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It is now October, 2024.
I called him to find out.
Youd written books beforeThe Library at Mount Char.
They were technical books, mostly about Linux, but they were books.
Then at some point in your life you started writing a novel?
Well, it was more the other way around.
Id done the technical books, but I had written three unpublished novels prior toMount Char.
They just werent very good.
One of em I thought was kind of on the borderline, but in hindsight, not so much.
Plus it was an animal story, which is a tough sell to the adult market.
It was strictly from an animal point of view.
So you completed three novels and then you looked at them and thought,I cant save this.
I cant fix this.
But I sent it out to the agents and got basically no response.
I should have just chucked it into the harbor, spared myself some embarrassment.
Family and friends were like, Well, it certainly is a book.
Guess thats how I actually ended up with my current literary agent.
What was the first sort of image or idea or piece that becameMount Char?
And this actually happened to me.
I was living in this little town, very rural Georgia.
One day Im out jogging with my dog and the stray dogs took issue with this.
One day I was kind of noodling around and I figured Id jot that down.
Which then leads you to the suburbs, which leads you to your setting.
I was just trying to write, and I had a hiatus while I did day-job stuff.
I was just writing down anything that sounded interesting without really having any kind of grand vision for it.
Eventually I had enough stuff that all the dots started to connect.
Youre not a storyboard writer.
I really had a very time intensive day job.
It was like seven days a week for a while.
I was filling in the gaps as solutions occurred to me.
What ended up happening in the edit and publishing process that changed from your first draft?
The very first draft was not one I submitted.
I showed it to my wife, and shes notoriously well, shes very fair-minded.
If she doesnt like something, shell tell you.
And thats exactly what I need.
Shes like, Its actually really good.
So that draft never saw the light of day outside the walls of my house.
The agent,Caitlin Blasdell, actually liked it.
(She also represents science fiction legend Charles Stross.)
Did a lot of people look at it?
What was the auction and buying process like for you?
It was pretty quick.
The agent contributed a lot that became fan favorites.
So we worked on that for a couple months.
This was like two days.
She sent it out to five editors and got offers promptly.
What was that process like with the editorJulian Pavia, then?
(He also editedReady Player OneandThe Martian.)
Suddenly youre in a new persons hands.
I have absolutely no complaints at all about the editorial process.
I wouldve sworn on a stack of Bibles I had chopped every unnecessary word out of this thing.
He managed to find and trim down stuff that I had a blind spot to.
It just didnt need to be there.
He was absolutely right.
Eventually theyre like,Were going to publish this book.
What was that month like for you up to the publishing and then pub date?
Im like a data-center guy.
I kind of keep the machines running, rather than attend a lot of meetings and decide strategy.
So Im really more heads down and writing is by its own nature a solitary occupation.
So it was strange.
It was definitely outside my comfort zone, but they were all, again, very pleasant.
So it was a lot of work, but it was also sort of dream-come-true key in stuff.
Honestly, very pleasant.
Did you at any point decide that your book was a success?
I want to say yes.
They both seemed fairly happy with it.
It didnt rock the world the way some books have, but its still plugging along.
Its been fairly steady for ten years now, I think.
Do you receive royalties from the book?
In fact, yes.
At what point did you think,Maybe Ill do it again?
I immediately set out to write a follow-up unrelated toMount Char.
I had a false start and kind of abandoned that about halfway through.
So I kind of dropped that one and moved on to something else.
Im hoping to have something worth submitting in the next year or so, but Ive been wrong before.
So youre unafraid to face the fact that this might be unfinished novel No.
5 is what Im hearing.
I mean, I keep trying.
I struggled to find a tone.
I was in a weird head space when I was writingMount Char, and Im struggling to recapture that.
For obvious reasons, its hard to get too enthusiastic about that.
I was going to say, that can be arranged, but …
So some of the creativity was fueled by a terror.
Same kind of thing with me.
