Every book is a book on craft by Eric Beetner

Do you have favorite craft sessions, or articles/books on craft that you return to for inspiration or help?

This week’s topic is tricky for me because the simple answer would be to write No and then end it there. 

I’m certainly not going to say I am self-taught. I have taken English classes in school, screenwriting classes in college. Never a novel writing class, nor have I bought any guide books or craft books beyond Strunk and White and I still have to refer to it when I come across Farther and Further. 

I can’t say I’m self taught because I learned and continue to learn a great deal by reading. And I should expand on that because I think there is much to be learned by novelists about storytelling structure and style from films, plays, and TV as well. 

Let’s open it up even further (farther?) I have long felt that there is as much if not more to be learned by unsuccessful work than by the brilliant stuff. A bad book or a bad movie can teach volumes IF you can break it down and decipher what doesn’t work for you. There needs to be a sense of what storytelling techniques were ineffective, and how you would improve them.

What is that if not a lesson in craft? 

Self-teaching mostly means taking advantage of the lessons all around us, but doing it outside of a formal classroom or having it written down and presented in a book form or in a seminar. 

Any writer interested in developing their own voice must learn to take in craft from other sources and then learn what to let go, what to absorb into your own style. 

I’ve played guitar since age 15. I took 3 months of lessons from a friend of mine’s brother who was only 3 years older than I was. He taught me basic chords and one blues scale. After that I went off on my own path, spending hours studying and dissecting albums that I loved and learning to play by ear. Through that process I never quite sounded like the records I was trying to emulate, but I learned how to play and how other players I loved did it. I’ve long toyed with the idea of taking formal lessons to learn certain techniques like finger picking or to expand on those blues scales, but I never have because for better or worse, my playing sounds like me. 

There are no shortage of tutorials to teach you how to play like Eddie Van Halen or Stevie Ray Vaughn. But why would I want to sound like someone else? I may not be the most technical player, but everything I’ve done has been 100% mine. I am the sum of my influences which are as varied as Black Flag and Muddy Waters, both of which I played for hours and hours in my bedroom while I learned.

I feel the same about writing. We all have our influences, our inspirations and the writers from whom we borrow either consciously or unconsciously. We absorb craft through the osmosis of consuming stories. We are inspired by great writing to reach for higher peaks, and are inspired by lousy writing to never do it like that.

So I don’t personally refer to books on craft, but instead try to see every book I read as a lesson in craft and it’s up to me what to take from it. 

Not A Birdhouse by Gabriel Valjan

 

Do you have favorite craft sessions, or articles/books on craft that you return to for inspiration or help?

I have never attended a craft session, nor have I paid much attention to either articles or books on craft. Please let me explain. I have read articles by writer friends. This blog is an example. I have visited Career Authors and Jungle Red Writers, but I read for perspective not advice.

I equate books on craft with How To books, a manifestation of Self-Help books, which I find perversely strange. Okay, I hear the counterargument. You read X to learn Y that you don’t know how to do. Let’s say, I want to build a birdhouse. I am not a carpenter, but I know the local store will have a Do It Yourself Kit, with instructions inside. I read the schematic and have at it. The result is a birdhouse. Serviceable and functional. Is it any different from any other birdhouse after the paint job? Probably not.

One and done.

“Now, hold on,” you say. “Writing is a technical activity, and it involves abstract items, such as Character, Plot, Dialogue, and techniques such as Foreshadow, Symbols, Irony, and so on.”

True, but there’s a difference in Intention. A story I tell will say something about me, about my view of the world, my take on humanity and the difficult situations people find themselves in. It may contain humor, a turn of phrase—all these things are unique to me.

When it comes to writing, I say trust yourself and your intellect. You were a reader before you’re a writer, and you have decades of reading behind you. That’s hundreds, if not thousands of books to draw inspiration from. It’s Borges’s short story “The Library of Babel” come to life. You want to know how to do X, refer to your mental Rolodex and summon forth an example from your reading of a writer who did something similar. Study it, analyze how and why it works, and then make it your own.

It’s yours and uniquely You. It will have Soul.

You can teach yourself techniques. I’ve consulted Dave King’s Self-Editing for Fiction Writers because it provided demonstrations of Before and After using excerpts from literary works. The Before is what we have for text from the writer, and the After is the application of Dave’s advice to the passage. Since we don’t have the rough draft or see how the author edited himself, you may or may not agree with Dave, but that’s not the point. Read, analyze, and learn from examples.

