth)
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