Not many things are more difficult than coming up with a stunning first post for a new blog. So let’s set our expectations low for this one, and maybe something interesting will happen.
I’ve been working on a novel for more than a year now and am afraid I’ll have to shelve it for a while. Giving up? Well, not exactly. It’s just that this particular story has zombies in it. This may not seem like a bad thing, but now that the Brad Pitt movie “World War Z” has come out and there’s a new season of “Walking Dead” it just feels wrong. Like maybe this zombie thing has been overdone just a bit? George Romero seems to think so. Perhaps the book-reading crowd doesn’t pay attention to what’s going on in cinema or on TV, but I doubt it. My greatest fear is that potential readers won’t make it past the dust sleeve once they discover that the story is about zombies. The reality is that, although I loves me a good apocalypse story, the zombies in the book are not the typical reanimated corpses that everyone is familiar with. They’re still very much alive, which is unfortunate for them. Of course, there’s a twist at the end that will make the reader’s head spin.
The working title of the novel is “Necrosis”, which I picked for no particular reason other than the word sounds cool. OK, well it may be somewhat related but I don’t want to spoil the ending. It’s an FBI crime thriller that’s fast-paced and should be fun to read. I hope that I’m creating some lovable characters that will stick around for another couple of books, they’re just a fun bunch and I have big plans for some more crazy adventures for them.
The difficulty for some readers may be the rapidly shifting points of view. Each chapter is broken into several vignettes that jump from one character to the next, or from one time period to the next. This format is used by some of my favorite authors, and changing points-of-view seems to be in vogue now where it was frowned upon in the past. This tends to confuse some older readers though, and unfortunately these are some of the people who read crime thrillers! My task then is to guide the reader gently from one point-of-view to another so there won’t be any confusion. Right now I’m using paragraph breaks with a roman numeral header to delineate a change in character, place, or time. I may try posting pieces of the story here on the blog for readers to pick apart and comment on.
Well, speaking of changing points-of-view I think I’ll change mine to the kitchen and get a diet Coke. This was a pretty painless first post, but entertaining or engaging? Let’s hope they evolve in that direction!
The Dark Chalice 