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Tenebrae: A Memoir of Love and Death
Mink Eyes introduces us to Dan Flanigan the novelist. Tenebrae: A Memoir of Love and Death shows us another side of Dan - the poet. The lead poem in this collection, is a lovely bracelet of verse and prose poems that link brilliantly together in a gripping narrative and wrenching emotional journey through the illness and death of his wife.
Other poems in the book - including several snapshot portraits of Dan's extended family under the title The Irish in America - reflect this same grappling with the fundamental issues of our lives - loss, change, growth, hope, despair and acceptance, reflecting throughout a compassionate embrace of the human condition. These are truly poems for the people - plain but exquisitely crafted, direct as a dagger, and expressed in a language that is both elegant and easy to understand at the same time. They reach from the heart to the heart.
Other poems in the book - including several snapshot portraits of Dan's extended family under the title The Irish in America - reflect this same grappling with the fundamental issues of our lives - loss, change, growth, hope, despair and acceptance, reflecting throughout a compassionate embrace of the human condition. These are truly poems for the people - plain but exquisitely crafted, direct as a dagger, and expressed in a language that is both elegant and easy to understand at the same time. They reach from the heart to the heart.
74 pages, Kindle Edition
Published March 3, 2019
3 people want to read
About the author
Dan Flanigan
13 books44 followersDan Flanigan is a novelist, playwright, poet, and practicing lawyer. He holds a Ph.D. in History from Rice University and J.D. from the University of Houston. He taught Jurisprudence at the University of Houston and American Legal History at the University of Virginia. His first published book was his Ph.D. dissertation, The Criminal Law of Slavery and Freedom, 1800-1868.
He moved on from academia to serve the civil rights cause as a school desegregation lawyer, followed by a long career as a finance attorney in private law practice. He became a name partner in the Polsinelli law firm in Kansas City, created its Financial Services practice, chaired its Real Estate & Financial Services Department for two decades, and established the firm’s New York City office and served as its managing partner until October 2022. View his legal bio at https://www.polsinelli.com/profession....
Taking a break from the law practice for two years in 1983-1985, he and his wife, Candy, founded Sierra Tucson, a prominent alcohol and drug treatment center located in Tucson, Arizona.
Recently, he has been able to turn his attention to his lifelong ambition—creative writing. In 2019 he released a literary trifecta including "Mink Eyes," the first in the Peter O’Keefe series, "Dewdrops," a collection of shorter fiction, and "Tenebrae: A Memoir of Love and Death."
"Tenebrae" is a bracelet of verse and prose poems dedicated to his wife, Candy, to honor her last illness and death and their 40-plus years together, a work that has been described as “celebratory” and “heartbreaking and exquisite.” It was a Finalist for both the 2022 IAN Book of the Year in Poetry and in the 2022 American Book Fest “Best Book” Award in the Legacy: Autobiography/Memoir category. The audiobook version will be released in 2026.
Dan’s novella, "Dewdrops," was originally written for the stage and enjoyed a successful full-cast staged reading at the Theatre of the Open Eye in New York. Its then well-known and regarded director John Cappellatti described the play as a “powerful” work about “addiction in America—addiction to drugs, alcohol, sex, danger, power, and to finding the Answer,” with characters that are “well drawn, real, and actors love to portray them.” The short story collection comprised of "Dewdrops," "On the Last Frontier" and "Some Cold War Blues" was a Finalist in the 2022 Independent Author Network Book of the Year for Short Story Collection and a 2022 American Book Fest “Best Book” Award Finalist in Fiction-Short Story.
In 2025, Dan published a second edition of "Dewdrops" to include a new story, "Dude." As an Editor’s Pick, Book Life called it “a short story collection that’s as heartbreaking, raw, and real as it is beautiful and tender” and said “Flanigan’s prose is melodic and hypnotizing, jarring and chaotic, exploring the human condition through a series of tense, often melancholic tales that still capture the imagination with their reality, sweetness, and sadness.” Writer's Digest said it more simply, "The writing is truly flawless." "Dewdrops" was a 2025 Global Book Awards Gold Medalist.
