A book with pages and everything...

As said before, Surf City Acid Drop is in the process of becoming a book – as in one you could hold in your hand, and read all those chapters without even one click.

I decided this time around to use CreateSpace to make some actual paperbacks. For me, this fits the vibe of this book. And it reminds me of those hours, as a teen, spent in libraries, book stores, and even convenience stores, scanning through those paperback racks looking for my next read.

For those who have read it, you may have picked up on the neo-noir 70's tone that runs through Surf City. As a book is often judged by its cover, I wanted the cover art to reflect that. The images I have used on the blog are not owned by me, so I had to get some actual rights, or permission-free images. Also, while surfing is important as a metaphor in this novel, I didn't really want a surfer on the cover. It's more about the mood.

So...

What do you think of these three? Two are using the same background image, with slightly different type treatments. Let me know which you like, which you hate (even if it is all of them). I am still tweaking the type, and if these fall flat with you readers, then I might just go back to the drawing board. But it is a start. 

Dive in. Let me know.

 

Where are you going, where have you been... Luke?

With apologies to the powerful short story by Joyce Carol Oates, I've been thinking about where we are at in Surf City Acid Drop. So maybe grab a Pacfico and some salsa and settle in.

First off, I guess the we is me the writer, and you, the reader... whomever you are. It's tough to know who reads Surf City - I do know some friends are currently reading, and my analytics will tell me which countries, and sometimes cities, where the readers are coming from. Don't worry, I am not secretly gathering some list so I can send you Luke Fischer swag (beer cozies maybe? Genuine Mostly Harold Lizard Boots? Actually, that would be kinda cool.) Analytics just let me know that people are reading - and for this I am very grateful.

Each of you play a part in encouraging me, not just to tell this story, but the other ones I am currently working on - this is huge. And yes, that does include the next Luke Fischer novel.

So here is the thing: We write in the dark. 

Now, if you are a writer, you probably are nodding along here. I am guessing that even those bestselling authors find themselves in a place where they really don't know who is reading, or what they think of the book. Sure, there are reviews, and those can be thrilling, helpful, and downright eviscerating. (I've had some of each over the years).

So far, to be honest, not a lot has been said about Surf City - one notable review from someone over at webfictionguide had me riding high for awhile – but mostly my readers have been sorta quiet. I do run into them from time to time, online, and even in person (hey, I'm reading that detective story of yours! Uh, thanks, but Luke is not really a detective. Okay, I never ever say that. Mostly, I just beam.)

Back to that review – here's the thing: the reviewer pointed out a few flaws. I have to tell you, I said, yes, yes, yes! Honesty is the best. I really want to know how a reader truly responds to the work. Saying, oh yeah, that was fine, doesn't really do much for me. I want to hear how it grabbed you, and how it failed you, or bored you, or whatever.

Anyway, the main purpose of this post is to tell you that there are about 12 Chapters left in the story - depending on how I break it down. As mentioned before, I am editing each chapter as I go, before I release it. And the beauty of online fiction, I can correct the mistakes (which are pointed out by one close reader, who I should really be sending 12 packs of Pacifico on a regular basis.)

The other point of this grand experiment was to see if Luke could capture an audience. The comments I receive, and my analytics, tell me that he has. It is not a huge following by any means - but it is enough to keep me going. True, a writer should just write - and not worry about the audience, or more so, if there even is an audience. And when I write, I do just write. But the idea of what I call manifestation has always been important to me. To finish the artistic act, the art (song, painting, sculpture, play, story, novel) must be manifested in a form that can be viewed (heard, etc.) by another human. In simpler words, Luke has been in my head a long time, I'd like to put him into other people's head, and see if he can walk, and talk... and think. It's a bit of my own Frankenstein model.

Luke has become a friend of mine, someone I like to hang out with, drink beers, and tell each other stories. If that is all that ever happens with this guy, well, maybe that's enough.

So I will close by posting that review I loved so much - and to once again thank all my readers, known, and unknown - you are really part of this. Stay tuned for the next 12 - including one tomorrow!

Surf City Acid Drop Review

From webfictionguide.com

Sep 4, 2015: Surf City Acid Drop leans on the breezy coastal atmosphere and standard crime tropes pretty hard, but honestly? That’s half the fun.

This is a tale of coastal crime, pure and simple. Terlson keeps everything light because it’s supposed to be light. There’s a flurry of details which allow you to really see Mexico the way that Luke is seeing it. The emphasis isn’t on the action—though there are some fun fight scenes—nor is it on the characters, who are a little on the thin side.

The emphasis is on the atmosphere. As the cliche goes, Mexico’s a character in and of itself here, and boy is it beautifully portrayed. One of my favorite bits is in the very first chapter, when Luke describes the bar he’s sitting in, El Rayo Verde, where all sorts of tequila bottles are lined up, catching the Mexican sun. The character doesn’t stay in Mexico for the duration of the serial, but it’s fun while it lasts. And even the other parts of the world are well-described by Terlson.