What you teach yourself, you remember, and what you internalize, you never forget.

Don’t look outside of yourself. Trust your instincts and your imagination. Trust the sum of all that you have read and observed in life, and your own unique relationship with words and language.

No two people use the language the same way.

Listening and Learning

 Q: Do you have favorite craft sessions, or articles/books on craft that you return to for inspiration or help?

-from Susan

 

At Left Coast Crime last week, a talented writer told me that something I said set her on a new and exciting fictional path. When she told me what resonated so much, it was something quite simple, nothing that I had polished or that I felt was original. It made me think, and it’s relevant to this week’s question.

 

You can hear the same message a hundred times and it runs right past you. At a specific moment in time, however, the gates to your mind open and in that piece of advice sinks in – not because it’s new or brilliant but because it comes in a form you “catch” or at the moment when your subconscious is ready for it.

 

I have a shelf with about a dozen craft books on it, the very first given to me by my biggest supporter and cheerleader, my late partner. BIRD BY BIRD, by his friend Annie Lamott, was just what I needed several years before I had crystallized my desire to write as an alternative career. Lamott’s basic advice is to just do it, no excuses, no rationalizations for being lazy or fearful, just “butt in chair” and get on with it. Her style made her advice not just acceptable but inspiring, a Big Thing broken down into small bites that were achievable. 

 There are bits and pieces of the other books that helped, but for me something said in a particular way becomes the catalyst. Right now on my whiteboard, held up by a magnet, is a list of Billy Wilder’s “Top Ten Screenwriting Rules.” Am I going to write a screenplay? Nope, but the entire list speaks to me about how to structure a novel that will grab and hold the reader. I’m still learning, but “If you have a problem in the third act, the real problem is in the first act” has helped me more than once. 

 I scribbled another piece of advice, maybe from David Corbett, who is whip smart on all writing techniques. It says to ramp up tension, “Put your protagonist in a bad situation and then make it worse!” I sometimes have to apologize to my protagonist as another villain bounds down the stairs while the first is holding her hostage! 

 What I’m trying to say is that there are aha moments, no matter how often and in various ways I have already heard something, when the bell rings and it becomes a forever tool I can draw on in my writing. I haven’t mastered any of this, of course, but when I’m stuck, my eyes drift up to the whiteboard and I’m comforted by the knowledge that so many writers and teachers are ready to help me dig my way out. 

 NOTE: Claire Booth and I are speaking Thursday, May 9 at 6:30 p.m. at the wonderful Avid Reader Bookstore in Davis. And, Terry Shames and I are interviewing each other Saturday, May 11 at 4 p.m. at the equally wonderful Book Passage Bookstore in Marin County. 

Carry On Writing! By Harini Nagendra

What would make you quit writing? Age? Infirmity? Lack of what you consider success? Boredom? Something else?

My fellow '7 Minds' authors, Brenda, Terry and Dietrich, have already responded to this week's prompt - and I was struck by the fact that everyone plans to carry on writing until they absolutely can't. We are all writers because we must, because their is a worm of compulsion that burrows its way into our mind and screams at us, "Write!" - that forces us out of bed at midnight, keeps us up till the late hours when the family is asleep and the road outside is lonely, empty - gets us out of a warm bed takes us to the writing desk in the early hours of the morning, shivering with cold - to get pen to paper, or fingers on keyboard, striving to get things out - because the thoughts swirling in our head demand to be put down on paper, to be organized and reorganized until we're satisfied that they are pulled together in  semi-coherent fashion. Only then can a writer to finally relax, put down their pen and close their notebook (or shut down their computer!), and relax, saying "I'm done. For today. I think."

It's wonderful to write for success, of course - heady when it comes, and terrifying when it doesn't. Infirmity can stop some from writing - it can get hard to hold a pencil, or type on the screen. I have to stop every few minutes now to do a few hand exercises, and lift weights to strengthen my wrists - my body, which I took for granted when I was younger, now reminds me that I'm aging, that I should be doing my eye and neck exercises more regularly if I want to keep writing with the same physical ease that I had until a few years back. But I do know that many writers now use audio to text software to dictate and transcribe their books - just like people dictated their letters to typists in the past. I've tried it, and found it too difficult - so I abandoned this - but if I needed to learn it, I would! 

