Q: How long have you been writing and what got you started in the business?

DP: Like many people who write, I started writing in my teens. For me, creating truly bad poetry was a way to associate with my world, through the eyes of a typically troubled youth… and it really was bad poetry.
What really got me going, however, was an incident that occurred early in my military career. I was a very new second lieutenant, and a captain whom I respected a great deal approached me one day. He said, and I quote: "Pratt, you can’t write and you can’t speak. Fix that or you will fail." And then he walked off.
It shook me up pretty bad, so I found the first correspondence writing course I could find and signed up. It was the Writer’s Institute Short Story Course. In the twelve months it took me to complete the course, I learned more about grammar, writing and composition than I had learned in sixteen years of school. I published my first two professional articles a month later, and I was hooked. I’ve been writing ever since.
Another prime influence on my writing is author Zelma Orr. She has helped keep me writing, even through the tough times. Zelma has over a dozen books in print and has been my mentor, friend, and a prime source of encouragement for me. I owe her a lot, and her stamp is deeply imprinted on "Buried in the Records."

Q: Why did you write this book, "Buried in the Records"?

DP: I am a retired hospital administrator, with advanced degrees in healthcare administration and management, and twenty years of experience in the field. In all that time, and with all that education and experience, I am still amazed that people like you and I will so quickly surrender all of our personal liberties so easily when we admit ourselves to a hospital for care. When we go under the knife under general anesthesia, or are otherwise unable to communicate, we are at the mercy of those who have been assigned to give us care. There are a host of opportunities in such situations for corruption, greed, and interests other than our own good care, to enter in and make us the victim, rather than the "cured". Hence the plot for "Buried in the Records."
Fortunately for all of us, the medical industry in our country has the highest of standards, and when we do actually surrender our consciousness and our liberties to a health care team at a hospital or anywhere else, the chance of our trust actually being violated is practically nill. I emphasize that "Buried in the Records" is a fictional story. If it’s a little spooky, then good. That’s what I was hoping for. But should a person stop going to the hospital because they’ve read it? Certainly not!

Q: The setting for "Buried in the Records" is Olympia, the capital city of the State of Washington. Why that location, and is there really a Wilkes Memorial in Olympia, figuratively or literally?

DP: The Olympia area, from Yelm to the Puget Sound, is my home. I love the area, and I can see no better place to set the story. Other areas included in the book are Lakewood, Washington, where I went to high school and Federal Way, another of my favorite towns. What better way to honor an area that I love than to put my story in those locations? It is beautiful country, with amazing cities, and an eclectic population that is energizing.
Wilkes Memorial is a fictional hospital. I’m sure that it’s a composite of all the hospitals where I’ve worked in my past. The name comes from a history book that claimed that one of Olympia’s founding fathers was a man with the name of Wilkes.

Q: So are you a Washington native?

DP: If truth be told, I’m actually a native of most of the western states of the US, from Bakersfield, California where I was born, to Anchorage, Alaska where my mother and stepfather live, and many places in between.

Q: The main character in the book, Bill Deming, is a retired military Medical Service Corps officer, turned consultant. Is there any connection there with your past?

DP: I am a retired Medical Service Corps officer from the Army. I own a consulting firm and do a lot of my work in the Olympia area. The math is pretty easy.

Q: There’s a dog in the story that plays a pivotal role. Any dogs in your life, and how pivotal are they to your writing?

DP: I once read that all good stories involve at least one animal. Since then, I’ve included animals in virtually all of my fiction, save for one Christmas short story. At home, my wife and I have three dogs, two horses and a cat. The dogs are frequently my motivation when times are bad. As the saying goes, "I strive to be as good as my dogs think I am."

Q: You have a varied background and education. Does this help with your writing?

DP: As a retired military officer, I had the opportunity to live all over the United States and Europe. I’ve also had the occasion to visit Egypt, Haiti and spend a fair amount of time in China. These experiences have given me a broad pallet of experiences to draw on in my writing. I recently completed a four part humor series for a local weekly newspaper, the Nisqually Valley News. That series of articles, of scores and scores that I’ve written, testifies in a very fun way to that diversity of background and experiences.
The education doesn't hurt, either. The more we know about our world, the more we study our environment and its dynamics, the more we have to draw upon when creating fiction. A Bachelors Degree in Psychology can’t hurt in that regard and I draw on that knowledge every day of my life. In the case of "Buried in the Records", my master’s degrees in Management and Hospital Administration came in pretty handy.