HE DID WHAT?!?!

Oh jeez, I feel dirty. That was clickbait. You deserve better and sorry.

I wanted to drop a line, give an update, have some fun, so, let's get WRITE into it.

I started working on the final draft of FALLING HOME (enter new tagline to make this book sound brand new here). This was my first/second novel that I wrote that is getting the updated the treatment. Already, it's been quite interesting to go back and research some of these "biblical" names and such and find out I spelled them wrong. Since this was in 2008 when I was doing all this research, you can imagine, It wasn't the best source of information for the internet. Not back then. If it wasn't Katy Perry kissing a girl during a showing of The Dark Knight, nobody cared to write about it.

And I guess I could have gone to a library, there were many around me back in the day, but that required reading, and I was trying to WRITE damn it!

Oh, how much I've learned since then.

Now, I'm unsure if I misspelled the name on purpose, just so folks can adjust their glasses as they wax poetic about their religious theology notes to me while I'm just trying to buy a damn jar of pickles for my son.

Context?

So, my kid, a five-year-old so cool that polar bears have to put on jackets when he's around, loves himself some pickles. And there's only two places in a hundred mile radius that sells they big jars of Vlasic Kosher Dills in the big jar. And, about once a week, I go grab another one of those jars from this place. Well, on one of those weekly trips, the place was sold out.

I was concerned! Scared for my life! Worrying what my child would do to me in my sleep! Would he smother me with a pillow? Buy a bunch of Robux using my fingerprint? Push me down the stairs? Nah, he'd just be like "okay" and ask for something else.

Everytime I grab these jars you see, the BIG ones, I often get "somebody likes pickles!" response from the cashier, and then I have to tell them that they're not for me, they're for my son. Listen, these are just regular pickles but larger, averaging 10 to fifteen pickles per jar, they're just larger. Chill the freak out you pickle pricks!

It comes with the territory of New England, everyone's a comedian.

One morning, early, I was in town and decided to swing by to see if they grocery store had restocked their pickles, and they had. Woot woot! About to get that "Parent of the Year" trophy out of the trashcan, baby! So, I grab two big jars and head for the check out. Some old geezer (I said it!) was loading his groceries, its 7:20am, the temperature outside is 25 degrees. "Quite the breakfast you got there," the man says after a double-take.

"Haha, you'd think. But they're actually for my son." See, even in the morning, I can start a conversation.

And nothing. Not even a blink as the man goes back to loading the conveyor with mothballs and butterscotch candies, or whatever old folks buy. I know that was ageist, and, I don't mean it at all. But this whole "I'm gonna say something and that's it" nonsense that comes along, more often than not, with New England types, is frustrating.

You see, back in Tennessee, you could strike up a two hour conversation with a stranger just by simply wearing shoes inside. Here, it's "let me say this real quick, and then you can fuck off."

Good times. But hey, we got so many pickles, so… right back at ya, old man!

I brought up an actual occurrence with pickles recently in the Thomas Murdock story I posted here, feel free to read that and come back here to see the story about how it all happened.

Oh hey, you're back! So, Vlasic recently released these "Pickle Puffs," they're like those big jars of cheese balls you see stacked high on a pallet during the summertime in most Walmarts across the country. Well, these are like those, but un a small ass bag and pickle flavored. I thought they would be a hit with the kiddo, but, much like in the story, I get slugged for "lying that they were good."

Lying and sharing an opinion was discussed after that incident, and, after I had the rib he punched out replaced with a spare rib I found in the refrigerator, we also talked about hitting.

But that was all a long tangent to tell you that I'm on Chapter 2 of the FALLING HOME, and I'm already excited about what I can…well…punch…up and expand upon with these characters. I wonder if it's easier to create the stories and go George Lucas them later than it is to just write them in the first place. I feel like, when you're creating something new, you can do whatever you want, but, as the years progress, more stories are told, going back and knowing these things helps shape a character better for the reader.

But I'm having a blast! Especially with the character of Jade. She's had parts in nearly every novel I've written, and, expanding on her story and giving more insight into her character has been fun. - Besides FALLING HOME, my favorite storylines with Jade are featured in Lawson City: Disintegration and The Peppercorn Files: The Numb3r Killer.

To give you snapshot of Jade's personality:

in LC:D, she seems to only be worried about the search for her boss after a bomb goes off at her job so she can remind him to approve her time-off request. Love it!

So, expect that kind of humor and more in FALLING HOME with the Jade character. I might even give her her own Lawson City: Shorts do sometime in the future! We shall see. I know I sound pretentious when I say this, but it's true AF: "I let the characters tell their stories, and I write them down."

Oh man…woman…everyone else…

Next week, we're going back to the morning BEFORE the attack on Lawson City and check in on Kara, Tom, and Ryan at their day job. See you then!

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Thank you for reading!

-Tyler Foran