Political scientist Elinor Ostrom, the first woman to get the Nobel Prize in Economics, and my very dear friend and mentor, battled pancreatic cancer towards the end of her life. She kept writing, and thinking about her writing, even when cancer sent her to the hospital. Her research and writing were what kept her going through difficult times, pushing the physical challenges she faced to the background.One of the very last things she said was "bring me my laptop". I think I can imagine most writers doing some version of the same - just like musicians will continue to practise their craft till the end, and painters will work with their brush and canvas.

Physicist Stephen Hawking was not just a brilliant scientist but also a determined writer - despite severe physical challenges, he found a way to keep writing, with the help of companies like Intel, who custom-designed software and hardware for him to use.       

More recently, I have been following the chronicles of writer Hanif Khureishi, who suffered a serious injury after a fall, but still keeps writing, engaging with readers across the world through his Substack - using dictation to write his new memoir, Shattered. 

I suspect all writers would like to carry on writing until the end...!  

Speaking of writing - my latest book, A Nest of Vipers - book 3 in The Bangalore Detectives Club series - is out on 2 May! Pre-orders are open here 

A Nest of Vipers - Harini Nagendra 

Death stalks the streets of Bangalore when the Circus comes to town . . .

January 1922.

The Bangalore Constabulary is on high alert as The Prince of Wales is scheduled to visit the city to redeem his reputation after disastrous visits marked by violent anti-British riots.

Kaveri has none of these concerns on her mind, not when she has just been given VIP tickets to the famous Bangalore circus. But when a celebrity magician, shackled in an iron cage filled with deadly snakes, disappears into thin air, she is stunned to discover her friend and favourite policeman, Inspector Ismail, is telling her to leave the case well alone.

After solving two murder cases, Kaveri Murthy thought she had cemented her reputation as Bangalore's favourite lady detective. But when death threats are left at her doorstep, former friends become foes, and the bodies start to pile up, Kaveri realises she has never been in this much danger . . .

A Fondness for Truth, A Polizei Bern Novel by Kim Hays

Today, our guest post is from Kim Hays, a crime fiction author on the rise. She writes the gripping Polizei Bern procedural series, featuring Swiss cops Giuliana Linder and Renzo Donatello. It’s one of the best detective series you’ll ever read. The setting is fresh and engaging, the themes current and relevant, and the rich ensemble cast of characters shines, especially Giuliana and Renato. Never far from boiling over, their mutual attraction simmers restlessly throughout the series, adding spice and nuance to their complex working relationship. 

Here’s what I thought of the first book in the series, Pesticide:

“Kim Hays's Pesticide is Switzerland's answer to Scandinavian noir. Fresh and oh so readable, you won't want to put it down."

Don’t want to take my word for it? How about Deborah Crombie, New York Times bestselling author of the award-winning Duncan Kincaid/Gemma James novels?

"Kim Hays brings a sparkling new voice to police procedurals, giving us engaging and realistically drawn detectives who struggle to balance their personal lives with the demands of a gripping investigation. Set against the fascinating backdrop of modern Switzerland, Pesticide will delight crime fiction fans--a standout debut for 2022!" —DEBORAH CROMBIE

Or how about George Easter at Deadly Pleasures Mystery Magazine?

"For aficionados of fine police detection and procedure, it doesn’t get better than Kim Hays’s Linder and Donatelli series. Puzzling mysteries, artful prose, and engaging characters abound in these Swiss-based treats for mystery fans of all tastes.” —GEORGE EASTER

A Fondness for Truth is the third installment of the series, and it’s out this week (April 16, 2024, Seventh Street Bools). I’m a huge fan of these books, and highly recommend them!

Meine Damen und Herren, ich präsentiere euch Kim Hays…

But What Is Your Book Really About?

 

When my German-speaking Swiss husband was a senior in high school, a teacher assigned his class a recently published novel to read; it was by a Swiss writer in his thirties who was just becoming famous. When the pupils and teacher discussed the book in class, my husband and some of his friends disagreed with their teacher’s interpretation of how it ended and argued with him about it. They rehashed the argument during lunch in the school cafeteria, still convinced their teacher was wrong. 