Sometimes the attempt at surf noir prose get a little purple, one of the many examples being when Luke says, “Any moment, I expected the girl from Ipanema to stroll right up and buy me a shot.” In and of itself it’s not a bad line, but they tend to add up pretty quickly.

Still, for all the purple prose, some of the lines really do sing. One bit that comes to mind involves Luke mixing up the sound of a wailing trumpet with the sound of a police siren. It’s a perfect noir detail—one which I can imagine getting filmed in black-and-white (or perhaps in that hazy 70s style, since this is really a neo-noir).

So: if you’re looking for surf noir, I’d recommend this. If you want to feel like you’re a white guy drinking beers in Mexico, I’d recommend this.

But honestly? It’s a beach read. Don’t expect grand revelations, or deep characters. Just expect to read a lot about a guy drinking at bars and punching people. (Also a bit of macho posturing, due to the guys continually punching each other. YMMV.)

It’s fun, it zips by, and that’s all it needs to do.

NOTE: Though the serial currently has 23 chapters up, I’m only on 14. I’m going to keep reading this, but wanted to get this review up while the serial was still ongoing. It was apparently written as a novel, not a serial, so if you want to read along while it’s posted, you better come fast!

Sneak peek of next Luke Fischer book.

Those who read this blog (or twitter) know that I have been working on a follow up to Surf City Acid Drop (somewhat spoiler alert...

also featuring Luke Fischer.)

This novel begins in Upper Michigan, also known as the U.P. (Upper Penisula). I thought it might be fun to just give a taste of the opening. So here it is. The working title is: Manistique.

Manistique. Now there was a damn exotic sounding name. A town with a name like that should be hugging the coast of southern France, soaked in syurpy sun, string bikinis, guys in berets and striped shirts, Vespas on the street, street musicians in black chinos, and gulls just happy to be circling in the wine-soaked air above Manistique. 

Problem was, it was pissing rain, and I was in northern Michigan. 

A beat-up Ford half-ton sped by me, sending up a spray that my wipers couldn’t keep up with, and causing me to do a half fish-tail and almost roll my borrowed clunker into the weed clogged ditch. The half-ton sounded nothing at all like a Vespa.

I’d first heard the name of the place from a heavily sedated and recently gut shot man. I thought he’d made it up – figured the drugs in the IV drip had kicked in and sent him to some faraway land where the temperature was always perfect, and the woman always bought the first round.

“You just rest there, buddy. They said the bullet missed anything really important. You will be slurping that Pozole you love so much in no —“

“Manistique.”

“Yeah, you said that already.”

“Go there. She said she would…” he swallowed hard and mumbled something that I couldn’t make out.

“Franko. It doesn’t matter what she said.” I put my hand on his shoulder. The clear liquid dripped down the hose and into his veins. “She’s not going anywhere anymore.”

The machines beep beeped and nurses shuffled through the hallway. One walked in, checked Franko’s pulse, peeked at his dressing, gave me a “are you still here” look, and walked out. She looked about 40 going on 75, and not a nice 75 either. She traded off with the other one, a slim brunette with a razor crisp uniform and a shape that elicited a small smile from my wounded friend whenever she entered the room.

I shook my head out of the fog of that hospital room. The rain picked up. I flipped the switch on the defrost fan and tried to fight the real fog that grew on my windshield from the inside. The wipers did their best to fight the torrent outside. I’d already passed two roadside motels, just wanting to make it to the town with the weird French name. The pair of low slung buildings looked like they were run by close cousins of Norman Bates, or his mother, or both. Far off lights shimmered orange and yellow through the rain, and through the pair of cracks that ran the height and breadth of the windshield The glow grew like a broken sun making me squint to find my side of the road. Dammit Franko, if you weren’t three inches from singing in the eternal chorus, I wouldn’t have ever said yes to this – especially since I didn’t understand what I was doing. Not that that had ever stopped me.

I pulled into the lot with the tall yard light that had been blotting out my vision. The motel had the same shape as the others, but I was struck by the purple curtains with the tiny white flowers. Maybe somebody actually took care of this place. Or the serial killer had a thing for floral patterns. Either way, I was done with the slick winding road. 

The owner was an older lady, five foot nothing and on the sloped side of sixty. She wore a dress not that different from the curtains. She took my fifty bucks cash for the room and let me know about the coffee and danishes she would put out in the morning.

“Any place around here I could get a beer?”

She wrinkled her nose.

“Everything’s going to be closed. I was off to bed myself when I saw your headlights.”

