Russell Avery

Russell Avery is a retired architect, a builder, and a born-and raised Angeleno, but drawn to Central California for decades, and to Berlin since before the wall came down—about the time writing took over his life.

“My writing career began at age seven in my cousin’s garage where a spontaneous puppet show was underway. I soon tired of the non-stop battle-whacking on stage, found a paper and pencil to write a script laden with pathos and hilarity, but halfway through the first page, a scuffle among the puppeteers toppled the cardboard theatre, and real-life mayhem broke the fourth wall for good. The script did not survive.”

His earliest influence was Walt Kelly—the writer and illustrator of the Pogo Possum comic strips and books. “Ultimately Mr. Kelly mined the self-deceptions we recognize in others and, if we’re lucky, in ourselves. His gift for the comic and his love for his characters made his pills of truth go down like nuggets of chocolate. Best of all, reading Pogo was the one occasion when my parents, my siblings, and I read and laughed together, often to tears. We all ‘got’ Pogo; we knew the humor was for us all, not just kids or grownups. For me, those were our best hours as a family—thanks to a writer.

Next came Mad Magazine. “I and my friends could not believe the brazen, joyous heresy we were reading, ultimately aimed not at us kids as kids, but at the nascent adult in us. We were party to the lambasting of hypocrisies and deceptions, especially in the world of grownups. The humor and illustrations were wicked and spot-on. When reading each issue I got to feel older, wiser, and a bit superior in a world that had been confusing and intimidating to me.”

The high school years: “I knew that books such as Kurt Vonnegut’s Cat’s Cradle, Joseph Heller’s Catch 22, and J. D. Salinger’s Catcher in the Rye were written for adults. The humor in them, however, made the transition less daunting. I had been schooled in the notion that being a grownup was serious, perilous, and no fun. It comforted me to know that these vaunted authors portrayed other views of the situation, and other responses.

“I reveled in the heavy stuff too—Hermann Hesse’s Steppenwolf, Erich Fromm’s Escape from Freedom, Dostoevsky’s Crime and Punishment, anything of Hemingway’s and so on. They offered heady expeditions into larger, more complicated lives. Unfortunately, I let such “serious” fare incline me to ignore what later on became my primary wellspring—mystery novels!

“My heroes and teachers for many years have been the likes of James M. Cain, Raymond Chandler, John D. MacDonald, Dashiell Hammett, Rex Stout, Robert B. Parker, and, across the pond, Dick Francis, Dorothy Sayers, and Josephine Tey. Countless others have enriched and added to this mix and I confess to reading these works far more than any others.

“But not exclusively. Fine sources like Tom Wolfe, Anne Lamott, Natalie Goldberg, and William Goldman still inspire and guide my work.

“Most recently, I’ve had the good fortune to attend the ‘Method Writing’ workshops developed by Jack Grapes here in L. A. His approach enables students to access deeper, unexpected, often unsettling layers of themselves, and acquire the full range of tools for effective self-expression. Jack is a true and generous Renaissance man and a lot of fun. No, I am not being paid for this pitch!

“I am also an Angeleno, though, and must credit the pleasures and inspirations I have always found in movies and television since childhood. My memory falters on many counts, but not when it comes to films. It seems I remember every film I’ve seen—and where I was, who I was with, what was going on in my life, etc. Often engulfed by the larger, confusing, and sometimes threatening world, I found films to be life preservers for someone like me. Double Indemnity, Casablanca, most of Woody Allen, all of Federico Fellini, Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid, Blade Runner, The Firm, Groundhog Day, The Verdict, The Bourne Identity—I could go on for days, and I’m sure you could too. We’re so lucky.

“Unpaid Pitch #2: I have taken Robert McKee’s Story seminar many times—there is way too much information and creative juice for me to absorb in one pass. His understanding and elucidation of the principles of storytelling is breathtaking and riveting for ten hours a day during the three days of his presentation, just his grizzled, brilliant, Irish-American self on stage, peppering his presentations with insider anecdotes and wry asides. If you go, you’ll be following the footsteps of many famous and successful writers.

“Thank you for reading this account and giving me cause to reflect on the path I’ve taken, or that has taken me. I hope you enjoy, or have enjoyed, reading Losing Ground. The sequel is underway.”