Douglas Arvidson is a past winner of the WICE/Paris Transcontinental International Short Story competition. His short fiction has been published in Paris, Prague, and in literary magazines in the United States and he was recently invited to be a staff writer for the Prague Revue, a cutting-edge, online literary journal (http://bit.ly/1mMT6ZC). The novels in his fantasy series, The Eye of the Eye of Stallion, include The Face in Amber, The Mirrors of Castaway Time, and A Drop of Wizard's Blood. His new novel, Brothers of the Fire Star, was selected as a finalist in the ForeWord Reviews 2012 Book of the Year national awards and as a finalist in three categories in the 2013 New Mexico-Arizona Book Awards: Action Adventure Fiction, Historical Fiction, and Young Adult Fiction. It has become part of the pantheon of Pacific literature and is now included in school literature programs. Brothers of the Fire Star is an adventure story set in the Pacific during World War II and concerns two boys of different races and cultures who escape the island of Guam in a small sailboat when the Japanese army invades. They must then struggle to survive as they master the secrets of the ancient Pacific navigators. Appropriate for young adults as well as adult readers, Brothers of the Fire Star is available on Barnes & Noble, Amazon.com (http://amzn.to/1j3axVk) and Crossquarter.com. Visit the author's website: douglasarvidson.com



Thursday, September 26, 2013

Late Night Writer: Siblings, Old Movies, Fried Seafood, and The Next Book

The Gang of Four, Left to Right: Me, Janie, Johnny, Patty: The Original Arvidson Sibs hanging out in Massachusetts, Summer 2013


Spending the day in a creative frenzy doing nothing. Got 104 pages on the next novel written, rough draft form--nearly formless. Trolling the day for epiphanies to explain the plot structure--to straighten it out, adjust the who and where. I do understand The Why. That's the strength now: The motivations of the characters are rock solid: Red-Winged Blackbird on a Joe Pye Weed: form emerging out of formlessness.

Today, to work through my quandary, I didn't push it. Took the Prius to her appointment for oil change, pigged out on fried seafood at a restaurant on Chincoteaque, came home, took a nap, drank a bottle of wine with friend, and then went to dinner and came home and watched an old Woody Allen movie (Manhattan, his classic satire of the neurotic, affected YUPs in The City). Lots of think time. Tomorrow, early up, ready to write.

Got word that Brothers of the Fire Star has been selected as a finalist in three categories in the New Mexico-Arizona 2013 Book Awards: Adventure Fiction, Historical Fiction, and Young Adult Fiction. I'd plan on flying out to Albuquerque again (was there in May for the Southwest Book Fiesta--a bust), but don't know if I could take the possible wash out. Took in in Chicago with deep, painful disappointment at not actually winning Book of the Year, although I understand that just being a finalist means we won. Hell, compared to the thousands of books that didn't make it that far.

Now sleepy and ready for bed.


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