She gave me a hard once over. Maybe considering kicking me back on the rain soaked road, and keeping the money. I stopped trusting little old ladies when one lifted my wallet in PV right after I gave her directions to the market.

“So nothing then? Convenience store?”

“There’s a gas station about a mile up. Or…” she looked at the doorway behind her, “I’ve got a fifth of scotch that I’d be willing to share. For the right company.”

I grabbed the key off the counter and thanked her while I banged the door behind me. Little old ladies. Damn.

###

The coffee in the morning could have doubled as an engine cleaner, and the danishes were freshly made sometime this spring. I had fallen asleep watching a Yul Brynner western and sipping on a warm PBR that I forgot I had bought at the last gas up. I threw the danish out the window, trying not to break a window in the motel, and peeled out of the lot.  

Franko had got well enough to put a few more sentences together for me. He told me that he found out the woman he was looking for wasn’t from Santa Fe, or anywhere in the southwest. She came from a whole different part of the country.

“What does it matter where she’s from? We both saw her get shot – about thirty seconds before you took one, and I had to haul our asses out of there.”

Franko coughed and winced.

“He wanted more.”

“Who, the husband? More what?” 

I felt Franko’s forehead. It was heating up like a broken rad. I pushed the red button. A different nurse came this time, redhead, to match the button. She was no nonsense, but gave me a brief smile.

“I’m sorry, Mr.?”

“Fischer.”

“Mr. Fischer, you will have to leave now.”

“Is he going to be okay?”

Franko’s eyes went glassy.

She pushed the button herself this time, and waved me out of the room. Dammit anyway, Franko. If he died before I figured this whole deal out, I was going to be supremely pissed.

Research Part 2 - Another Craig, the Marines, Skinning Moose, and Eating Grasshoppers.

To cut to it, I met an older guy in a bar and we talked about Marines, streets of Detroit, and eating grasshoppers in Cambodia. Just another Thursday night.

I'd decided to find one last bar to sit and observe in - well, have a beer and eat wings really. So I went into a place called W___ Pub... who knows, I don't want to advertise here, besides there was stuff I am supposed to keep on the QT. And I don't mean that in a snide way.

So I'm sipping my local brew, in a place full of locals (always a bit of an odd feeling) - mostly 30somethings it seems, maybe a couple of seniors. The beer is damn fine, some sort of local spicy brew (I've been told there is coriander in it... go figure.) And in walks this guy, who saddles up to me, and the bartender asks is he wants a 7 and Water. It strikes me that this was my father's drink, though any rye would do. He is grizzled, missing a few front teeth, but looking sharp in his clothes and his dark blue baseball cap with stitching that reads Marines, and more that says "Recon" on the side. I figure the hat looks pretty new and this guy is pretty old (I find out later he is 69, though he could easily be ten years older than that.)

I didn't want to be the bothersome tourist (or worse yet, the writer tourist). So I gave him some space and drank my beer.

"You ever work for the Forestry Dept?"

That was his opener. Turns out I was a dead ringer for a friend who use to work in Forestry, and he hadn't seen him in years. I said nope, and then we drank some more. Eventually I asked him if he grew up in Manistique - partly to be friendly, but yeah, I came here to research and I wanted to know about the place. He'd been there since '72 - came from Dee-troit. His wife and kids, brought them along too. Pretty hairy times out there, he could tell me about (but I didn't think he was going to.) Kids moved on, one lives near by, one got killed (it happens, he told me), the wife had enough of him and let out a number of years back. He now owned the hotel up the street. I'd driven by, it was in pretty rough shape.

So I am sitting there taking this all in - realizing that I am being let into someone's life. I want to treat it with respect, my curiosity of course is on fire to learn more about him, and those hairy times - so it is a balancing act. He begins to tell me more stories. First about Manistique, and how it was booming when he got here in the 70's. Lots of jobs, fishery was happening, lumber - now all you could get was minimum wage, so half the town left.

He was a hunter and a fisher - deer, moose, salmon, and his favorite: perch. Some big mothers. He laughed and asked again if I was sure I didn't know him. I looked so familiar. (I think I have that sort of face.) I asked what kind of people were youpers (he was a self-professed one now that he left Dee-troit all those years ago.) 

Digression: I knew the term, travelling here before, the Upper Peninsula, the U.P., hence: youpies, or youpers.

He said they were just good people - 99.9 percent of them he trusted. Trusted them enough that if he handed over his gun to one of them right now (he made the motion), he would be okay with that. At that point, i realized my new friend was packing. And he told me this is a quiet town - not like Dee-troit.

I asked why there was a Sheriff, and State Police? And he corrected me, and local police too! Made it pretty quiet. What kind of crime is around here? Oh, just piddlly shit. Break and enter? Yeah, or ripping up someone's flower bed.

No organized crime then, I said.

