Evening star., 1945-06-24
Among
the Authors
By Carolyn Cogeins.

This Man Truman" will be the
title Of the story of Truman's life,
coming August 6, which has been
written by Frank McNaughton and
Walter Hehmeyer. McNaughton has
been covering Truman for Time
Magazine the last four years and Is
Missouri man. Hehmeyer was on
the Truman Committee.
y X X X
An unusual story came our way
from man who had visited several
German prison camps in the United
States. There he found the Ger
mans learning English with the help
of Sears Roebuck catalogues. Since
the thousands Of items listed in 1t
are described in very simple Ian
guage, it is their favorite means of
studying. Also, since size, color and
the like are given for nearly every
thing, they get practical words.
u X X X
An enormous supply of sharp
pencils and week ends at home are
the things H. w. Roden requires to
turn out a mystery story. He is
president and general manager of
baby food company, an occupa-
ton sufficient to send most men
YEARLY to the country every Sat-
urday to recover. 1t may be that
his writing career happened, and
was from the first successful, be-
cause he is an executive who or
ganizes any project he undertakes.
Or it may be due to his air-condi-
toned Office where we went to dis
cover some Of the more interesting
details of how he became an author.
For years he has been a mystery
story fan, preferring the hard
boiled type of story. Finally his de-
mand far exceeded the supply of
such books, and he sat down to
work out a plot just to amuse him.
self. He was so entertained he kept
right on until book had been COM
pleted around it and sent off You
Only Hang Once" to a publisher
Rather, he gave a list of IL pub
fishers to his secretary, and told her
to send the manuscript to the first
one-Morrow-and then to the 9TH
ers right down the line until they
had all had look at It, That off
his chest, he and Mrs. Roden left for
California.
Soon afterward a letter was for
warded to Mr.. Roden. 1t was from
Morrow, who knew nothing of the
author of course. They said they
would publish his story, and ex-
planned that although advances
were never large for mysteries, if he
were In need of funds they would
be glad to send him a couple hun
dred dollars against royalties. Since
Mr.. Roden was then at Del Monte
paying something like s35 day for
his room he sat right down and told
them he certainly could use 5000.
So many people asked him how
long it took to write a book that he
kept track when he wrote the next
one, TOO Busy to Die" He spent
total of four weeks of 1O-hour
days on it. He lives in a penthouse
on upper Fifth avenue with a ter
race overlooking Central Park.
Whatever he scribbles on week ends
is typed by the secretary at his office
SO that he can correct from these.
Usually about three drafts are done
on book.
Mr.. Roden is a medium sized man
with rosy fresh face and graying
hair. He has very blue eyes, a calm,
collected appearance and seems to
be one of the fortunate whose work
and hobby of writing are done in
such a well-balanced way they give
him pleasure and profit without
wearing him out. All his books
have been selected by the Detective
Book Club. They have all gone into
reprint editions and foreign editions.