OMC: Why did it take you so long to write the book?

PN: Back when I wrote it and shopped it around to publishers, I couldn't get a tumble. I just said, "Screw it." I raising kids, I was busy, I was a single parent. Ten years later, this turkey starts another war, and I think I've got a contemporary war novel if I just go back and update it. I had to be careful about some anachronisms, but everything else was there. It was a better time to question the war, since it was more like Vietnam. So this politician that I detest actually gave me a gift. It's a gift I'd rather not have, since there are a lot of young kids are dying.

OMC: How did you straddle the line between getting preachy and telling a good story? Did you have to avoid pushing your politics too hard?

PN: To the extent possible, I made the opinions the opinions of characters, not didactic narration. The passages in the book where the omniscient voice is offering an opinion are rare.

OMC: Why did you write the novel?

PN: There's a part of me that's an artist, apparently. I didn't always know I was a writer, but I always acted like one. In fourth grade, I wrote the Christmas pageant. It got rave reviews from all the parents.

OMC: Ultimately, how did you get the book published?

PN: I looked up independent publishers on the Internet. I have a golf book, also. That was a collaborative effort, and I was looking for another publisher. I looked at one, Community Press. I called them up and told them about my problems with the golf book. In the course of that conversation, (the publisher) asked me to tell her about my novel. She said she wasn't really interested in the golf book but wanted to see a copy of the novel. And the rest is history.

OMC: What are the expectations for an independently-published book?

PN: I don't know, I'm going down this road for the first time. I'll tell you when I know how the movie pitch is going. I'm also writing a second novel. One of the characters (from "Twice Upon A Time") is the protagonist. This next book starts a little bit in the future, in Omaha. People wake up and there's a spacecraft parked in the sky.

OMC: So, you're heading into more science fiction?

PN: ("Twice Upon A Time"), I think, is more speculative fiction. A guy travels through time. But if you suspend disbelief, everything else is a novel. It just takes a moment and turns it on end.