So these four or five boys went to the school’s one payphone, looked up the author’s name in the phone book, called him—and he answered. Feeding coins into the slot from their pockets, they told the writer about the argument and asked him what he had meant by the ending.

 

“Oh, there’s no right or wrong interpretation,” he said. “It can mean different things to different readers.” The boys were crushed.

 

When my husband told me this tale years ago, I thought the author was a spoilsport. Now that I write novels myself, I still shake my head over him. To have a group of teenagers find your book so intriguing that they call you from their school to ask about its meaning—surely that’s a terrific thing to happen. Okay, so the kids were hoping to hear that their interpretation was right and the teacher’s was wrong. But they were also showing enthusiasm and asking for information, and all they got in return was a gobbledygook answer.

 

I thought of this story recently when I was invited to a book club meeting to discuss my first mystery, Pesticide. Usually, having an engaging discussion about any book but a classic is almost impossible if you are trying not to reveal the plot. If you can’t bring up what a book’s about, how can you say anything entertaining about it? This is a quandary that I imagine lots of authors and reviewers face. But at this book club meeting, I was going to have a chance to field all kinds of questions about Pesticide, and—since everyone in the room would have read it—I could debate about the plot, characters, and themes to my heart’s content. 

 

The group welcomed me warmly. Many of them told me how much they’d enjoyed my book, and then . . . and then they were too kind to challenge what they’d read. Or perhaps plot, characters, and themes take on a certain inevitability once they are in print, making it hard for readers to see them as the results of an author considering, choosing, writing, changing, reconsidering, and choosing again—and perhaps making a bad decision.

 

Now I’ve been asked to attend another book club meeting to discuss Sons and Brothers, the second book in the Polizei Bern series. This time, I’m going to make it clear that every decision I made as a writer can be called into question. Other aspects of the novels should be open for discussion as well. Each of my mysteries is an entertaining story about how two police detectives solve a homicide. In telling those stories, I’ve introduced issues worth debating: organic versus conventional farming, the legalization of marijuana, the existence of a patrician class in Bern, and the idea of a universal service for young people, among others. Perhaps one of those themes will inspire a challenging question.

 

The third book in my series, A Fondness for Truth, just came out, so there hasn’t been time for any invitations to talk with readers. At least if I’m lucky enough to be asked to explain what this new book is really about—as the famous Swiss writer was asked by my husband and his friends—I’ll do my best to give a real answer.

—Kim Hays, A Fondness for Truth

 

A Fondness for Truth: Summary

Andi Eberhart is riding her bicycle home on an icy winter night when she is killed in a hit-and-run. Her devastated partner, Nisha, is convinced the death was no accident. Andi had been receiving homophobic hate mail for several years, and the letters grew uglier after the couple’s baby was born. 

As Bern homicide detective Giuliana Linder pieces together the details of Andi and Nisha’s lives, her assistant Renzo Donatelli looks into Andi’s job advising young men who’ve been drafted intoSwitzerland’s civilian service. Working closely together on the case, Giuliana and Renzo are again tempted to become more than just friendly colleagues. 

As both detectives dig into Andi’s life, one thing becomes clear: Andi’s friends and family may have loved her for her honesty, but her outspoken integrity threatened others, including, perhaps, her killer.

  

 

Not my story

What would make you quit writing? Age? Infirmity? Lack of what you consider success? Boredom? Something else?

by Dietrich

Death.

To put it another way, I’m planning for the long haul, so I tell myself the best is yet to come. And that’s easy to do when I think of the many greats who did their best work late in life — take George Orwell and Nineteen-Eighty-Four. Okay, he was on his deathbed, but he was around long enough to see his masterpiece published and rise to critical acclaim.

In spite of a wealth of talent, Cormac McCarthy saw little success from his early writing. In fact he was sixty before All the Pretty Horses, the start of his border trilogy, hit it big. Margaret Atwood wrote The Testaments, the sequel to The Handmaid’s Tale, when she nearing eighty. Philip Roth was seventy-seven when he penned Nemesis. And Agatha Christie had already turned eighty-five when Curtain: Poirot’s Last Case hit the shelves.

There have been many other late-bloomers over the years, take Toni Morrison, Henry Miller, Raymond Chandler. And many others who stretched out prolific and long careers: Norman Mailer, Ray Bradbury and Leo Tolstoy each wrote for nearly sixty years. Tom Wolfe, Kurt Vonnegut, and Agatha Christie were at it for over fifty year.  

