I saw a comment you posted on Ethan Lofing's blog, and you mentioned religion and the brain.  A little off topic, but this is a great article about how religious experiences actually atrophy the hippocampal region of the brain.  Great article.

Scientific American - Religious Experiences Shrink Part of the Brain

Interesting read.

I'm a member of the Atheist Writers group here--have contributed quite a lot to discussions there, in fact; you might have a look, if you're interested.

I earned an MFA in Fiction from the University of California at Irvine and an AB in English Composition from Syracuse University, and I was a Wallace Stegner Fellow in fiction at Stanford a while ago.

My first novel, HARD FEELINGS (Atheneum, 1977), was an American Library Association Best Book in 1977 and a 20th Century-Fox film release in 1982. My published work includes four other novels, MULDOON (Holt, Rinehart and Winston, 1982), COLD COMFORT (Harmony Books, 2001), THE FIFTH SEASON (Three Rivers Press, 2005), and the third novel in my Hector Bellevance literary suspense series, THE ERRAND BOY (Three Rivers Press).  My home page here included the images of the jacket art for those books.  I've also published essays and book reviews in a variety of publications, including "The New York Times Sunday Magazine," "The Los Angeles Times Book Review," and "Paris Review." 

Two of my screenplay adaptations have been independently produced and released internationally as feature-length films, "Where the Rivers Flow North," starring Rip Torn and Michael J. Fox, and "A Stranger in the Kingdom," with an ensemble cast including Ernie Hudson and Martin Sheen.

My current project is a YA post-cataclysmic epic set in a much-diminished, post-oil, post-climate-change America now governed by evangelical Nazis--the gels--who are the book's villains.  If this book gets any attention at all, it could be pretty controversial.  It's sort of an American GOLDEN COMPASS, but edgier, with overtones of THE ROAD.  My agent likes it.  When it's ready to show, we'll just have to find a publisher who's willing to invest enough in the book to get it out there.

Why thank you Misty but you know that's not me I hope!