David Davis has had 17 plays produced, including productions in New York and Hollywood.  His script, NIGHT OF THE HAWK, was produced off-off Broadway in 2003.  A collection of his plays has been published under the title, “Selected Plays of David Davis.” His novel, “The Mistakes,” was published in September 2020. He has also published a collection of essays on religion and science, “Seven Heretical Sermons,” a collection of mystery short stories, “The Detectives,” and a collection of poetry, “Heartspan.” He has also had poetry, magazine features, and scholarly articles published.  He earned a Ph.D. in Theatre and is a member of the Dramatists Guild, Atlanta Dramatists, and the Atlanta Writers Group. He has worked as a physics and math teacher, actor, head of three college theatre programs, technical writer, editor, and health communications specialist.  He currently lives in Atlanta, GA, with his wife, Kathy, and has one daughter, Elizabeth.

• Facebook
• Twitter
• Instagram
• LinkedIn

David Davis – Writer

Novels and Other Books

NOW AVAILABLE ON AMAZON OR BARNES AND NOBEL IN HARDCOVER, SOFTCOVER, AND EBOOKS.

SELECTED PLAYS OF DAVID DAVIS

This collection of playscripts includes full-lengths, one-acts, and short plays selected from the works of David Davis. Produced Off-Off Broadway, in regional theatres, and by educational and community theatres these plays cover the range of theatre, from comedy to tragedy, history plays to science fiction, poetry to theatrical experiments. Several won awards from groups like the Southeastern Theatre Conference and Western Carolina University. The comedies reveal a sly sense of humor and recognition of the absurdities in life while the dramas show an awareness of how small things can be just as significant as major events. These plays have come alive on the stage and now come alive again on the page.

HEARTSPAN

Heartspan is a collection of poems covering the entire range of emotions from the humorous to the satiric to the serious and heartbreaking.  Taken from various eras in the author’ life, these poems touch on everything from sex to literary criticism to historical events.  Written to be clear even to the average reader, the poetry reaches all parts of our lives, usually looking at things from a slightly odd point of view.

THE DETECTIVES

Like locked room murder mysteries?  Stories about impossible to solve crimes?  Detectives who are out of the norm? The Detectives is a novella and several short stories about just such puzzles and the detectives who solve them.

Set in various locations in the South and Southwest, all six start with the puzzle of how a murder happened, but quickly move on to the puzzle of the detectives themselves and how they deal with the crime.  How do normal people suddenly deal with seemingly unsolvable puzzles?  And how does that change them?

The novella is about an ex-basketball player female agent with the North Carolina State Bureau of Investigation who is assigned to assist a small beach town when a body is found in a locked-from-the-inside “hurricane-proof house” just off the beach.  How it was done is quickly solved, but who did it when most people had no reason or opportunity to kill the guy is much more of a problem. 

Other stories involve a rookie detective in Virginia facing the case of young college teacher who dies sitting alone on the end of a small fishing pier in plain sight of witnesses on the shore and a Hispanic female chief detective in Yuma, AZ, taking over the case of young man shot and stabbed inside an empty locked jail cell inside an empty prison from the 1800s.  This is followed by a police captain with a “Dolly Parton” figure dealing with two orphan college women found nude with a claymore thrust through their bodies inside a locked University of Arizona Baptist Student Union building and a medically retired detective asked to help solve the case of an elderly college professor repeatedly stabbed inside her own locked apartment in faculty housing in the mountains of Kentucky.  The final story concerns an ex-football lineman turned amateur detective in Atlanta and a young accountant who disappears from her own locked apartment several stories above the street.  In each case, the detectives must draw on their own lives and experiences to figure out what really happened and why.  In these cases, it is the people who are the real puzzle, not the crime.

SEVEN HERETICAL SERMONS

Seven Heretical Sermons is a collection of essays in sermon form intended for the layperson dealing with the impact of modern science on theology.  Written with a humorous, sometimes sarcastic tone, it reviews the historical development of several theological ideas, including aspects of beliefs about abortion, the origin of religion, homosexuality, evil, creation, and the nature of God; all in the context of modern scientific thought.  In the past, when science has appeared to contradict theology, it has been theology that eventually adapted to science.  Today that process continues, despite many efforts to resist the process.  Here physics and anthropology are mixed with history and textual analysis to explore a new way of looking at religion. 

