“Reading a Book is Like Life:
You Live it One Page at a Time.” (Ron Yates)
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About Ronald E. Yates
Author, former foreign correspondent for the Chicago Tribune, and Dean & Professor Emeritus of the College of Media at the University of Illinois, his acclaimed works are now available through this site.
The Latest From My Blog
Q & A with Novel PASTimes Part 2
I was recently interviewed online by NovelPASTimes http://www.novelpastimes.com/ a blog for Historical Fiction Lovers. Here is Part Two. What would you like readers to gain from reading your book(s)? Because the Finding Billy Battles trilogy is historical fiction and is set in the 19th and 2oth Centuries, I would like …
Q & A with Novel PASTimes Part 1
I was recently interviewed online by NovelPASTimes http://www.novelpastimes.com, a blog for Historical Fiction Lovers. Here is Part One. Tell us a little about what you write. I write both fiction and non-fiction. Currently, my books fall into the historical-fiction/action-adventure categories. My previous books have been journalism textbooks, a corporate …
America’s New Warfighting Military: Old Blood and Guts Would Be Proud
Late last month, Secretary of War Pete Hegseth told an unprecedented gathering of generals, admirals, commanders, and senior NCOs that from this moment on, the only mission of the newly named Department of War is this: “warfighting, preparing for war, and preparing to win, [and being] unrelenting and uncompromising in …
A Little Shameless Self-Promotion: Three Reviews of the Finding Billy Battles Trilogy
For most of my professional life, I worked as a reporter and foreign correspondent for the Chicago Tribune. I feel privileged to have been a journalist during one of that newspaper’s golden eras—from about 1969 to 1997 when I left to teach journalism as a professor and dean at the …
Today’s America Hating Migrants vs. the Huddled Masses of the Past
When my maternal Great-grandparents immigrated from Denmark to Northeastern Kansas in the 1890s, they were ecstatic. For something like 200 years, their ancestors had endured a serf-like existence on a baronial estate on the Danish island of Langeland. In the 19th and early 20th centuries, millions of like-minded Europeans immigrated …
Trump Opens a Big Can of Whoop Ass on the United Nations
President Trump finally did what other American presidents have failed to do: he opened a can of verbal whoop ass on the United Nations. He blasted the U.N. for funding illegal immigration to the United States and many European nations and took it to task for a litany of other …
Q & A With Ron Yates On Writing Fiction (Part 3)
Over the past few years, I have been a guest on several radio and podcast shows, discussing topics such as writing fiction and the craft of writing in general. I posted the first two of those interviews for the past two. Today, I am posting Part 3. I hope you …
Q & A With Ron Yates on Writing Fiction (Part 2)
Over the past few years, I have been a guest on several radio and podcast interviews discussing topics such as writing fiction and writing in general. I am posting those interviews as a three-part series for the next couple of days. I hope you find these posts interesting and, most …
Q & A With Ron Yates On Writing Fiction (Part 1)
Over the past few years, I have been a guest on several radio and podcast interviews discussing topics such as writing fiction and writing in general. I am posting those interviews as a three-part series for the next couple of days. I hope you find these posts interesting and, most …
Today’s Chicago: Not My Kind of Town
For the past 13 years, Chicago has had the dubious distinction of being the murder capital of America. And here are a few more ominous facts about “That Toddlin’ Town:” For seven consecutive years, Chicago has had the highest murder rate among U.S. cities with more than one million people. …
Three things I learned while writing “Finding Billy Battles”
During a recent “virtual book tour” with several book bloggers, I was asked what three things I learned while writing the Finding Billy Battles Trilogy. It was a good question because it prompted me to pause and reflect on the fiction-writing process in a way I had never done before. …
The Challenges of Writing Historical Fiction (Part Two)
At a book signing during the Los Angeles Times Festival of Books a while back, where I was promoting my Finding Billy Battles trilogy, I was asked several times about the research process for writing historical fiction novels. I explained that researching the first book …
