Benton physician completes 'list' with ' We All Hear Voices' release
By MIKE DOUGHERTY Editor

Dr. Sam Taggart is a partner in a successful eight-physician family practice in Benton. He has a home on Lake Hamilton in Hot Springs, where he lives with a wife he adores, Dr. Annette Enderlin, a successful ophthalmologist whose office is near Taggart's at 3 Medical Plaza near Saline Memorial Hospital.

He has accomplished much in his life. But he had one major goal that had been on his "bucket list," he said, since he was a teenager.

He wanted to write a novel.

"When I was 14 growing up in Augusta, Arkansas, my dad gave me a gun, so I could go hunting, Taggart said. "So I did. I began hunting.

"I would take the gun and a book and I would go out into the field and read.

"I killed two rabbits and a squirrel over the next two years. Then I finally gave the gun back to my dad and told him that it might as well go to someone who would enjoy it because I wanted to be a writer."

He wrote off and on over the years, but mostly collected a pile of unfinished stories and scraps of paper with ideas for other stories jotted on them.

Then in the early 1990s, he said, he wrote a short story called "Wheel of Fortune" and he's been writing since then. In 1992 or so, he began working on a manuscript that eventually became "We All Hear Voices," which Taggart has self-published through iUniverse. It is available at Hastings Books Music and Video, 1431 Military Road in Benton, can be ordered from iUniverse, Amazon and Barnes & Noble online and will be available at Barnes & Noble stores March 18.

The book takes place in a small town in Arkansas called Gum Ridge. It's not Augusta, Taggart said, but it is a lot like his hometown.

"It's somewhere east of Batesville, south and west of Jonesboro and north of Newport," Taggart said. (That would place it about 40 miles north of Augusta, if it existed on an Arkansas map.)

He said the title of the book evolved from an instance in 1996 when he was describing his writing project and a nurse commented, "Yeah, we all hear voices."

The Web site for Taggart's book, weallhearvoices.com, describes the book:

"Brimming with Southern flavor and peppered with quirky characters with their own unique challenges, We All Hear Voices serves up a tale of unlikely friendships and the human desire for happiness.

"Jack, the troubled cook at Moon's Bar and Grill, has the gift of synesthesia; that is, he hears colors and tastes shapes. His passion for flavors and smells turn even the most ordinary dishes into magnificent creations and soon Moon's is the hottest eatery in the Mississippi Delta.

"Mary Ann, the waitress who befriends Jack, is waiting for some tallcotton cowboy to sweep her off her feet and far away from this town. The problem is: when Mr. Right shows up she isn't sure she wants to go.

"Moon, the owner of the grill, is a man who has spent his life convincing himself that bad ideas are good ideas. He's on a first name basis with the God of Chance and his get-rich-quickschemes threaten to bring down this little house of cards."

Taggart said he actually finished the manuscript for "We All Hear Voices" a few years ago and set it aside to work on other writing projects - three of which already are longer efforts than the new book.

He said his wife got the old manuscript out one day in mid-2004. She told him that if he didn't do something with it, she was going to. So he started doing checking to see what it would take to get it published.

Taggart said he was not concerned with making any bestseller lists or making a lot of money from the book, but he did want to see it finally published.

"I did some research and decided to go with iUniverse," he said. "They have been professional all the way, including in assigning me an excellent editor. One thing I was impressed with was how much she worked to make this a better book."

He said occasionally he did encounter things that indicated she was of a younger generation. "She asked me once, 'Who's Faubus?' "

One thing that surprised him about the entire editing process, Taggart said, was his reaction to deadlines.

"I really had not worked under deadline situations before, since the days of writing papers in school," he said. "I was surprised to discover that I didn't respond as well as I would have guessed - I got nervous as certain editing deadlines approached."

Taggart said he has always been organized and preparing for the editing deadlines was no different.

"But I would get nervous about the deadline, even if I was on schedule to complete that part of the editing. … I learned something about myself."

The original printing of the book was sent to Taggart in December. He said he was excited to finally have it in hand, but was disappointed when a close friend pointed out a major error in the printing. He called the man serving as his liaison at iUniverse and told him that he wanted them to be reprinted.

"He said, 'You know this is going to cost you more money.' I told them that I knew that but I had to do it right."

Taggart plans to speak on synesthesia at a book-signing event at the Bob Herzfeld Memorial Library, 1800 Smithers Drive in Benton at 6 p.m. Monday, and then will repeat the lecture and signing at the Bryant Public Li- brary at 6 p.m. Tuesday.

He will appear at book-signing sessions at Smith-Caldwell Drug Store, 414 N. Main St. in Benton from 7:30 to 9 a.m. and 5-7:30 p.m. March 13. The Hastings store in Benton will host a session from 3 to 6 p.m. March 15.

Taggart will deliver the synesthesia lecture and sign books at the Hot Spring County Library in Malvern at 3:30 p.m. March 17.

Back in Saline County, a reception and book-signing session will be held at Dizzy's Grill, 1217 Ferguson Drive in Benton, from 7 to 9 p.m. March 20.