Browsing Tag

Thieves

Publishing

Opening Day of Extra Innings

What a relief to finally have this book Extra Innings:  The Diamond Thieves finally available.  Not only for myself but all those who have been inquiring about it.  It’s been quite a journey.  The fictional story of identical twin brothers Jimmy and Billy McGee has been some recent revisions – primarily in Chapter 1.

When I first received an actual printed copy and turned to the first page of Chapter 1 – I was not happy with what I read.  The first line use to read:  Jimmy and Billy stood in each other’s way of the bathroom mirror, upstairs in their parent’s Mississippi home, each desperate to find his own evidence of puberty.  

I felt “stood in each other’s way” was too negative of an opening.  This was not the image I was going for in this book.  Nor did I want the reader to think that puberty was the primary theme.   The tricky part of removing this line was that I really liked how it read.  So after some careful thought, I found a more impactful and appropriate place for it in Book 2:  Race of the Gemini.  It actually fits better here considering the overall theme of this particular book compared to the theme in Book 1: The Diamond Thieves.

From there the chapter went on with negative comments about how the boys were too hot, their attic bedroom was too hot, they were bored and just one negative comment after another.    I’m not sure why I never had this general impression before.  I guess looking at a computer screen or an 8.5 x 11 printed page doesn’t deliver the same impact as when your actually holding your complete book in your hand … who knows?

So I did a major overhaul to the first 3 pages.  I also did some work to a baseball card trading dialogue between Fist and Boston in Chapter 2 simply because some of the facts were inaccurate.

Probably one of the biggest changes was one of the twins’ friends Ryan Blair.  By some random course of events, I learned through Google that “Ryan” was NEVER a first name of a boy prior to the late 1950’s.  This book takes place in 1947 and the character Ryan Blair was 13 – so he would have been born in 1934.  At this time, Ryan was only a last name.  How me or my editor never caught this before is beyond me.  So I used Google to search for popular Southern boys names, 1930’s and found http://www.ssa.gov/oact/babynames/decades/names1930s.html

The name Charles popped out as one that I liked the most.  Charles was the 6th most popular boy’s name at that time.  PLUS, Charles is my grandfather’s name (on my dad’s side).  Charles Gibson.  So I thought this would be perfect.  Being that this is the South, Charles became Charlie and therefore Ryan become Charlie Blair.

There were a few other minor character’s who’s names needed changed to more accurately reflect the time period.

Additionally, my mom pointed out that the street the McGee twins lived on (which was also the name of the street my mom grew up on in Ohio) was inaccurate.  I had the street name as Greenvalley Drive.  My mom corrected me and said that Greenvalley should be two words, so to better pay homage to my mom’s childhood I changed it to Green Valley Drive.

Lastly, I beefed up one of the character’s roles during the baseball game.  As stated in the book’s summary T.J. was the team’s spark plug, so I enhanced some of his actions throughout the book to more dramatically reflect this claim.

Overall, I am MUCH HAPPIER with this revised product.  I hope that all my readers enjoy it and most importantly, I hope that the last chapter (Chapter 12) leaves them craving the release of Book 2 (of 3): Race of the Gemini.

Publishing

Kidnapping the Slave

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.”

Publishing

Detailing Characters & Settings: Is More Less Better Than More?

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.

Publishing

Editing Book 2 Underway

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.