good end to awful year
After having a novel rejected this past March I immediately started to write another one, to recoup, and to convince myself that I could still write interesting novels. I'm happy to say that the new one has come along pretty well and is nearing completion. I should deliver the manuscript sometime next February. It's a lot simpler and more conventional than the Bad Novel, a lot more like The Good Son. It's about a couple of aging Vietnam veterans who buy a big house in Mexico and run afoul of the drug cartels. It has plenty of action and some observations about Mexico and Mexican culture, sort of along the lines of how Pakistan was almost a character in the previous novel.
I may have mentioned that The Good Son was shortlisted for the Steel Dagger award. In the event, it did not win, but I got to go to London for a fancy party and mingle with the stars of British mystery TV shows, something I did not expect. When they distribute the Pulitzers they do not, I believe, invite the short listed authors to cavort with the stars of the movies that have been made from novels, but it was sort of fun, in a creepy way. They had a stuffed horse and an actor dressed as Qadaffi, if that gives you an idea, and each prize was handed out by a lovely couple, who bandied wit before opening the envelopes.
I am going to teach a course this February about writing commercial thrillers, if anyone's interested.
This is the info: