Having just returned from Prague, I’ve received great news: Ellery Queen’s Mystery Magazine is buying the story I wrote about a month ago, called “Investment in Vevey”—a tale of two young Texans in Europe committing tourism fraud, and how, once they believe everything is all right, a sweet old Texan couple becomes their greatest nightmare. I’m very pleased. When it comes out is anyone’s guess, as I’m told they have quite a backlog of stuff.
The story seems to have some appeal, for it’s the same one that piqued the interest of an agent in LA who asked me to work up an outline and some pages of screenplay. I did that, sent them off, and am still awaiting his reaction.
Waiting seems like a common act these days. Not only am I waiting for word from LA, I’m also waiting on my editor’s reaction to my redraft of Book 4, presently called Liberation Movements. As well—and perhaps more anxiously—I’m awaiting reviews of 36 Yalta Boulevard, which, after nearly a month of circulation, has received two online reviews, and another in Texas Monthly. I’m not complaining, because each of these places is great, but…
Okay, well maybe I am, because with my previous two books reviews came somewhat quickly after the book’s release, and I’m under the cloud of belief that if a book doesn’t make waves quickly, it ain’t gonna make them.
However, yesterday I did notice that my little book had been done a fine honor, being placed in the right-hand column of Ms Weinman’s esteemed broadsheet as a recommended read. A recommendation by her is a great thing indeed, and I thank her for it.
So with all this waiting, one might ask, “How do you find time for writing—do you find time for writing?” Well, yes, somehow it happens. Even though I’m still showing my sister the grandeur that is Central Europe (and next week, the grandeur that was the Balkans), I still find time to type. I’m 50pp into the fifth and final book of the crime series, which will take much longer than the others to write, as I expect it to clock in at somewhere around 1000 pages. And because I know that will take so long, I’m also working on the shorter novel I mentioned somewhere below, about a man who leaves his family after 9/11, pretending he made it to a Twin Towers meeting on time, and died. Years later, he runs into his widow on a Budapest street. Story ensues.
(Originally posted at the Contemporary Nomad)