"The Big Tilt," the second book in the Peter O’Keefe series, was published in 2020 and has been described as “deft, hard-boiled, but literary prose that’s reminiscent of Raymond Chandler’s best work.” "The Big Tilt" won the 2022 National Indie Excellence Award for Crime Fiction and was a Finalist for the 2022 Independent Author Network’s Book of the Year in Thriller/Suspense. In 2023, "The Big Tilt" was a Legacy Fiction finalist for the prestigious Eric Hoffer Award as well as making the 2023 Eric Hoffer Book Award Grand Prize Short List.
"On Lonesome Roads," published in 2022, is the third book in the series and was a Notable 100 Book in the 2022 Shelf Unbound Best Indie Book Competition and 2023 IPPY Silver Medalist in the Best Mystery/Thriller eBook category. Most notably, "On Lonesome Roads" followed up "The Big Tilt’s" 2022 NIEA Cri
He moved on from academia to serve the civil rights cause as a school desegregation lawyer, followed by a long career as a finance attorney in private law practice. He became a name partner in the Polsinelli law firm in Kansas City, created its Financial Services practice, chaired its Real Estate & Financial Services Department for two decades, and established the firm’s New York City office and served as its managing partner until October 2022. View his legal bio at https://www.polsinelli.com/profession....
Taking a break from the law practice for two years in 1983-1985, he and his wife, Candy, founded Sierra Tucson, a prominent alcohol and drug treatment center located in Tucson, Arizona.
Recently, he has been able to turn his attention to his lifelong ambition—creative writing. In 2019 he released a literary trifecta including "Mink Eyes," the first in the Peter O’Keefe series, "Dewdrops," a collection of shorter fiction, and "Tenebrae: A Memoir of Love and Death."
"Tenebrae" is a bracelet of verse and prose poems dedicated to his wife, Candy, to honor her last illness and death and their 40-plus years together, a work that has been described as “celebratory” and “heartbreaking and exquisite.” It was a Finalist for both the 2022 IAN Book of the Year in Poetry and in the 2022 American Book Fest “Best Book” Award in the Legacy: Autobiography/Memoir category. The audiobook version will be released in 2026.
Dan’s novella, "Dewdrops," was originally written for the stage and enjoyed a successful full-cast staged reading at the Theatre of the Open Eye in New York. Its then well-known and regarded director John Cappellatti described the play as a “powerful” work about “addiction in America—addiction to drugs, alcohol, sex, danger, power, and to finding the Answer,” with characters that are “well drawn, real, and actors love to portray them.” The short story collection comprised of "Dewdrops," "On the Last Frontier" and "Some Cold War Blues" was a Finalist in the 2022 Independent Author Network Book of the Year for Short Story Collection and a 2022 American Book Fest “Best Book” Award Finalist in Fiction-Short Story.
In 2025, Dan published a second edition of "Dewdrops" to include a new story, "Dude." As an Editor’s Pick, Book Life called it “a short story collection that’s as heartbreaking, raw, and real as it is beautiful and tender” and said “Flanigan’s prose is melodic and hypnotizing, jarring and chaotic, exploring the human condition through a series of tense, often melancholic tales that still capture the imagination with their reality, sweetness, and sadness.” Writer's Digest said it more simply, "The writing is truly flawless." "Dewdrops" was a 2025 Global Book Awards Gold Medalist.
"The Big Tilt," the second book in the Peter O’Keefe series, was published in 2020 and has been described as “deft, hard-boiled, but literary prose that’s reminiscent of Raymond Chandler’s best work.” "The Big Tilt" won the 2022 National Indie Excellence Award for Crime Fiction and was a Finalist for the 2022 Independent Author Network’s Book of the Year in Thriller/Suspense. In 2023, "The Big Tilt" was a Legacy Fiction finalist for the prestigious Eric Hoffer Award as well as making the 2023 Eric Hoffer Book Award Grand Prize Short List.
"On Lonesome Roads," published in 2022, is the third book in the series and was a Notable 100 Book in the 2022 Shelf Unbound Best Indie Book Competition and 2023 IPPY Silver Medalist in the Best Mystery/Thriller eBook category. Most notably, "On Lonesome Roads" followed up "The Big Tilt’s" 2022 NIEA Cri
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