The best way to guarantee you will NOT do something is to say you will do it when you have time. That approach offers a built-in escape clause that allows you to look at the clock while pulling on your pajamas and say, oops, guess I didn’t have time to do that today.
Which explains why the Gypsy has been galloping around in big loopy circles for the last month, doing everything but writing regular blog posts. Bad Gypsy.
BUT!
I have managed to start the sequel to “Ghost.” So far, the process consists of drinking large quantities of coffee and staring out the window, wondering if there are any chocolate chips in the freezer and what season we're doing today. Such is the creative process.
The sequel has no title. It has something that is trying very hard to be a plot. It has a jumble of quirky, rural-Iowa-in-the-summer scenes and eastern Iowa folklore and actual history that, given enough time and discipline, will evolve into an actual manuscript. When I was writing “Ghost,” I remember a speaker at a writers’ conference saying the first draft and the final draft should not look like twins. Maybe cousins. Once removed. With some questionable DNA results and a lot of questions about that uncle who lives in a doublewide up in the hills.
I’m working from some notes I made a Very. Long. Time. Ago. Maybe some writers can remember every element of character development and timeline and plot twist as they create it, but I am not one of them. Half the time I can’t remember who did what in the previous chapter.
The creative process also includes filling out vendor intake forms for local farmers markets and researching esoteric topics like how to pay Illinois toll fees and when did Grant Wood paint “Young Corn”? Do not question the creative process. And I still owe the state of Illinois an undetermined amount of money, which they do not seem very interested in collecting.
BOOK #2
A few weeks ago, I announced the happy news that I’ve signed with Hayseed Press to make my second novel, a cozy mystery titled “Exercise Finished,” a reality this summer. Hayseed is an Iowa-based indie press co-founded by brothers Nick Narigon and Aaron Narigon.
One of my favorite memories from our shared newspaper days involved dead people. I one hundred percent blame the fact dead people have supporting roles in my writing on the fact I spent about thirty years writing obituaries. This was when the internet was in its infancy, and putting obits in the newspaper was Serious Business. Back then, people picked up the paper for information instead of picking up a device.
Part of my job was to process the obits for multiple newspapers in our publishing group. On an average week, there were four or five, enough to fill half a broadsheet page. I was on a first-name basis with funeral directors across eastern Iowa. I knew the various spellings of local surnames, including Bloethe, Cronbaugh, Schlabaugh, Leichsenring, and Demeulenaere. I not only knew how to correctly spell Armah, Koszta, and Genoa Bluff, I knew where those cemeteries were located. I knew pallbearers was one word and casket bearers was two.
Anyway, I went on vacation, and Nick wrote the obits that week. There were thirteen of them, and the deceased had all lived long, service-driven lives which were fondly recalled down to the last Lutheran women's ice cream social committee membership and county fair board office, as well as extended family trees whose branches were documented to include the most distant cousins. They took a staggering amount of time to write and a vast amount of space to print. When I came back to work, Nick informed me I was never allowed to go on vacation again. He was kidding. I think. Shortly after that, he left for greener pastures. I’m pretty sure the obituary apocalypse had nothing to do with it.
Flash forward to 2020. The world was in lockdown. I’d been dabbling with finding a literary agent to represent “Ghost.” It wasn’t going well. Out of the blue, Nick emailed me and said, in effect, “I’m bored. Send me the manuscript for your novel. I want to read it.”
So I did, and he did, and the suggestions he made launched “Ghost” onto the path to what it finally became. I’m excited to join forces with him and Aaron at Hayseed Press. Check out Hayseedpress.com to see what projects they’ve got coming up. I’ll be part of a panel with other Hayseed authors at the Des Moines Book Festival on Saturday, May 2, and Nick has promised he will tell us the topic we’ll be discussing at least five minutes before we sit down.
I am also writing (gonna need more chocolate chips) a short story for Hayseed’s collection of all things weird, suitably titled “Iowa Weird, Volume 2, which will release this fall.
And at the end of this month, Nick is going to finally get even with me for making him write thirteen obituaries in one week when he drops the first round of edits for “Exercise Finished” back in my lap. At that point, I’ll jump from Jess McCallister and Dan Sinclair’s world of ghosts, cemeteries and historic mystery into River Kincaid and Tyler McAllan’s world of murder at an obedience trial.
This coincides with the calendar turning to April and my first mission as trial chair for the Iowa City Dog Obedience Club’s three-ring, three-day circus—um, highly efficiently run obedience trial. Followed by a road trip north for another classic spring trial weekend. Followed by a road trip south for Aussie Nationals. Followed by whatever follows hauling all over the Midwest for three major events in two weeks. No one plans to live like this on purpose, it just happens. If you encounter me walking around, talking to myself, please offer coffee or chocolate or a hug. All three would be appreciated.
Check out the sidebar for dates I’m giving author’s talks and signings. Come if you can!
As always, I invite you to follow me at my author’s page at https://www.facebook.com/melinda.wichmann.author for updates from my very small corner of the literary world.
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