In the midst of my lumbering through these chapter summaries I recognized a major opportunity area at the beginning of Chapter 10 when the boys kidnap Slave from “the mob” (their opposing team). I won’t go into any depth here since that would only eradicate the juiciness and suspense. I just wanted to share with everyone how eye-opening and a bit saddening it was to realize and area of Book 1 still needs further development. So onward I go with adding a new piece to Book 1 (The Diamond Thieves) and I apologize to the fans who’ve already completed Book 1 and will miss out on the additional drama between Jimmy & Billy’s team and “the mob.”
diamond
Skip calls everyone to an early morning emergency meeting at the baseball diamond. After the meeting, the twins decide it best to take a short-cut through the woods which side-tracks them on an eye-opening journey making them late for church.
This hot summer day is about to become a scorcher as Jonas and his band of neighborhood troublemakers show up at the baseball diamond with one goal: they want the diamond for themselves. Jimmy, Billy and all their friends have been playing ball there for years and they aren’t about to give it up to the likes of Jonas and his mob. The settle the score, the two teams challenge each other to a baseball game where he winning team will get full reign over the baseball diamond once and for all.
In the collection of conversations I’ve had around the topic of character & setting details in a literary work, I have heard an overwhelming response of folks in favor of authors who provide vast amounts of detail when describing a character’s physical description. And the same goes for a setting if its a key location (such as the town or street where a character lives, a room where important pieces of the story take place, etc). For example, chapters 1 -3 of The Diamond Thieves well-depicts the main characters physical description and personalities. This is especially important since they are identical twins yet extremely different personality-wise. I have only heard of readers preferring that a character be more left up to that reader’s imagination for minor more utility role characters & places in a book. The beginning chapters also provide an abundance of visual imagery to describe the small, fictional, Southern town of Eugene, Mississippi.
Editing Book 2 of the Extra Innings Trilogy (Race of the Gemini) is underway. I have decided to go with my brother-in-law’s cousin Derek Mitchell. Derek is a writing tutor with his bachelor of arts from Kent State University. We had a great talk yesterday regarding his impression of Book 1 (The Diamond Thieves). Derek said he enjoyed getting to know the characters and said it was a fast read that kept him interested through all 160 pages. More to come as I take this journey with Derek deeper into the lives of Jimmy and Billy McGee.