Hah! No, I'd know about that. People would just start disappearing. Back in Dee-troit, hell they had that there. I got in some situations. Got shot a couple times, right in the wrist here. A helluva lot quieter here.

Somewhere in this conversation, he introduced himself as, Craig. I said, Craig. He thought I'd misheard and said again. I'd say, yeah, that's my name too. No shit, he said. I guess we won't forget each other's name then.

Also in the conversation, he had mentioned he was a Marine, and also did some time with the National Guard - he was a reservist in Manistique. And he had a great time with those guys. Sure, he had tasks, but when they weren't working... parteee! I admit, I grinned when he gave a broad toothless smile. And also want to say, the guy wasn't a drunk. He'd been nursing a tall 7 and water all through the conversation (while I'd finished my pint and was considering another.)

He had alluded to maybe being overseas, but he let it slip by real fast. I repeated, so you were a Marine from '65-'71? That was Vietnam. His eyes' lit up. Oh yeah, it was. So were you overseas? We landed in Vietnam, but no one knew we were there. We were observing the Ho Chi Ming trail - just observing. I was a radio man. Studying them, any structures, or movements, that sort of shit. But this is on the QT, no one knew we were there. No records of us being there.

Were you in a plane? A helicopter?

We came in on a helicopter, and repelled down ropes into the jungle. We were there for days, eating crickets and grasshoppers. You couldn't cook anything. Light a fire, no way. So still, I got no problems eating grasshoppers. With those guys in the National Guard, they'd find a grasshopper, and I'd say give it over. Pull off it's legs and pop it in - they all went, ewww, but no big deal for me.

At this point in the convo, well, let's just say I didn't have much to say.

We drifted away from the VietNam talk and he asked where I was from. I said Canada. Where? Winnipeg. No recollection in his eyes - out west somewhere then? He said he did a lot of hunting up in Canada. Moose. And then told me of shooting moose up by Sault St. Marie, and then bringing them back in his half-ton.

He went outside for a Marlboro, and I finished my beer and wings. He introduced me to the bartender as another Craig. I shook his hand and told him it was a real pleasure (it was). I went out into the dark Michigan night, and the other Craig finished his 7 and water, and most likely wandered down the street to his hotel. He said he had a bunch of real dummies staying there right now.

And that is some real research - or better, just talking and getting to know another human. Cheers, Craig.

Shown above: Manistique at sunset - lighthouse on Lake Michigan.

So what does writer's research look like anyway?

On a road trip researching my next novel (a follow up to Surf City Acid Drop). Now, I am sure everyone does this differently, but I wanted to give a window into what my researching looks like. Mostly, I am just trying to get a feel, or vibe, from the area. I've been down here (Upper Peninsula of Michigan, or the U.P.), but I wanted to refresh my memory.

There are scenes in this novel that take place in bars and diners (no surprise), so whenever I am in one of these, I bring along a small notebook, and scribble down somethings in between bites of sandwich, or sips of beer/coffee/soda.

Here are a few notes from yesterday's visit to Ben's - a small, but seemingly popular diner, where I doubt the decor has changed since they opened in the 50's. Though, as you will see they might have reupholstered a chair or two.

A long u-shaped counter that waitresses dip into, serving the cowboy and baseball hat wearing clientele. Big metal grill and dome, half-dome lamps dangle off the ceiling attached with cheap chains. The booths are standard diner issue, the Formica is freshly scrubbed, the booths have a newish coat of periwinkle blue paint. A row of hooks down a skinny hallway for the regulars to hang their coats.

A dozen chrome and black vinyl stools - looking quite new - wrap around the counter.

The place is not pretentious retro-chic - they are just keeping up the place, neat, tidy, cared for. The laminated menus have a third of the items stroked out in heavy marker (no longer available I guess) They blew the budget on the stools, no money left for new menus.

The word "Gourmet" next to burgers look out of place. A square Fanta machine with 4 different choices stands next to huge metal milk dispenser that wouldn't look out of place in a factory cafeteria. A TV hangs soundless over the grill showing games shows.

Mixed with the half-domes are a trio of chandeliers, 6 fat bulbs pretend to be candles, one of the three fixtures is burnt out.

A lone "45" record dangles on a string from a chandelier, and swings in the breeze when someone opens the door. The record is not a look they are going for - it's just the one record (maybe the cook's favorite?) Was it a look that they tried, and gave up on, just never taking the single down?

The atmosphere is friendly, a slower pace, most people know each other, the diner part of their daily routine. A candy machine contains a last layer of rainbow coloured disks - the last time someone bought candy, the 45 was probably still playable.

When I write this, I am never sure if I will use any of it - but I am looking for that interesting detail that brings something fresh. For me it was that lone record dangling from a string.

Off to walk along Lake Michigan... bringing my notebook.

Oh, and I did manage to sneak a shot of that record... for the record.