Bill was born May 27, 1954 in Chicago, Illinois. He grew up in an eccentric house in Mahopac, New York, where he enjoyed playing ping-pong and poker with friends. Bill earned his bachelor's degree in English from Harvard University in 1981. He yearned to be a writer and, as he put it, supported that ambition by working as a bonded courier, circulation department flunky, customer support serf, and radio dispatcher for everything from teamsters to private detectives. In 1988 he visited Ashland, Oregon, for the Shakespeare Festival and vowed that he would live there; twelve years later he moved there and lived the rest of his life in Ashland.
Bill published thirteen short mystery stories in the late nineties and later two science fiction novels, The Unwound Way and The End of Fame, that he wrote with his cousin Cecil Brooks. Dead Sirius, a thriller, was published in 2008. All of these works, along with an earlier unpublished novel, Tilt, are currently available from Amazon.
Bill's great loves were books, movies, board games, and the theater. He was an amazing font of information on all of them. In Ashland, he shared his knowledge and insights about Shakespeare with friends and guests. A memory we cherish was the time he drew a crowd at the first intermission of a slightly puzzling production of Coriolanus, explaining to us and a bunch of strangers just who these characters were and what was going on. Over the past year, hardly a day has gone by without us thinking of some arcane question we want to ask him.
Bill is survived by his brother Edward, sister Lia, nephew Dell, niece Kelsey, cousins Jerry and Cecil, and his in-laws Judy, Fran, and David. We all miss him.
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