AA meeting

Sorry guys, I've got nothing for you today. It's a gray day here in Suburbingham and I think I'll spend it all in a world of my own invention.

I'm plotting out my second book right now and laying down the first words. Teri wants me to call this one Academic Affairs, but we'll see. If I tell you in future posts about going to an "AA meeting", you'll know what I mean.

This book is going to be very different from the first. I want to try my hand at a straight ahead murder mystery. The protagonist is the "acting" chief of the police department of a major southern university.

I've already killed my first victim (there will be at least one more), and I do believe that my method of murder I employ is a literary first, but for the rest of it I will follow all the conventions of a detective novel to the extent that I am able.

I think I know who the killer is, but I'm not positive of that just yet. It's one of two people for sure. Some of the characters are already roaming around in my head and they're a lively bunch. They're whispering to me now, and I have a feeling they will soon be shouting for attention.

Teri is mystified and, I think, a little frightened by my ability to create people and places out of whole cloth and have them inhabit their own worlds. What scares me is how much easier the process feels this second time around.

I'm shooting for 80,000 words this time, which is about right for this kind of book, but I've got a lot of people who want to show up in those 80,000 words. We'll see what happens.