Science tells us that there’s no correlation between age and creativity. So, while retaining ones marbles is a good thing for any of us, it’s also reassuring to consider that a wealth of life experience can serve us well, meaning the older we get, the more of it there is to draw on.

It’s good that writing a novel doesn’t require the physical stamina of a marathon athlete, and lucky for some of us couch potatoes, there’s no heavy lifting involved. Not to say that writing is easy, or to imply that anybody can do it well enough to get an agent to commit that writer’s number to speed dial. In fact, thinking it’s a piece of cake — figuring the first draft is perfect and ready to send out, that the editor has it all wrong, or to have illusions of an immediate Rowling kind of $uccess — could lead to such a writer packing it in early. A thick skin and a realistic attitude go a long way to overcome setbacks, bad reviews and critique, and how about those pesky rejection notes.

As for boredom — not a chance. As long as the wheels keep turning, and the ideas keep coming, why worry about ticking clocks? I plan to keep on; no quitting on account of age, infirmity, or boredom. That just ain’t my story.

Quit? Never.

 

Terry here, with the answer to the burning question: 

 What would make you quit writing? Age? Infirmity? Lack of what you consider success? Boredom? Something else? 

 I’ve often said that doctors will be ready to pull the plug on me, and I’ll yell, “Wait. Let me finish this paragraph.” 

 I guess that means the short answer is “nothing will make me quit writing.” I wrote before I ever had thoughts of being published. I’d write short stories or descriptions or scenes. It was my way of thinking. And sometimes my way of relaxing. I never was successful at keeping a journal, so maybe it was my way of journaling—but making most of it up. 

 And as for boredom, If I find I’m bored with something I’m writing, I know it will also bore the reader, so I do the creative (and sometimes hard) work of finding ways to make what I’m writing more exiting (another body!) 

 The bigger question, though, is whether I would keep writing for publication. I just attended Left Coast Crime and there was quite a bit of buzz about how chaotic the publishing industry is these days. And how carelessly publishers treat authors. Many writers who are not in the top echelon feel at best taken advantage of and at worst treated like throwaway commodities. I heard several stories of authors who had a couple of contracts with major publishers and who found after those contracts were fulfilled, they were dumped. It seems that major publishers, and even some smaller ones are only in the publishing business for the money and not because they love books. The ones in it for love of books are exceptions, and they are golden. And usually small. 

 In the past six months I’ve heard more and more stories of authors undertaking hybrid publishing. That is, publishing some books with traditional presses, and other books independently. Why? Because for those authors with a track record, they make a lot more money if they publish their own books. People are tired of getting a paltry few cents of each dollar the publisher brings in. 

 The ones who find success as independent authors are not writers who dash off a book and throw it up on Amazon. They are the ones who do the following: 

 

1) Have dedicated beta readers 

2) Either hire an editor or do very careful editing themselves 

3) Either hire someone who knows how to format an email and “tree” books, or take the time to learn the details themselves 

4) Either hire someone to do great covers unless they feel confident that they have a creative eye for cover design. 

5) Either hire someone who knows how to promote their books or learn the ins and outs of marketing. 

 It’s tempting! But it’s also a lot of extra-curricular work or is expensive. By the time you hire all the grunt work out you might find that you have evened out the amount of money you would have made with a traditional publisher. The people who are most successful at this have developed a team of people they are happy with and/or have learned to do it themselves. The say yes, there is a learning curve, but once you learn it, it gets easier. 

One of the most chilling comments I heard was that there is a trend toward dismissing mid-list authors in bookstores. Publishers push big books and debut authors, but those authors who write good, solid books that aren’t huge sellers get shoved aside. 

Sadly, I even heard a few stories of authors whose publishers had cheated on their royalties. And I have an example from my own experience. Anyone who has ever tried to read a royalty statement knows that wouldn’t be hard to cheat. But what is the point? We’re talking small money here. I’m willing to believe that sometimes it’s carelessness, but it’s a real issue. My first agent, with whom I’ve maintained a cordial relationship found that my publisher had routinely underpaid me for e-book sales. She confronted the publisher, and they corrected the problem and sent me a check. I was grateful to her for continuing to pay attention to the books that were sold through her agency. But why should she have to keep an eagle eye on a publisher to make sure they do the accounting right? Why would a publisher routinely cheat an author? Is it carelessness or venality? I’m afraid it’s hard to tell the difference. 

