Two Old Friends

Lots have been going out of late with a character of mine named Smitty and other writing formats.  So much so that I'm thinking two old friends of mine have been unintentionally pushed to one side and possibly forgotten.


Turner Hahn and Frank Morales.


Two characters I created to walk down the dark, decidedly dangerous, and uniquely barbaric back alleys of society rarely seen--two cops who pursue the crazy, the homicidal, the huckster, the insane.


Two old friends. 


That's what first attracted me to these characters.  Old friends . . partners . . . working the homicide trail of police work.  What would they be like?  How do two hard, experienced, cynical old cops who have seen it all when it comes to humanity's twisted, homicidal self, stay friends?  Stay sane?  How do you face the powerful tragedies of life and death a crime victim is subjected to--or witness the horrors a twisted mind can concoct when it comes to inflicting pain on others--and not go bonkers yourself?


How do you create two specific, unique, fully developed characters and mesh them together in a working partnership where each is as capable, as brave, as intelligent as the other.  And here's a biggie . . . how do you create a partnership where one doesn't become the Sherlock Holmes to the other's Doctor Watson?


Or can you?


Hmm . . .


Turner Hahn and Frank Morales are living, breathing entities residing in my head.  There's stories--short stories and novels--just waiting to burst out onto a computer screen--or in print--for readers to enjoy.  The book cover above is a collection of fourteen short stories which I put together some time back.  Soon a novel, A Taste of Old Revenge, will be coming out.  But the short stories, the novel(s),  reveal the humanity of the two.  Their humanity . . . as well as their toughness, their smarts, their humor.


Turner Hahn and Frank Morales.  Two characters I think deserve to be in the spotlight a little more often.  And maybe if you discover the two, you might come to agree with me.