After a very enthusiastic recommendation from my good friend Kelly, I put my name on the library waiting list for A Good and Happy Child by Justin Evans. The book is incredible, even more so considering this is a first novel.
When George Davies can't bring himself to pick up and hold his newborn son, George's wife demands he see a therapist, who seeks answers from George's childhood. George remembers some strange letters from his father, just before his death, as well as images of a mysterious friend that appeared to George as a boy.
This is one of those novels you can't stop reading, and when you absolutely have to stop, you're thinking about it all day long. I'll have more to say about it when I'm finished, but for now I'm completely absorbed.
Justin Evans has a website for the book which is quite interesting. I wish other writers would discuss research on their website. Also interesting is the timeline for how Evans wrote the book.
All of this caused me to wonder why more writers don't share more publicly about research and the process. Do they think that their fans won't be interested?
2 comments:
Some authors do. These days, you have to decide whether you want a real website or a blog or a combination of the two. Then there's the issue of how often to update. Some people just won't come back if there isn't new material.
This then generates the time sink question -- how much of my valuable writing time is it worth to update website/blog/etc?
Some people seem to have inexhaustible bursts of writing energy -- see John Scalzi's and Marjorie Liu's blogs -- and get legions of fans. Some writers are either not interested or else not conversant in the technology.
The sad thing is that must publishers these days don't do a very good job with even midlist authors -- you really have to go on the offensive yourself and promote your own work. Which then leads back to your original question. (grin)
Dr. Phil
It doesn't look like Evans is updating this site, but he probably has a separate blog. But I appreciate that he put down a little "How I Did It" section. Nothing huge, certainly not a dissertation, just a brief summary. Helpful and encouraging.
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