 So why do I persist with traditional publishing? Partly, it’s laziness. Learning how to do the publishing work myself is daunting. Partly, though, I do it because I like my publishing team. My editor, the publicist and the proofreaders are hard-working and they are very supportive. Their business model isn’t perfect, but I know they do care about books, so I’m not ready to jump ship. And I’m not ready to quit writing. 

When people find out I’ve quit, they’ll know the plug has been pulled!

Twenty Years and Still No Quit

What would make you quit writing? Age? Infirmity? Lack of what you consider success? Boredom? Something else?

Brenda starting off the week.

This is a timely question as my 25th book Fatal Harvest is released today. This also marks 20 years since my first published book. I'd be lying if I didn't say that I've thought about stopping on a few occasions. Then I give my head a shake.

I love writing. When I'm away from the keyboard for a while, I still can't wait to get back. Of course infirmity would cause me to stop writing, but until then, I'll carry on. As for lack of success, this has not always been my driving goal, rather my enjoyment of the process. I've never found writing to be boring, so this wouldn't factor in either.

If I ran out of ideas, this might have me stop ... until I come up with another idea.

So, in keeping with today's release, I'm delighted to share a little bit about Fatal Harvest, third in the Hunter and Tate mystery series. Here is the cover blurb:

Small Towns can be Murder

Eleven-year-old Matt Clark is staying in the outlying village of Ashton for the summer while his parents work out their separation. He’s been told to keep his head down and to stay off social media. Labour Day has come and gone, and Matt believes he’ll be home soon, completely unaware that someone has been posting his photo and location on one of the sites, and trouble is on its way.

Detective Liam Hunter gets the call — a double murder and a missing boy. While he spearheads the investigation, true crime podcaster Ella Tate undertakes her own search for the killer with mixed results. Meanwhile Homicide and Major Crimes is undergoing a major upheaval and the top position is up for grabs as Hunter’s partner struggles to keep her job.

The rainiest September in recent history proves a fitting backdrop for this haunting story of lies, betrayal, and deadly repercussions.

And a snippet from a review: 

If you’re looking for a mystery with intrigue, heart, a finely drawn setting and relatable characters finding their way through tragic circumstances, Fatal Harvest is for you. Brenda Chapman knows how to tell a story and is, quite frankly, one of the most readable Canadian mystery writers of our time. 

– Anthony Bidulka, author of Going to Beautiful, Crime Writers of Canada 2023 Best Crime Novel, and the Merry Bell trilogy (including 2024’s From Sweetgrass Bridge)

The first two books in this series are Bind Date and When Last Seen:  “… compelling characters, an interesting plot and a conclusion that one does not see coming.”– Glebe Report

Website: www.brendachapman.ca

Instagram & Facebook: BrendaChapmanAuthor

X: brendaAchapman

Never look back: Writing a serial novel, by Thomas Pluck

 

Thank you, Josh, for the opportunity to write this. The only thing more surprising to me than Josh liking a contemporary YA fantasy is that I wrote one. And here's the story of how that happened.

My latest book almost didn't happen because of the pandemic, and then only happened because of the pandemic. One of my friends and literary heroes is Lawrence Block, who has written books while on cruise ships, so I decided that my next book would be written while I embarked upon a grand circuit of the United States by rail. (You see where this is going, don't you?) I even asked ol' LB for advice on which Amtrak services to take. The book was at heart a road story, and the places I visited would inspire the tale. It would practically write itself!

Thankfully I hadn't booked the tickets by March, when everything shut down. A lot of things happened. I won't bore you with it, you went through it too, but one of the lesser indignities was having to witness a million writers decide to post daily word counts on social media, to let everyone know they were still typing away while the world changed around them. Because somewhere, someone said that to be a writer, you should write every day.

Now, you can write however the hell you want. I shouldn't even have to say that, but due to the enormousness and the enormity of writing "advice" on the internet, a lot of people don't feel like they are "real writers," whatever that means. (Have you written something? You're a writer.) Now, there's something to say about momentum. The first law of motion applies to writing, sometimes, somehow.

