Larry Benjamin. Wordsmith. Writer. Author.

Two years ago today, we had to let go of our precious girl, Coco. She was fighting heart disease and the effects of old age. We knew it was time and she let us know she was ready. Still, it was hard. She wasn’t the first dog we’ve lost—but in the intervening years, grief had lost its edge. We’d had to put down my first dog, Channing, after an attack by a neighborhood pit bull. For a decade he’d been my most constant and cherished companion, predating Stanley. I was, to put it mildly, devastated. It wasn’t until we adopted Coco that Stanley stopped looking at me with anxiety and inexpressible sorrow. Weeks after we got her, I was talking to my mother on the phone and something she said made me laugh. She paused and said, “You know, after Channing died I didn’t think I’d ever hear you laugh again.” It was only then that I realized how deep and visible my grief had been.  I made an appointment for that Saturday at 3. Stanley left work early and met us there. I’d spent...

A reader, who recently finished Vampire Rising, commented that it was different from my other books mostly because with the others I spent a lot of time on character development so readers really got to know the characters. And that is true, with What Binds Us , we follow Dondi, Thomas and Matthew for ten years; in Unbroken , we first meet Lincoln at age six and Jose at age 12. Their story spans 40 years and we watch them grow from children into brave young men and on into parenthood. Vampire Rising is a very short book. It tells the story of the damaged Vampire, Gatsby, who is still reeling from a decision made 200 years earlier that saved a life and cost him his love, and the young human, Barnabas, who, abandoned by his mother, becomes a ward of the state, unwanted and invisible for too long. But the story really isn’t about Gatsby and Barnabas; the story is an allegory, it’s a metaphor for how (poorly) we treat those considered the least among us are a metaphor. But, I ...