The Mistakes

By David Davis

Science fiction humor relevant to current social and environmental problems that relates to senior citizens through young adults concerned about intolerance of “the other.”

Available in hard cover, soft cover, and ebooks on Amazon https://www.amazon.com/Mistakes-David-Davis/dp/1646631633/ref=sr_1_1?dchild=1&keywords=The+Mistakes%2C+david+davis&qid=1600870747&s=books&sr=1-1, Barnes and Noble https://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/the-mistakes-david-davis/1137324203?ean=9781646631612, and through most book stores.

Description

When Hal Southerland, a socially isolated computer contracts manager nearing retirement at a federal agency in Atlanta, spots a curious anomaly on an astronomy website, he realizes aliens are coming.  A slip of the tongue before it becomes public knowledge results in Hal being chosen by the aliens to serve in a very special role: king of the planet.  The catch is that Earth is on the verge of environmental disaster, and this very special role has a very special task: to choose which four billion humans will be “Disappeared” to preserve the oxygen essential for both human and alien survival.

What follows is a series of missteps on the path toward creating a world where he aliens and humans can live together in peace.  Will Hal and his alien “liaison” Angie (who looks a lot like Marilyn Monroe) find a way for humans and aliens to live side by side?  Or will the mistakes continue in this clash of civilizations?

Endorsement Quotes:   The Mistakes  by David Davis

The precise, savvy prose of David Davis tells a science fantasy story so compelling as to be absurd, realistic – and humorous — as it unfolds!   When a sophisticated, bookish, middle-aged widower finds himself  “enthroned” among beneficent, highly advanced, though controlling,  Alien visitors to our planet,  the difficult literary objective becomes … believability!…  Davis’s hero, Hal Southerland, achieves it!   We care about his fate as he negotiates his way through a network of Alien involvements; and, as the visitors try to establish themselves in their adopted earthly home, the dramatic effect of The Mistakes lingers well past the final page…

R. Cary Bynum, Former publisher, Author of Night Streetcars, Woodhall Stories, and Reunion In Thera

“It all started with a mistake – and no, I don’t mean the universe, although that’s debatable. The mistake in this novel was Hal Southerland opening his big dumb mouth to James Gilly about a possible alien spaceship heading to earth. From that one seemingly innocuous slip of the tongue, one mistake after another builds up to a bizarre and exciting boiling point in this hilarious sci-fi satire in the vein of ‘Catch 22’ and ‘Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy’. David Davis crafts a delightful tale about human incompetence mixed with a golly-gee optimism that leaves the reader laughing at, while also feeling strangely hopeful about, humanity’s future. Can we coexist with Aliens? Well, as one character points out, “humans have a very bad history of getting along with ‘the other.’” But perhaps Hal can overcome his own mistakes and show us all the way.”

Daniel Guyton, MFA, Author of “Three Ladies of Orpington” and “The Mother of God Visits Hell”

David Davis invades readers imaginations as we follow his protagonist and widower, Hal Southerland, and the entire planet’s surrender to the “too slow to be scary” invasion. Prepare for your mind to be invaded, by Hal’s unanticipated, unexpected leadership into a deal for a new earth.

Valetta Anderson, Stage & Screen Writer Member of Dramatists Guild, Merely Writers and Working Title Playwrights. Served on the Boards of Decatur Arts Alliance, Georgia Assembly of Community Arts Agencies and Working Title Playwrights. Was Executive Director of DeKalb Council for the Arts and Teaching Artist at the Alliance, Fox and Horizon Theatres and was Adjunct Professor of Playwriting at Spelman College.

Plays

Poetry and Other Writing

Poetry

David Davis has had poetry published in national poetry magazines, including Amelia Magazine, The Kindred Spirit, Poet’s Corner, Kentucky Poetry Review, Esquisite Corpse, MANNA, Cotton Boll, and the St. Andrews Review.

Scholarly Works

David Davis has published peer-reviewed academic articles in Public Health Reports, AIDS Eduction and Prevention, Health Promotion Practice, and Southern Theatre.

Essays, Reviews, and Journalism

David Davis’s work has appeared in Creative Loafing (Atlanta, GA), Spontaneous Magazine (Atlanta, GA), and the Trinity Review (San Antonio, TX).