 

It's worked for me. I finished my first novel during National Novel Writing Month. It was even a coherent narrative with a three act structure! Five novels later—three of which were published—daily word counts became less of a challenge, and more of a dread. It kept me from writing. And working for a children's hospital during the pandemic—even remotely—made for long, stressful days that left me little time or desire to write, especially in "sprints" or with a pedometer strapped to my brain.

What had kept me writing was a newsletter, delivered via Patreon, that a few dozen people followed me on. I promised them a few short stories, so I had to pay up. One of those stories was "Good People," published in Vautrin, and chosen as a distinguished mystery story in Best American Mysteries and Suspense 2021. Another was "88 Lines About .44 Magnums," still one of my favorite titles. "Good People" was written in four parts, over successive weekends, so I couldn't go back and edit. I had to make it work.

It sounds like madness, but it worked. I didn't know how it would end when I started, but I had to find a way there. It recharged my urge to write. So I decided to write the road trip book one chapter at a time, publishing them on Sundays, with no ability to go back and edit them, because they were delivered to readers serially.

It worked for Dickens, didn't it? (No pressure.) Somehow, it made me more eager to write than ever, even if it didn't make any sense. If a thousand words a day is too daunting, how the heck is writing a chapter a day any better? Because my method was to sit down at the keyboard with my morning coffee, and sit there until the chapter was done. I didn't write a little each day. I didn't start on Saturday. I could think about what I wanted to write all week, and I did, on long morning hikes at Eagle Rock preserve, where some of the story is set, on long commutes to the hospital to work in the data center, and from my recliner while everyone else binged TV.

I had a vague idea of a story: a young kid's parents are taken by ICE, and they have to make their way across the country to safety. I had purchased a set of postcards based on old WPA art of the National Parks, and I used them as my guide. The kid wanted to visit all the National Parks, and would use the postcards, bought by their dad, as a sort of road map. 

Some of them didn't make sense; Vyx starts the story in Jersey City, and wants to get to California, near Sequoia National Park. so Acadia in Maine wasn't in the cards (pun intended!). 

But 30 chapters later, and Devil's Tower, Bryce Canyon, Glacier, Shenandoah, and somehow, Mount Denali, all managed to make it into the story, and let me tell you, traveling that way by imagination was a lot cheaper than by train. (I have looked at the Talkeetna rail trip from Seward Alaska, since I visited Denali while crammed in a wobbly old pickup truck with my cousin and his family, and the clouds hid the mountain peaks the whole time we were there.) 

As always with writing, whatever works, works. Cliffhanger endings inspired imaginative escapes. Surprises could be explained chapters later. "When in doubt, have someone come through the door with a gun in his hand," much like "Chekhov's gun," doesn't need to be taken literally. Something exciting has to happen. In Vyx's case, it was never a man with a gun: it was a talking fox and magpie, a dragon on a hoard of blinged-out cell phones, and a government agent who could freeze people solid with his breath.

And while Chandler could never explain who killed the chauffeur in The Big Sleep, who you write about magic, it has to have some rules and make sense. I kept it somewhat simple, but sometimes it felt like I was building boxcars on a moving train. But I finished the book, and even pulled the old "everything changes" at precisely chapter 15, even though I didn't know what the change was going to be. Vyx just got thrown through a faerie-house door, and even I didn't know where it went when it happened. 

It was a lot of fun. Before it was published as Vyx Starts the Mythpocalypse, I did edit it again, and I had the chance to go back and seed it with foreshadowing, create callbacks, and strengthen the structure, but the readers loved the story the first time because they didn't know what would happen next. How could they, when I didn't? "Pantsers" say this all the time, but I'd never considered myself one. I always had "mile markers" thought out ahead, even in this case, so I considered myself a Plotter. But like Vyx, I've found that I'm never just one thing.

Would I do it again? I'm planning to, right now. Writing the sequel, one chapter at a time. Oddly enough, it's the only time I've written a book under a hundred thousand words, so I think the boundaries suit me. Can lightning strike twice? I'll let you know, once I finish Vyx Stops Weathergeddon.

You can order the paperback of Vyx Starts the Mythpocalypse from Amazon! The e-book is available on Kindle and all other e-book formats, and if you would like a signed paperback, you can buy one directly from me.