The Briefcase: Germ of an Idea

As mentioned in the previous post I started to write in 2008.  I shared some of my earliest short story ideas with a friend in the publishing business. He immediately recommended several books to help me in my quest to become a writer. I read the material, some were helpful and some just too tedious to get through. One book was an anthology of short stories by John Cheever. This book was inspirational and way beyond what I was writing. But it set a standard. I understand what good writing is supposed to be.

I then started a short story that grew too long. It was set in the condominium where I lived. It was an impressive place built as a vacation hotel for NYC white collar workers in the early 1920's. the place was built from quarried stone near the Croton Reservoir in Westchester County, NY. The grounds included 740 acres and a 40 acre pond 35 miles north of Manhattan. I came up with a fairly good plot and some interesting characters. I shared my novelette with an author friend. She was supportive, but suggested the addition of several deaths to enhance the story!  I took this to heart but put the idea on the back burner.

My next idea was The Briefcase. The spark of the story is a recurring dream I have had for years. I decided to pattern my novel as a James Patterson work using many short chapters. I raced through several chapters with only one objective -- moving the plot forward. I did not know where I was going or how to get there. The book had no outline. I kept no character list. I was at the helm of a ship without a rudder. But I would include deaths.

More to come.

Author, Author

The Briefcase by Charles Holt

I wrote the post below just overnight years ago.  My new novel, The Briefcase was just released on August 9, 2017.  Over the next few weeks I will share the hows and whys of this long gestation period.  You can find both print and/or ebook versions of The Briefcase at Outskirts Press, Amazon Books, Kindle Nooks, Barnes and Noble, Nook Books and Apple Books.

Tuesday, August 18, 2009

Author, Author

The Dickerson Pondit has not been at all faithful to his blog. Shame on him! It is not that he has abandoned the pen and paper or more truthfully the keyboard and Microsoft Word. While traveling across the northern US of A this past June and July, the Pondit decided he would spend some time writing stories. In the past six weeks he has written two short stories and started his first novel. The two stories are fully finished in draft form and he has asked some friends to help him with editing the stories. The novel is still in construction mode but he has made significant progress. The plot line is developing nicely, at least the Pondit believes it is, but with the transition from short stories to a full blown novel, there will need to be a great deal of follow-up work to do a better job in developing the characters in the book. For reasons unknown to anyone including the Pondit, the novel is set in Key West Florida. Perhaps he has a fixation on Hemmingway or he just isn't as clever as he should be.
His first story is set in Valeria, the home of Dickerson Pond. This is place well known to the Pondit and made the writing of the story a little easier. He did not have to spend hours using Google Maps to find names for locations and try to fathom what was north, south east or west from the point of action in the story. The second story is part of a proposed trilogy on technology. The technology in the second story is texting. It is fairly short and raises some concerns about privacy in this new world of instant communications. The Pondit is hoping that he can get some of his work published. The Pondit also heads out when he sees a rainbow to try and find the pot of gold that the leprechauns hide at the end of the colored arc.
I am going to share chapter one of the novel, The Briefcase, with my blog followers. Feedback from the highly intelligent readers of the Dickerson Pondit is as always, gratefully accepted. So far the novelist has penned thirty-one chapters of his first book

FYI:  I will not be sharing parts of my copy righted book on this blog.