While waiting to decide on my next book-length project, I’m working on some short things. One of these may be a way to tie together my travels in the past with writing.
In reading about other writers, as well as about kings and princes in foreign lands, I learned about The Grand Tour, where the person goes around the world, usually with a trusted friend or relative, not for the purpose of adventure but to learn about the world. Tsar Nicholas 2nd of Russia did this while he was crown prince. Others have done this, though the names escape me right now. Emerson, I guess, was another one when he made his trip to Europe after the death of his first wife. But I prate.
I finally figured out, however, that I actually had my grand tour, but I had it long before I ever figured on being a writer. My time in Saudi Arabia and Kuwait gave us the opportunity for lots of travel. A month in Europe. Two weeks in Egypt. A month in Asia. Weeks in Greece and Turkey. Brief stops in England. My Grand Tour.
But how to work them into my writing? Those trips are ancient history now. I have nothing to offer a travel magazine or book, as anything that happened in China in 1983 would be irrelevant now. China is a special case, however, because I’m still planning on writing a novel based on that trip. Tentatively titled China Tour, it would have this tag line: An American family traveling in China becomes embroiled in a CIA operation.
So as I’m taking some years to think of how to work my travels into my writing, a possible way came to me through Facebook. One night a woman who I knew in junior high, high school, and college, who still lives in our hometown of Cranston, Rhode Island, reported on Facebook that some kind of police action was going on in her neighborhood. I just had to make a smart comment. Here, let me past in the exchange we had.
HER: Wow! Lots of activity in neighborhood. Loaded with cops driving around and walking in large groups with flashlights. Out walking the dog and they told me to get in the house! Going thru back yards and looking under bushes… what is going on?
ME: I didn’t do it. Nobody saw me. You can’t prove anything!
HER: You’re lucky you don’t live around here! You’d be prime suspect! lol
ME: Me! I’m a model citizen.
ME: And what were you doing out so late with the dog? Must have been a drug rendezvous, maybe with your crack deal? Hmmm, maybe I can get a short story out of this: A RI woman who hides her ancestry behind a new name gets caught up in the a drug war. I like it.
HER: Just the nightly bedtime walk………Nothing spectacular
ME: Yeah, like the police haven’t heard that one before.
ME: OK, I’ve been thinking about this plot, and my thoughts are beginning to gel. “How about this plot: [Woman’s Name], by all appearances a simple housewife from Cranston, RI, is caught outside her house when police swarm through her neighborhood, looking for a car chase fugitive who is now on foot. She goes back inside as ordered, but the fugitive escapes. As the police investigate, they learn the woman’s maiden name is really [insert good Italian name here], she was once a CIA operative, and she was the case worker for the fugitive who escaped (or maybe she helped extract him from some foreign country). They then figure she helped the fugitive escape, or might even be hiding in her house.” Not quite sure where to go from there. Sounds like it might need to be a novella rather than a short story.
HER: Can’t believe you put all this thought into it! What were you up all night thinking about this? The “simple” to describe housewife doesn’t sit well with me. 🙁 Can you make me sound a little more interesting? But don’t go overboard! Or leave an adjective out completely……
ME: What, being an ex-CIA operative isn’t interesting enough for you? Actually, I didn’t like the work ‘simple’ either, and thought ‘ordinary’ would be better, or possibly ‘normal’. And an office worker. “[Woman’s Name], by all appearances an ordinary housewife and office worker from Cranston, RI, ….”
That took place in January of this year. I couldn’t let this go; thoughts and plot lines kept running through my head. It occurred to me I could possibly work this into a series of short stories, if not a novel, wherein this housewife and office worker would actually be a CIA agent, traveling to the places I did, doing various espionage operations. Even a title came to me: Whiskey, Zebra, Tango. Code letters, perhaps, in a CIA operation. I could get a whole series of titles like that.
Finally in August I wrote the story. It finished off around 6,800 words, or twenty-six printed pages. I sent it to the namesake in the story, figuring since I’m using her real name I’d better have her permission. Yesterday I heard from her, saying she loved the story. It made her feel like a cross between Stephanie Plum and Nancy Drew. I haven’t read either of those, but I’m glad she liked it.
She asked for one change in the story, which I’m happy to make. Also, as I read through some of it yesterday, I found a couple of things I’d like to tweak—a comma here, an adjective there. I’m afraid I just can’t write to Heinlen’s rules.
So, that’s where I’m at. I will likely finish the tweaking tomorrow evening. Then there’s the problem of a cover. I may try it myself, or maybe I’ll be able to beg another one. Look for this to be published in about a week, if everything goes right.
