My friend from last week's post told me that he finished Smoke. He talked as if he enjoyed it very much. Like many of those who tell me that they have read it, he's looking for a sequel. That book was written as a stand alone. At some point I will write another book in that 1948 setting featuring some of the same characters. It is my favorite of the books I've written (so far). I simply haven't felt moved to write a sequel. When I started writing Smoke, I only had the opening scene, and a confidence that the story would develop. I wrote that scene and then waited for more ideas to coalesce. I figured out the ending and then had to figure out how to get to it. Along the way, I changed the ending, added characters and had the best time ever writing the story which connected that opening scene with Noah and Monica to the exciting conclusion. That book took me a couple years to complete from the time I began writing the first scene until I posted it to Amazon--of course, I was writing two other books at the same time.
Enough boring reminiscing of the ghost of writing past. (Which makes me think of this). The current project is progressing nicely. I hit my word count goal every day this week and pounded out more on Saturday. Chapter seven is half finished. Chapter six turned out to be longer than I had expected. I've known the ending from the beginning since I started, but some of the pieces in the middle remained nebulous; those are getting clearer all the time. There's been no shortage of action, but I had to do some lengthy dialog for some necessary character development and background. I'm about to crank up the action knob several clicks.
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I've started reading this book by Nick Cole:
I saw that it was free and picked it up without realizing that it's a zombie apocalypse book. I started reading anyway. I quite like the author's style and technique so far. I'm only 20% in (ten chapters read). I'll post a review when I've finished the book. This is another author that I would like to interview.
Speaking of author interviews, the world famous writer, traveler, and B&N frequenter DJ Butler has responded to my interview request. I expect to post the interview as soon as he responds to my annoying follow-up questions--and his response arrived before I completed this blog post--give me a day or two and the interview will appear.
As for reading, I read two other books--one book and a short story, actually.
As far as I know, this is the first book I've read by Farmer. I want to read some of his other works. This was a short story, or novella, with a Twilight Zone vibe. It was one of those stories where a more astute reader would have caught the coming ending more quickly than did I. It's not a very cheery read.
This book from the golden age of science fiction features a billionaire-scientist-inventor-soldier as the protagonist. The story begins with the discovery of an alien scout ship that speeds through the solar system using its superior technology to have its way with the human settlements and ships after the manner of a hot knife carving butter before heading homeward to assemble an invasion fleet. The protagonist must use the clues left by the alien to counter and overcome the alien technology. It's a battle for the solar system and the existence of the human race.
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In conclusion, because it's tough to get enough Mark Twain quotes, here's this from Huckleberry Finn:
"Jim said bees wouldn't sting idiots; but I didn't believe that, because I had tried them lots of times myself, and they wouldn't sting me."
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