My Story
WP Truesdell was a radio brat who grew up in southern Minnesota and northern Illinois. He attended Illinois State University, where he studied theatre and playwriting.
Like many of his classmates, Chicago became his next destination. He was the marketing director with Northlight Theatre and Managing Director for The Orchestra of Illinois before moving to similar positions at Boston's Huntington Theatre, The Cleveland Play House, The Cleveland Museum of Art, and the Kansas City Repertory Theatre.
As a consultant, Truesdell served several diverse cities including Dallas, Milwaukee, Long Island, and Montgomery AL. Throughout his career in arts communications, he continued writing plays, roughly a half dozen and short stories.
In 2018, he returned to Illinois State to manage the Illinois Shakespeare Festival. With the arrival of COVID, Truesdell took early retirement to be a full-time writer.
In Boston, he studied creative writing under author John V. Higgins, who encouraged him to continue. Several short stories resulted.
In 2008, a stage play entitled Sparts Radio received a favorable production in KC. It became the basis for his first novel, For Love of Art and Ericka, available on Amazon and Lulu.
His pen name, "Truesdell..." was chosen for his maternal grandfather Glenn Truesdell. It is also his official stage name under the Actor's Equity Union, which he joined while a professional actor in Boston.
FOR MEDIA RELEASE
CONTACT: Will Truesdell, wptruesdell@gmail.com, (309-714-1600)
BLENDED GENRE NOVEL INSPIRED BY CLEVELAND ART EXHIBITION
(Bloomington, IL) Author W.P. Truesdell announces the release of his second novel, THE PHANTOM BUGATTI (274 pages), on Amazon.com in e-book, soft and hardback covers.
Set in Cleveland and rural Indiana in the Y2K era, world-wary Jack Reinhart has just inherited his grandfather’s forgotten farm property. Visiting it for the first time since his youth, Jack discovers under the barn a rare French-built Bugatti car from 1931.
Against his wife Sally's initial desire, Jack decides to restore the antique and seeks out advice from an early automobile expert who gives him the confidence to pursue it. Without any experience, Jack enlists help from a mechanical high school buddy, Flahaven. They start making routine visits to the farm and soon engage with locals at a nearby tavern, including two attractive sisters who operate a cafe.
Over time, Jack finds a kindred spirit in one of them, Rosie, who helps him piece together the puzzle of his Grandfather's Bugatti. At the same time, he loses trust in Flahaven, whose motives he begins questioning. The restoration is further complicated by Jack's lack of funds and marital issues.
According to Truesdell, “My novel imagines an average guy's journey of self-discovery through the process of restoring a family heirloom and his own life goals. Elements of legacy, family secrets, love, and betrayal come together as Jack uncovers truths about his world. For auto buffs, an intriguing link is drawn between Europe’s auto entrepreneur Ettore Bugatti and Auburn Automobile Company’s legendary E.L. Cord, who transformed the fledgling Indiana carmaker."
William (Prenevost) Truesdell recently turned to writing novels after a forty-year career in arts management, his last position heading the Illinois Shakespeare Festival. He attributes His writing experience includes playwriting, poetry, and short stories. The Phantom Bugatti to his experience working on The Cleveland Museum of Art’s groundbreaking “Bugatti” exhibition in 1999. The Phantom Bugatti was originally part of a more ambitious historical fiction about the extraordinary Bugatti family of artists, Beauty and Speed, planned for a separate release in 2025.
His first novel, For Love of Art and Ericka, is also set in Cleveland, imagining a farcical “arts makeover” of a sports talk radio station. He resides with his family in central Illinois.
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