HUGE NEWS on our potential upcoming releases!

I'm embarrassed at times when I think about the fact that a few years back, I completed and saw published four novels in the span of three years. I was in a really good groove as a writer and my life and schedule were locked in, so much so that I felt unstoppable. 

And then, as it did to everyone, the Covid-19 pandemic changed everything. While I did finish two more books during that time, one was a series finale that ended up being delivered six months late, and the other was a memoir that was really just supposed to be a creative palate-cleanser after writing four books as Avery in the Avery & Angela series. I had (still have) other novels in various states of completion, but I never really got back to the discipline I'd had before.

I know other writers who used that time to find their own process and managed to come out the other side of things with huge creative efforts. I was proud of them. 

But the way the pandemic affected my process was to pretty much throw it out the window. My children were home doing virtual school, my wife was home working, and the processes that had sustained me through all of those published works were no longer sustainable. I simply couldn't work the same way anymore.

So, that's why I haven't had a new title out since 2020. In all honesty, I still have not quite yet gotten back to the kind of discipline that I had in the olden time, but I'm getting there. My kids are all in college now and while my teaching work remains rewarding and takes more time than my days as a mixologist, it remains part-time. 

The time to work exists now and I'm making progress. So much so that I'm excited to share news on not one, but TWO possible releases that may be available this year!

I've written about the Freddy Pinkerton novel in the newsletter before (which you can join here) and I'm nearly done. If things go as planned, I may have that one in the hands of my editors and beta-team within the next month. Unless our team decides to explore other options, I would plan to launch the Freddy novel in October, which is in line with the time of year that the story takes place. I've always loved launching that way. THE LAST GOOD DAY was a summer story, so it came out in summer, for example. So, stay tuned on that front. 

The other, far more unexpected news is regarding a project I've never really shared with all of you before.

Back in 2007, my family and I moved to Hawaii in support of my wife's career. I left my position as a school administrator and became a stay-at-home dad to our three kids, who were 3, 3, and 1 at the time. There was a lot of on-the-job training for me, and as I tend to do, I wrote about the experience and whatever else was on my mind. It was a way to process my new life as a parent and also a way to reconcile my own feelings and relationships, having moved half a world away from home. This was in the early days of Facebook and social media, so honestly, the original "Aloha Kugs" blog became my way to share with friends and family all over the world what was going on in my life. Several of those old blogs became books of their own, and a few of them made it into my ALMOST TOLERABLE PERSON memoir. It was my first time really developing discipline as a writer. I put myself on assignment. It was fun. I think it made me a better writer.

So, as I tend to do, I often look to upscale. I liked the blog but felt like I had bigger stories to tell. I said to my wife, a few too many times apparently, "I think I could write a novel" and "I'd like to write a novel," as she, the kindest person I've ever known turned to me one evening and said, "Why don't you just go do it and stop whining about it? Here's the keys, I've got the kids. Drive down to the beach and write something and don't come back until you do."

So, I did that. With fits and starts and all sorts of other things, I began work that very day on a novel that would eventually become THE GEOGRAPHY OF HOME. It took a few years and endured more than its share of imposter syndrome, but by the time we left Oahu and moved back to the East Coast, it was an actual completed novel. 

It went through editing and beta reading. After learning more about the publishing industry, I took it to NYC and pitched it to some agents and editors. There was some interest. 

In the end, nothing happened. I got discouraged. I put it away. I didn't write much creatively for a while until one afternoon in San Francisco, where I pulled out my notebook and wrote down the first lines of what would later become THE LAST GOOD DAY. And that book started a journey that I'm still enjoying. 

But I didn't really think of GEOGRAPHY very often. I started calling it my "training novel" that taught me that I could do it and could do it better. While I remembered the book fondly, I never thought about sharing it with anyone again. 

About a month ago, one of the twins was asking about my old MP3's. They are a very analog kind of music listener. They have a Walkman, a discman, and were looking for new tracks to add to my decades old iPod, and possibly to make a new mix tape with. So, I found the old external hard drive storage device that I used years ago as a backup for pictures, music, and writing files. 

And there it was, nestled right next to the folder with the music files, was all of my backups and notes for THE GEOGRAPHY OF HOME. I pointed it out to them and we started checking out the songs in the other folder. 

As I clicked through the MP3's, something unexpected happened. The songs were a genuine snapshot of what I was listening to as I wrote GEOGRAPHY and it took me back to that time, and place, and the writer I was then, and things I was feeling then. Anyone who knows me or reads my work knows that music is omnipresent. So, hearing songs by Coldplay, Colbie Caillat, Jason Mraz, and others really took me into the headspace of that younger version of myself. It was totally reminiscent of how if I hear certain songs by Foo Fighters, Indigo Girls, Sonicflood, or Bruce, it puts me in the headspace I was in writing the Avery & Angela books. 

And, it made me want to look at that book again. So after everyone else had gone to bed, I sat down with it and gave it a look, trying very hard to look at as though it had been written by someone else. You know, since it had. 

I'd love to say that as I looked at it I didn't cringe a few times at my own senseless use of passive voice, crutch phrases like "for a moment," and "looking deeply." I'd love to say that as I read it, I immediately said, "PEOPLE NEED TO READ THIS AS IS RIGHT NOW," but of course I didn't. I was reading a writer who was still finding their voice and making a lot of newbie mistakes. 

I was reading a writer who was clearly trying, sometimes too hard, to be profound and descriptive. 

I was reading a writer who needed a lot of help. 

And then I remembered something important: I know how to help that writer. 

This current (hopefully still Almost Tolerable) version of myself has learned those skills. I've used them to help other writers, most of whom now wildly outsell me. I've taught other people how to do this work. I know more than that young version of me, and I thought, maybe, just maybe, there's enough in GEOGRAPHY to if nothing else, be a fun little thing for people to check out. 

Added bonus being that it's not a YA book. It's closer in genre to the Freddy book. So, it might even be beneficial for me to use the old book as a test ballon and learning exercise for me, as I prepare to navigate a new genre.

So, I've been doing a complete re-write of THE GEOGRAPHY OF HOME. It's needed a lot of work. I need to write at least one more chapter as the ending needs more. That said, I have an entire notebook filled with chapters and notes on the sequel (what is it with me and sequels?) I thought I could do which had a working title of SUNRISE ON DIAMONHEAD. So, that work has continued.

In fact, it's almost done. If all goes well, the new and undoubtedly improved GEOGRAPHY OF HOME will be in the hands of a very special beta team this week. 

And unless they come back to me with, "dude, put this back in a drawer," you might be able to read it next month. And for me, after five years of stops and starts, the idea that I might have two books for you in the next few months is motivating. It's a little scary but intoxicating as well. 
 
Thank you for your patience. Stay tuned.