Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: SUNDAY, February 12, 1995 TAG: 9502130010
SECTION: VIRGINIA PAGE: C-4 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: CHRISTINE NEUBERGER RICHMOND TIMES-DISPATCH
DATELINE: BOWLING GREEN (AP) LENGTH: Medium
This small, rural community isn't a place where you'd expect to find the best-selling authors of true-life dramas.
Indeed, Bill and Marilyn Hoffer once were told they had to live in New York City to make it in their field.
But the Hoffers, known for such works as ``Midnight Express'' and ``Not Without My Daughter,'' can practice their craft anywhere.
Seven years ago, this husband-and-wife writing team abandoned the hectic pace of Northern Virginia for this Caroline County seat 35 miles north of Richmond.
Since their move to Caroline, the Hoffers have written 10 books, including stories about a jetliner that ran out of fuel, police corruption, an innocent man condemned to death row, the Vietnam War, Peruvian Indians, Nazi hunting and insider trading.
Before arriving in Bowling Green, Bill Hoffer found success with ``Midnight Express,'' the chronicle of an American who escaped the horrors of a Turkish prison where he had been held for years on drug charges. The book was made into a major motion picture.
``Not Without My Daughter'' sold 15 million copies worldwide and was made into a film starring Sally Field. Co-authored by the couple with Betty Mahmoody, it told the harrowing story of an American woman's struggle to flee Iran with her child.
``Freefall,'' the Hoffers' book about an Air Canada Boeing 767 that ran out of fuel at 41,000 feet, will air this month as an ABC made-for-television movie.
The Hoffers are prominent in ``as-told-to'' book circles. But their name might not be familiar to the public, which suits the authors.
Bill, 51, and Marilyn, 48, savor their privacy. The parents of four grown children, they live with their Old English sheepdog, Elsie, in the three-story home they have been renovating since 1987.
Around the dining room table, the Hoffers interview their co-authors for hours on end. Once they have produced the early skeleton of a book, they pore over every page with their collaborators to draw out more details.
``You get into their heads,'' Bill Hoffer said. ``It can be fun sometimes. It can be very painful at times. I don't think we've worked with anyone who didn't experience catharsis.''
The intense sessions build trust and cement lasting ties. The Hoffers became godparents to the daughter of Betty Mahmoody, whose husband held her prisoner in Iran until she and her child escaped across the mountains into Turkey.
Dennis Levine, the former New York investment banker whose arrest on insider trading charges led authorities to Ivan Boesky and Michael Milken, was easy to work with, they said. But Levine, who penned ``Inside Out'' with Bill Hoffer, clearly felt more at home on New York's Wall Street than Bowling Green's Main Street.
Levine ``was just climbing the walls,'' Marilyn Hoffer said. ``He would much rather be in New York with telephones and faxes. He was thoroughly New York.''
Richard Burke, a former administrative assistant to Sen. Edward Kennedy, D- Mass., fared better. Burke found an outlet in the health club he joined in Fredericksburg.
``The Senator: My Ten Years with Ted Kennedy,'' co-written with both Hoffers, described Burke and Kennedy's alleged cocaine use as well as the inner workings of Congress.
Father Mariano Gagnon, a Franciscan priest who lived with Indians in Peru's jungles for 20 years, perhaps came to feel most at home during his stay in Bowling Green.
The American-born priest got to know the local barber and liked to buy farm produce as he took daily strolls around town. He used salty language, loved Scotch and relished the water rides at Paramount's Kings Dominion nearby.
``Warriors In Eden'' told Gagnon's story of how he led the Ashaninka Indians in remote jungles and mountains of Peru to fight for survival against terrorists, drug smugglers and a right-wing government.
``You find that people who seem average are capable of extraordinary things,'' Marilyn Hoffer said. ``You find they aren't so average after all.''
by CNB