It’s been just over four years since I published my last novel. So where have I been? What have I been up to? And more importantly (to this blog post and website anyway), where is my next book?
The truth is, I haven’t finished a project since I finished “The Fall of Faith.” Not because I don’t have any ideas. In fact, I’ve outlined another domestic thriller loosely based on my college experiences and one of my favorite professors who, unfortunately, passed away after a long battle with Alzheimer’s. Side note: that professor’s character played a pivotal role in the first inciting incident in “The Fall of Faith,” when he killed Jimmy’s beloved dog, Maybelle.
I outlined a three-book story arch based on another minor character from the first part of “The Fall of Faith,” the man who lived in the abandoned motel on the other side of the road from The Waffle House and gas station strip club where Jimmy’s story began. Turns out, that guy is an ex-military hero now tangled up in a cult.
Don’t worry. I haven’t forgotten my surviving characters from “A Killer Secret.” I’ve also outlined what could be the next two to five books in a potential series. The first of which would include a girl’s college in a small town near Eden, Missouri.
I’ve also flirted with, and even written a couple of chapters of, a sci-fi thriller based on a dream my wife had and the subsequent story we developed around it. That was going to be my first experimentation with sci-fi and with pantsing my way through a novel.
And yet none of those projects have gotten beyond an outline or a few chapters. Not because I don’t think they’re worthy, but because life has found a way to pull me in other directions.
I’ll admit, I needed a break after writing two thriller novels in three years. If you’ve read either of them, you know my stories are dark. They explore things most of us, thankfully, never have to deal with in real life. They dive deep into characters’ flaws, motivations and twisted inner thoughts. Turns out, that takes a toll on me. I guess the good news is that this means I’m not a psychopath? Yay, me!
Aside from that internal mental wrestling match, I’ve also had a lot of personal and family issues in the last four years. My wife had a major health issue that was more frightening than anything I could write. I almost lost her. Honestly, that would have ended me. She’s doing better now, but things are harder. Money is tighter. Days seem shorter. And any free time I have had, frankly, I’ve chosen to spend with her. I don’t regret that. I don’t see it as a choice, really. She’s my muse. The love of my life. She is my life.
And then there’s work. Boy, you probably know how uncool the economy and job market have been over the last several years. After the company I was working at imploded, I luckily found a new job pretty fast. But it was my first remote job for a company in another state and time zone. I underestimated how much time it would take to build strong relationships with coworkers you never see and to learn a new company culture and way of working when you are rarely in the office. I’m proud to say that, after three years, I finally feel like I’m in a groove.
Which brings me back to that important question I posed at the beginning of this post: Where is my next book?
A year or so ago, an old colleague (and I mean old colleague in every sense of the phrase) called me up out of the blue. He had an idea for a dark comedy medical drama. He’d written a pilot and wanted my honest feedback. Well, friends, I was honest. I told him I loved the idea but not his script. I didn’t fault him for this. The man is a great art director. He is not a writer. He asked me if I would be his script doctor. I thought that’d be a fun, new skill to learn, but ultimately, we decided to start with a novel and then shop it around, not just for publication but for broadcast rights. Another fun, new adventure, I thought!
So we talked a lot. He told me his vision for the story and the characters. We batted around ideas. Then he left it in my hands. That was over a year ago.
As I mentioned, life. Oh, and since I haven’t finished anything since “The Fall of Faith,” that little self-doubting, loud-mouth inner voice that likes to tell me I’m not as good as I think I am had grown bolder and louder. But life feels more in control, and I’ve been able to lower the volume on that inner voice (for now at least). I just finished a 13-page outline for what is now a medical thriller that will hopefully take the dark comedy undertones that I toyed with in my first two novels to a new level.
Currently, my friend and co-creator is reviewing the outline. I expect he’ll have some edits. But I can’t wait to start writing. And that, my friends, is a feeling I haven’t had in a while.