You never want the wrong fatal diagnosis.
Were you going through some stuff?
They had probably one question.
And I figured, we all got places to be.
Should probably update that however.
Well, not long after April 2019, things got more hectic.
I wonder what was changing in the world for you in 2020?
Oh God, people are probably going to crucify me for this, but really not much.
I guess my main thing was that I was pleased to be able to wear a mask in public.
That was nice, being socially acceptable.
Always kind of wanted to do that.
And you work from home primarily, right?
Yeah, I have for nearly ten years now with the health-care company.
Do you get out a bit or do you not get out a bit?
I mean, every now and then.
Not like I never leave the house.
Im just one of those people.
Everyones like, Why dont you want to travel?
And Im like,Why would I do that?
Its just too many.
Thats one of the things Im really chewing on, whether I want to pick that up.
Are there sequels or adjacent universe buildings that you really like that you read or watch?
Well,Breaking BadandBetter Call Saulis the canonical example.
I was a huge fan of both.
I think Ive got three of them on paper and the wife thinks two of them are okay.
She really is your first reader.
Thats pretty bold in a marriage.
So from day one, she saw right through me.
I mean, they were all frustrating, some more than others.
And that, in my case at least, turned out not to be the case.
And so its hard not to be mindful of that.
Im not entirely at peace with it.
That would not be a fair characterization.
But it is what it is.
I really am sincerely glad to have gotten this far.
And if thats as far as I ever get, I can live with it.
Yeah, that was on the table for a while.
It is a good choice not to go crazy.
Well, it was just really frustrating.
And so far, I just havent come up with anything that anybody agrees is worth pursuing.
And Im trying to remedy that, but it hasnt happened yet.
So thats kind of where Im at.
Every word youve written, youve learned something.
Theres not any guaranteed reward at the end, if youre not enjoying it in and of itself.
And I will say writingMount Charwas the most fun Ive ever had doing anything.
If I could do one experience in my life again, that would be it.
And Ive had a pretty good run, but that really was it.
Do you write in the morning?
Most ofMount Charwas written between 2 a.m. and 6 a.m.
I did that for a long time.
But we had a lot of dogs at the time, and the house was quiet.
Were you ever approached about adaptations or stuff fromMount Char?
The rights are out there, and Im curious to see what happens if anything with it.
Its been optioned a couple of times.
Nothing has materialized so far, but we live in hope.
It does seem to be extremely adaptable material.
Your mouth to Gods ears.
I think part of it is that theres only one of em.
It seems like the stuff that actually gets picked up has potential for five seasons or whatever.
Thats kind of what writing a new book is like to me.
Thats the publication process.
What else should I ask you about?
Well, heres one thing.
Im a big Stephen King fan.
I would argue thatThe Standin particular was a lot about him losing his mother at a relatively early age.
Im just speculating here.
And inThe Shining, he was coming to terms with the fact that he was maybe drinking too much.
And I tried to put that intoMount Char.
My relationship with my dad was a little bit rocky not bad exactly.
We went through probably more than the usual teenage headbutting kind of thing.
But before he died, we became what I would consider very good friends.
We really got pretty close.
Hed always been kind of a scary guy.
He had a very stern presence.
It put my entire childhood into a different perspective.
So I wanted to put that in the book.
Are you going to retire someday?
Yeah, I am.
I dont have an actual date set, but lets say ten yearsish.
When you put it like that, it sounds like a really long time.
Im hoping to live that long.
I had about a year off afterMount Charsold where it was quasi-retirement.
I didnt do much besides write.
And honestly, I got really bored.
It was kind of the dream come true, but Im not really hankering for it.
I like the job Im doing.
I like the people I work with.
The work itself is interesting.
So you had that thing that everyone thinks is the dream.
How long was it fun for?
What did your wife think of you after a month of you not working and just being around writing?
She was sick of my crap.
She wanted me to figure out something to do.
