Gene Paleno on “The Porter Conspiracy”

Gene has written a well-researched non-fiction historical novel about a relatively unknown Civil War Major General. Although innocent, Fitz John Porter was accused of losing a crucial battle and tried and convicted for cowardice and disobedience. This true story reveals the political false reasons for his court martial.

The tale depicts the Second Battle of Manassas in grim, eye-witness accounts of the fighting and dying during three days in August 1862. President Abraham Lincoln’s unhappy part in the tragedy is woven together with the events of that period like threads in a bloody tapestry to create the changes that shaped and changed America for all time.

Gene Paleno has farmed in Lake County for nearly fifty years and been writing even longer. During most of the good part of a century of life Gene has had more occupations and professions than you can count on both hands. He writes to entertain. Gene has written fifteen full-length novels and several collections of stories on a wide range of subjects, and a weekly newspaper column of the animals and people he’s met while he’s farmed…to novels about the Civil War, Lake County history, and Adult science fiction and fantasy.

Asked, “Why do you write?” his reply was, “Because I must. Writing is like breathing. It is the reason I wake each day glad to be alive.” “Besides,” he adds, “Seeing my stories in print and knowing people enjoy reading them is like having Apple Pie… and I love Apple Pie.”