Wednesday, October 14, 2015

Home Is Nearer

The publication of my last novel, Home, is getting closer. I have the manuscript back from the proofreaders. Teddi Black is working on the cover. If things go well, perhaps the book will be available as soon as November.  Keep checking back here for more developments. I'll have more to say about Home once we get it out there to the public. One interesting thing that occurred to me as  I was reviewing the book was how autobiographical it is. By that I mean that Home is about a fellow who is lost and keeps walking through his neighborhood in Detroit. He is trying to figure out where he is and where belongs. He wants to know why something that had always been familiar is now foreign.  I think this is a metaphor about what I did in writing these seven novels. Taken together, the books are a journey through Detroit, looking for meaning. In the last book, the journey ends. What started with the Hero's Quest in the first book, finally concludes. Little wonder that the idea for Home, or at least its conclusion, came to me while I was still writing Smoke. Even then, I suppose, I could see to the conclusion. I just needed to get there.  As for finding meaning, time will tell.