A doctor-turned-prisoner-turned-crime writer aims
for goose pimples with his latest novel.

JULIE EDGAR SENIOR WRITER

R

obert Davis is the kind of
character you'd find in the
pages of a hard-boiled
crime story: He starts out
good, battles drug and alcohol
addictions, gets nabbed for a
crime he says he didn't commit,
goes to prison, straightens up ...
and writes a few novels.
Dr. Davis, a Farmington Hills
native, just published the first
of four books he wrote while in
the Lompoc federal penitentiary
in California, where he served 2
1/2 years for allegedly billing in-
surance companies for services
not performed at his medical
clinic in Salt Lake City.
After his release last June, he
moved back to Detroit to pro-
mote Plutonium Murders, the
last in a series of novels he
penned in prison. Horizon Press,
his publisher, printed 30,000
copies in the first run and has
orders for 20,000, he said.
Sylvester Stallone requested
a copy of Plutonium Murders,

and Dr. Davis and his publish-
er have contacted movie studios,
a number of which are "very ea-
ger," he said.
Dr. Davis, whose parents.are
Thelma and Marshall, plans to
return to the Southwest, hope-
fully as a physician. He has pe-
titioned for a medical license in
New Mexico.
In a series of recent bookstore
signings in the area, Dr. Davis,
43, has sold a few hundred
copies of the book, which has
as its hero Dr. Alex Seacourt,
who saves the world from a
plutonium-poisoned water sup-
ply — after he himself is poi-
soned.
"Alex Seacourt's character is
kind of my alter ego. He's my
height and weight, he's my age,
he's a smart guy, he's moralis-
tic. He kind of gets thrown in
these dilemmas and has to work
his way out," Dr. Davis ex-
plained.
As for style, he compares him-

PHOTO BY JOH N M. DISCHER

Medicine Men

self to John McDonald, author the "hole" —solitary confine- of Miami. And, back in high
school, Dr. Davis won a writing
of the Travis McGee crime/sus- ment.
"It was a terrible place. The contest for a local newspaper.
pense novels, and John Gr-
only way I could get out was to Writing was a talent akin to
isham.
"Anything science fiction-y in- go to the typing room, which was speaking a foreign language: He
spires me. I like Stephen King, also the size of a bathroom. I had little use for it until it was his
started going there two hours only means of being understood.
too.
Drugs didn't land him in
"Grisham is my inspiration a day. There was no dictionary,
from a marketing point of view. no thesaurus. That's when I prison, but they paved the way.
Dr. Davis began using drugs
He self-published A Time To Kill started writing," he said.
He had minored in English in in college. He dropped out of the
and literally got in his car and
drove around the Southeast college before moving south to University of Miami because of a
seaboard. He bought all the study medicine at the University MEDICINE MEN page 12
copies and gave
them away.
"Tom Clancy
was unable to
find a publisher.
He cut a deal
with Annapolis
Press, which did
Hunt For Red Oc-
tober. Those sto-
ries go on forever.
Walt Whitman is
an example of
a guy who self-
published. It's a
business like any-
thing else: it's
about believing in
yourself. That's
what I learned
while I was in-
carcerated."
The genesis of
Dr. Davis' new
career began in Robert Davis signs a copy of Plutonium Murders for Gwen Kelly of Lake Orion.

.

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