Dave Donelson – Portfolio – Dave Donelson Portfolio

A life of stories told with words and images

Provence Reflections touches on art and artists, history, folklore, and the sights and sounds of the south of France. Not a travel guide, the book gives a wildly different view of this wonderful tourist region as seen through the Dave Doelson's photographs, paintings, drawings, prose, and poetry.

The Journal of My Seventieth Year - a memoir in real time

A journal is a journey. In this case, my journey through a tumultuous year recorded day by day in words and pictures. The journey begins in the Summer of 2020 as a deadly pandemic kills millions of people around the world and one of the most portentous Presidential election campaigns in American history builds to a climax with unimaginable consequences. The journey ends in the Spring of 2021. Over the year, I become a different person, as all journeys change those who undertake them.

Fathers

When Dave Donelson became a father, he pledged to protect his own children from a tumultuous childhood like the one he experienced. His three successive fathers were role models of the worst kind—absent when he needed them most, unable or unwilling to support a family, at times even physically and mentally abusive. He wrote Fathers: a memoir to tell his own son and daughter the story of how he rose from a life lived in dirt-floor cellars, went to work at the age of 12, and became not only a successful entrepreneur and community leader but, most importantly, a father who loves them with all his heart.

Fiction

Not all we believe is real, nor all fiction false. I write stories long and short, fun, serious, and entertaining.

Golf

I have a life-long obsession with the game I have played and reported around the world.

Nonfiction

As true as I can make it with observations and reportage.

Photography

I try to tell at least one story in every image real and imagined.

about me

My careers as a broadcaster, entrepreneur, writer, and photographer have taken me from the jungles of Australia’s Cape York Peninsula to the minarets of Riyadh. I’ve climbed the spire of the Empire State Building, floated the Usumacinta River to the Mayan ruins at Piedras Negras in Guatemala, and photographed the tree-climbing lions and mountain gorillas of Uganda. I've also played and written about golf everywhere from Scotland to Cabo San Lucas, Pebble Beach to Casablanca.

Since 1999, I have been a full time freelance writer and photographer and published many books of fiction, non-fiction, and photography. My work has appeared in dozens of national and regional print and online publications. In previous careers I’ve been an entrepreneur and management consultant for corporations large and small across the United States.

I live in a 300-year-old farmhouse in West Harrison, NY, with my wife, Nora, and an ever-changing roster of dogs, cats, and assorted wildlife.

It's not possible for a writer--or his readers--to be too interested in the world around him. Thanks for joining me in mine.