PB and Done!

I just typed the last word of the first draft of my latest novel in progress, Pittsburgh Blue. She’d done. If you’re interested in a raw sneak peak, check out my last post.

What this means is two thirds of the first drafts I’m working on are done. One more to go, and it has been sitting happy at maybe 45k words as I waited for the real world events inspiring it to play out. Actually, that uncompleted draft I have sitting on a drive somewhere is the sequel to 40 x 491, 66 x 666.

You’d think that’s a cheesy name for a book, I guess, but those are real life highways. The world famous Route 66 turned into Highway 40 in the fair, tan state of New Mexico. Using your powers of deduction, I’m sure you have already figured out that Route 666 became highway 491. No, this won’t be a prequel. There’s this strong scent, maybe an inkling, an intuition, that the evil fog floating in the air around all of the poor city at that intersection has lingered a long, long time. That’s right, Donovan, Beatrice, Colt, and Arthur may not be real, but they live in a real city.

Up until now, I haven’t really used the names of the cities, fictional or not, where my stories take place. I feel like that sort of detracts from the immersive quality of my tales, so I’m not going to do that any more. At least, not if the story takes place in a single city.

For example, despite what you’d think, Pittsburgh Blue takes place in Nevada. One third or so is an unnamed city, another a mysterious military base (or is it?), the rest in Las Vegas. What is the deal with my boner for Sin City? I don’t know. I’ve been drunk there more than a few times and it is time for me to give something back.

This next story I’m about to start Friday (guess I kinda lied about the 4 drafts in progress thing) will take place in a fictional, yet named city somewhere in New York. Actually, I’m not sure if the story will mention it in some way, or not, but it will be the same city Sitting Ducks took place in. I feel like I’m really starting to tie the room together. If all goes according to plan, PB will really be the only story that doesn’t have at least one character from my other books in it. At least that can change in the future, but I feel like that’s its own thing. My thought right now is that PB will turn into a post-apocolyptic series about the sort of Mad Max-esque main character, Ynez. She’s not quite a battle hardened road warrior, yet, though.

Whatever. Enough about the writing of these things. I was just proud I finished another first draft and wanted to celebrate by posting. Two done, Two or more to go. That’s the way it should be, though, right? Always churning out content for the thousands of people itching to read my work. Just kidding, sorry. Gotta take those shots sometimes.

This was a bad post, and I should feel bad. Go look at my last two while you’re here. There’s poetry and fiction.

Enjoy!