Michael Miller has written hundreds of thousands of words over the past two decades as a successful author.

But Miller’s sixth book — released late last week — holds an extra special meaning for the Bradford native: he got to co-write it with his role model.

The book, “Journeying Beyond the Mountaintop,” is the autobiography of Tom Bleecker, a Hollywood screenwriter who is also an eighth degree black belt in American Kenpo Karate.

The two met at a seminar in Florida in 2012 and immediately developed a relationship.

“Tom happened to be one of the eight instructors at that event,” Miller recalled, “and he and I hit it off right away.

“When you’re in the same (martial arts) system, you hear of people and he was very aware of me and I was very aware of him because he’s my role model and the guy I want to be like.”

Miller, a fifth-degree black belt, owns Miller’s Kenpo Karate Dojo in Bradford and has taught martial arts to hundreds of kids and adults from the region since 2006. He stayed in contact with Bleecker after that first encounter and the two went on to work together on one of Bleecker’s next books.

After that successful project, Bleecker reached back out to Miller a few years ago as the now 77-year-old was ready to write his autobiography.

The writing process, which began last year, relied heavily on technology with Bleecker living in Hollywood and Miller stationed in McKean County.

Miller, who graduated from the University of Pittsburgh at Bradford in 2002 with a bachelor’s degree in writing and a minor in sociology, had written several other books on the “legends of Kenpo” and began to embark on the process of turning someone’s life story into a hopeful page-turner.

“It was a pretty good process because he talked about his life on a dictaphone and then sent all the files to me on email,” Miller explained. “I downloaded and transcribed them and I had all the information…which was hours and hours worth.

“(Doing it that way) actually saved time because I didn’t have to call and interview him and transcribe those so it turned out to be an easier process than other books.”

The 356-page autobiography is filled with nearly 200 photos and describes Bleecker’s life starting with his tough childhood and upbringing in New Jersey before the cross-country move. It then focuses on his beginnings with American Kenpo to his later work with Hollywood stars such as Bruce Lee and William Shatner.

Bleecker worked with Oscar-winning screenwriter and director Blake Edwards for nearly 15 years and spent close to 30 in Hollywood altogether.

And while that writing career is featured heavily, a majority of the book focuses on his affiliation with American Kenpo Karate and how he helped that self-defense combat system develop over a nearly 60-year period.

“Tom is one of the original black belts under Ed Parker who is the founder of the system of martial arts that I teach,” Miller said. “He started training in 1962 under Ed and there were only three black belts in the system. Now there are thousands.”

Bleecker’s career eventually led him to cross paths with Lee, the martial arts icon, who was the subject of Bleecker’s first book, the “The Bruce Lee Story,” co-written by Bruce’s wife, Linda Lee. The two went on to marry in 1988, the same year the book was published.

Bleecker went on to write two additional books on Lee, including a mystery-thriller and full length feature screenplay inspired by the controversial death of kung-fu legend.

All of those stories on Bleecker’s interactions with some of Hollywood’s most recognizable names like Clint Eastwood and Julie Andrews are featured in the autobiography, which Miller says took around seven months to complete.

The book is available exclusively on Amazon and only in paperback for the time being. For Prime subscribers, the cost is $24.95. Miller’s other five books are also available online.

“I wrote the very first draft and sent it to him and it probably took me a month to write it and then it took him about two months to kind of read it over and manipulate it a little bit,” Miller said. “He then sent another draft and I read through it to catch any mistakes and to edit it….

“He’s a Hollywood writer, we are talking top of the line journalist and screenwriter…he knew a heck of a lot more than I do.”