an author and a humorist
Portrait of the author as a young kid
Welcome. My name is Jim Riva. I'm an author. That’s all I really am because that’s all I ever really wanted to be.
I left a small town in Illinois for New York City in order to put myself in an environment more conducive for developing as a writer. After a couple of years there, I figured that a culture-change would do me and my writing some good, so I headed for Kathmandu – and then I was all over the place, especially Asia.
I lived (and wrote like a maniac) in Japan for fourteen years, taking off occasionally with my backpack for several months of off-the-beaten-track traveling and off-beat writing. Then I returned to the USA with my Japanese wife to settle down, start a family, promote my books, and keep on writing.
I have written four books, which are as different as apples, oranges, bananas, and pineapples – and I self-published them under the name Soaring Sparrow Press (motto: “Laughter is good for your health”).
I thought that I would be laughing all the way to the bank, but I was naive. I learned the hard way what a self-publisher like me is up against in the brutal, corporate-controlled book-selling world.
None of my books have achieved best-seller status, and that’s an understatement; but all of my books have drawn raves from readers, and that’s a fact.
If you would like to know what the books are about, please click on the book covers. They are arranged, from top to bottom, in the order that I wrote them.
I aim to entertain, and I hope that you enjoy the ride.
