J.K. Coi

GUEST AUTHOR: Bobby Ozuna

I first met Bobby while I was blog-jumping over at Melanie Anderson's little slice of internet and saw that she had another guest for one of her wacky interviews. Intrigued, I searched for his book, Proud Souls, and was even more intrigued by the blurb and the great reviews. So when Bobby contacted me and asked if I had some space on my blog for another guest, I jumped at the chance to have him visit so that I could hear more about his book -- and 'cause he's such a cutie!

Please welcome Bobby Ozuna:

In the summer of 2003 I visited a small west Texas town called Seymour. And just north of the town whose population was just over 2,900 people, sat the beautiful still waters of Lake Kemp. I had my family with me-—my wife Michele, my daughter Elizabeth and my son Dominic who was just a baby at the time. And there to greet me was my special friend and his family, Ralph Ponce of Abernathy, TX. By 2003 I had seen my friend every year since we departed our lives as US Marines at Camp Lejeune in North Carolina. We would share a cabin between our two families and “rough it” for an extended weekend, without running water, cell phone usage and the plagues of city life, we spent a wonderful time together talking beneath the stars of the west Texas sky. At night I sat on their porch swing overlooking Lake Kemp and listened until the calmness of the night's sky was all I could hear. It was truly magical. It was a time with my friend and his family I will never forget. I came home that weekend and after my wife and children fell to sleep, I wrote fourteen pages of descriptive material for nothing more than fulfilling my necessity to write. Below is a sample from my journal, written in 2003.

Journal Entry, 2003:
“The sun was winding down behind him and shadows danced before him on the ground—shadows of the blackbirds that gathered on the roof of his cabin. They gathered every evening in small bands, feasting on left-over bread he tossed upon the roof. He sat still in that porch swing, as if he was nailed to the wood on his back and thighs. He watched the shadow of his porch extend further and further away until it finally reached the water's edge.”

Within a year of that moment I was divorced from my wife and acclimating to lonely nights in a bed without her or my children to kiss goodnight. The rage that comes natural with being Bobby Ozuna was amplified and the hate I tried to put to sleep every night since leaving the US Marines became personified in my attitude and my perception of life. In essence, a part of me had died and in exchange, I allowed a darker more vindictive side of my persona to take hold. In October 2003, I began adding more detail to my journal.

10.13.2003
“There were only a handful of things left in the world that he cared for anymore, and none of which was himself. He just as soon let God strike him dead where he stood; but God doesn't work that way and that was something he had to learn...The only evidence to prove he was alive came from the steady breeze that slapped his face at intervals as the porch swing rocked back and forth. He sat in the same position overlooking the same settings as he had for the past six years.”

I put the journal away for two more years before attempting (or even considering) to write a novel. Before this time I only produced short-stories, completely fictional, with traces and hints of my own personal life. Like my hero Justin, my journal sat in a corner of my life like his Holy Bible sat in the corner of his cabin off Lake Kemp. It would stay dusty and untouched until May 16th of 2005 where I began extending the storyline and working on what would become my debut literary novel. The story of Justin Bower is not a story of my own life. It is the story of many lives. By October 29th of 2005 I would change the title from The Cabin to Proud Souls.

Those years of my life tested my faith in a higher power and my trust in relationships. No matter how much I smiled or who I was able to charm with my wit and romanticism, still inside I wrestled with the notion of a life full of hope. At the recommendation of a very good friend named Ladd Holder, I scrounged enough courage to start working on telling the story of Justin Olerude Bower. On May 16th, I wrote the following lines:

5.16.2005
“Most people were obliged to stay away from the hobbling, broken-spirit who trotted through the bar like a pirate, slant-eyed and bitter, carrying not a parrot on his shoulder but the burdens of a past life and the hatred of those patrons who clung desperately to hope.”

This theme written in the late Spring of 2005 became the driving force behind my novel, Proud Souls. And as much as I would like to say I had a plan for how the story would turn out, I did not. Using mythological archetypes I created a supporting cast in the life of Justin Bower. To challenge his cause to die I created the character Tessa Jameson, who in her fear of being alone and unloved became the epitome of the lonely damsel in distress. With her sexual aggression she would help me find my place as an independent author and publisher by scaring away my first print press. In early 2007 the manger of the print shop clapped his hands to me and said, “We wash our hands of you and this book.” But in a relentless pursuit to see my book in print, Ozuna Publications was created and my book hit an online storefront and gained immediate recognition.

I took the feelings of being without my children and gave them to Justin. Instead of three children like myself he had only one. A son he lost along side his wife in an accident outside the town of Seymour, Texas. I allowed myself to trust a scattered few for advice and guidance and in the essence of their spirit, the Reverend Hillard Ray Polk was created. He would represent the spiritual guidance Justin would need to make his decision to end his life or move forward with what life he had yet to live. And like any chapter of our lives, there stood for Justin the living symbol of guilt and regret. It came in the form of a lonely grocery store manger named Ralph Winslow Parison. These characters and the stories of their lives within their metaphorical prisons would become the binding force in my novel Proud Souls.

I put a lot of myself into this story. For many who have read it, it seemed to “hit home” and it jostled the nerves of many past scars for many readers. I have been asked about the details within the pain of this story and whether I lost a family member or contemplated suicide or even dammed God Almighty for my adversities. All I can say today is this: All fiction stems from some form of truth within the author...and...with my characters I thereby confess my sins.

I have never read my own book, cover to cover. I lived many of the emotions in simply writing the tale of the broken soul within Justin Bower, the sexual prowess of Tessa Jameson, the spiritual confusion of Reverend Polk and the agonizing guilt of Ralph Parison. I know the story inside and out because each of them became real within my imagination and my daily routine of life. It has been two years since finishing the book and walking away from that chapter of my life. And although I know I have grown far from the man I was when I created this story, it's ironic how much has stayed the same. It took some time to find the perfect opening quote to establish the theme for this story but I found it. Below is a sample from the completed published version of Proud Souls, opening with a quote from W. Somerset Maugham.

***

“How the gods must have chuckled when they added Hope to the evil's with which they filled Pandora's box, for they knew very well that this was the cruelest evil of them all, since it is Hope that lures mankind to endure its misery to the end.”

Six years had passed since their accident and with each day spent without his wife and son Justin deteriorated, shrinking into a dismal world, a prison he created within his mind. And now there were only a handful of things left in the world that Justin Olerude Bower truly cared for anymore, and not one of those particulars included his own soul. He had become a bitter man who would just as soon let God strike him dead where he stood. The sun was setting behind him and he stared out towards the lake in front of him.

The only evidence to prove he was alive came from the steady squeaking of the rusted chain that held his porch swing firmly in place and the intermittent breeze that slapped his face as the weight of his body carried him back and forth in a slow and steady rocking motion. He sat in the same position overlooking the same settings as he had every evening for the past four years of his life. And like the June beetle that fluttered aimlessly, slamming itself carelessly from wood to concrete and then finally resting into the fowl remains of leftover food in the dirt, he too was lost in a drunken stupor somewhere between the memories of his past life and the realities of a certain death.

***

I cannot say anything more about the story without giving it away. I will say this much. In the story the reader will face many human emotions, some that will anger them and others that will arouse them. In a nutshell, Proud Souls is a roller-coaster of emotions and feelings, with insights into the human struggle to survive. I can't say it is dark and I wouldn't call it a story of light. I will say this...it is merely a story common to all of us, the author and its audience. And looking back some five years after the opening lines were written...here at home with my wife Michele and my children...well...there is always hope, isn't there?

Sincerely,
~Bobby Ozuna