The Latest From AngelaHoy.com

As some of you may have read, Police Chief Charles Moose (famous for the 3-week sniper rampage last Fall) has obtained an advance for his new book, Three Weeks in October, due out in October. His story will also be made into a movie. When his superiors heard about the deal, they claimed it violated their ethics restrictions and would not give him permission to write the book. Unfortunately, this disagreement led to Moose’s resignation from the police force late last week.

Let’s face it, if any of us were offered a large book and movie advance that would probably ensure our (and our family’s) financial comfort for the rest of our lives, we’d jump on those deals, too…especially if our full-time job was a high-stress, low-pay position.

At WritersWeekly.com, we speak out for writers’ rights whether they’re veterans or newbies. Our opinion is this. Police officers don’t make enough money to compensate them for the stress they endure on the job. I deeply admire and respect all emergency personnel because they spend each day, in unimaginable conditions, helping the rest of us in our greatest times of need.

I can’t even fathom what kind of stress was placed on Chief Moose, his employees and all emergency personnel in the greater D.C. area before the suspects were apprehended. Chief Moose was even moved to tears on national television when a 13-year-old boy was allegedly shot by the snipers.

Moose, who holds a PhD in Urban Criminology and has been an officer for 27 years, was offered around $100K (not a whole lot of money and he’s only been paid $4K to date) to write the story of his life and about the events leading up to the capture of the sniper suspects. Now, news reports indicate that Chief Moose’s bosses are not content with Moose’s resignation. They are now considering suing him for the future money he makes from the book. Is it just me or do I smell sour grapes? Is someone a bit jealous of Chief Moose’s celebrity status and success?

Rather than having a media spokesperson do his job, Chief Moose confronted the snipers on live television and showed courage, determination and, most of all, compassion. He met personally with victims’ families to keep them apprised of the investigation. And, when life finally started to return to normal earlier this year, Chief Moose was called to active duty in the military. Our opinion is that Chief Moose will be writing the book on his own time (not on the county’s payroll) and that the publisher is interested in his story, not somebody else’s. The money from the book deal belongs to Chief Charles Moose, not the Montgomery County (Maryland) police department.

To show my support, I’ve already pre-ordered a copy of Three Weeks in October from Amazon.com. I just hope the royalties from my purchase end up where they belong, in Chief Moose’s pocket.

Also, prior to publication, I forwarded a copy of this article to Barbara McNally, Executive Secretary of the Montgomery County Ethics Commission. She, of course, did not respond.

UPDATE: I’m receiving many emails about this topic, roughly half in favor of Chief Moose keeping the money and half opposed.

If the county was simply suing Chief Moose to stop him from writing the book, that might sway my opinion. However, they are only threatening to sue him for the money he makes from it. So, it’s okay for the county to profit from his tenure, but not okay for him to do so? That, in my opinion, is very, very wrong.

RESPONSES FROM READERS:

I read your article on Chief Moose’s problems with respect to his book and I, too, am outraged by the lawsuit brought against him.

Jack Thomason, Editor
J. B. Scott Publishing
Independent Contractor
Through The Gears
Trucker’s World
803 Bama Drive, Suite C
Oxford, AL 36203

Yesterday, I uttered a large sigh and felt the stress leave my shoulders. My eyes teared a bit and I wore a goofy grin…for about an hour. I was elated and…also somewhat sad. What caused this? I’d just finished my new book, of course!

This book took two years to complete. When we put it up for sale in a couple of weeks (we’re waiting for the print galley to arrive), I’ll explain to all of you why it took so long to complete. At that time, you’ll understand why I wasn’t able to share with you the topic and the things we’ve been experiencing, as a family, for quite some time.

This book is a completely different genre than my other books, but it’s a book that I had to write. I felt a pulling at my soul over the past two years to get it finished, knowing each day that it could be helping someone.

The ebook version of this title will be available for free to anyone who needs it. It’s our way of giving back to the community what was given to me in my time of need. The print book will be priced as low as we can get it to cover our costs. The publication of this book is not to turn a profit. It’s about helping people who really need help but who can’t afford to buy books at this period in their lives. Anyway, you’ll understand when I tell you the whole story in a couple of weeks.

So, after waves of glee yesterday morning and afternoon, I just could NOT sleep last night. Was I thinking of our vacation next week? No. Was I thinking of taking some time off? Um, nuh uh. I was mentally making a list of what my next book should be. While I already have four more books (they’re all for writers) in the works, Like most writers, I just can’t stop making mental lists of new book ideas! Arrghh!!

Today, I meticulously edited Ali’s (age 12) short stories for a large assignment she’s been working on for weeks. While I was tempted to rewrite some of her stories, I knew I couldn’t. While teaching her about typos and grammatical errors, I must also allow her to make the same mistakes we all made and learned from in school. Still, it’s hard not to put a nip here and a tuck there.

Parents are supposed to help their children with homework, right? But, how much involvement is too much? I used to make numerous changes to the children’s papers…so much so that Ali stopped showing me her work at one point last year. She got mad if I changed anything, saying it was my A, not her A. I understood. So, I learned to restrain myself and she let me start reading her papers again. (Needless to say, I don’t think we’ll ever have to worry about Ali buying papers from a term paper mill!)

Even when I leave run-on sentences, missing punctuation and repeated ideas in their papers, Zach, Ali and Frank still make remarkably high grades when writing is required in their classes. I’d like to think this is genetic. However, I feel it’s actually because I read bedtime stories to them from the time they were babies, and that I have always insisted on reviewing their written reports over the years.

This year, I taught Frank how to do research for and write a research paper. He’s had to write two of them so far and he’s only in fourth grade. He made an A+ on both. And, since I help him during the process, he enjoys doing research papers and doesn’t complain when it’s time to get to work. And, an A+ is a terrific motivator!

Zach (age 16) has written some incredible poetry this year. While praising a recent poem, he told me that writing poetry comes so easily to him that he feels like he’s faking it. I think he excels because he learned from an early age to be observant and to spin pictures into words. This is easy for some, but hard for many. (My poetry has never progressed beyond the Roses are Red stage.) Zach has always been a varocious reader and read Stephen King’s The Stand when he was in 2nd grade. Just don’t ask him about the science paper I edited (err…. rewrote) for him last year…

Which brings us back to Ali’s short stories. Ali wrote a story about a meatloaf. Mr. Ground Beef started his tale of woe in the grocery store meat department. He then progressed to the grocery cart where all of the other food was rude to him because his packaging was “sticky.” He was then taken home by a lady, mixed with spices, squished in a bowl and put in the oven. When the oven started to get hot, Meatloaf said, “It’s hot.” I thought Meatloaf should have said, “It’s hot!” But, Ali disagreed. It was hard, but I bit my tongue. So, Meatloaf kept his cool (har har). The meatloaf story is so funny that I’ve asked Ali to wrote more descriptive stories about everyday items describing their lives. They would make a really funny and educational children’s book, which we’ll publish for her, of course, on Booklocker.com.

I’m sure this almost uncontrollable urge to edit children’s school papers is a common occurance in many writing households.