Tag: Iowa

There Were Once Two Books Lurking in My Electronic Footlocker

I’ve joked here about a month ago that I haven’t been a good Iowa writer. By this, I mean I haven’t set much of my writing in my home state of Iowa12. My first book, The Holy Fool, had a protagonist who was born in Iowa but otherwise had little connection with the state3. My second book, The Yank Striker, and its subsequent series, has no connection whatsoever with Iowa4.

I just called The Holy Fool and The Yank Striker my first and second book. They are the first two books I ever had published, but they are not the first two books I’ve ever written. That honor goes to two books I wrote back when I was still within my twenties and early thirties, books I have discussed here previously but have not revisited for a while. And I’m finding myself coming back to them all these years later and wondering whether they might be worth a low-stakes revision and publication.

Book 1: Buried Secrets (AKA Rough Boys)

The first book I ever really wrote, the first one to emerge from the perpetual stew simmering inside my head and to live more than a few hastily written or typed pages, was essentially a young adult crime novel.

It started bubbling up in my imagination somewhere in my twenties, those years when I kept calling myself a writer and yet didn’t write much of anything but anonymous news articles about city councils, elections, feature stories, and the like. I thought fiction had been set aside in my head, but I finally got around to producing … something.

At the time, I was still trying to sort through all the teenage debris in my head, even as I was getting closer to being an adult. By the time I’d finished putting together a rough draft, I’m pretty sure I was already married and in my mid-twenties.

In it’s initial form under the title Buried Secrets (inspired by some ideas from a variety of young adult novels I devoured throughout my teenage and young adult years), it started as a high school senior with interests in journalism and/or law enforcement learns that a mysterious girl his age is living alone in a house that seems to be abandoned. He gets to know her and learns that she is trying to find out the identity of her biological mother and father after her adoptive parents died. She came to find out that they were both residents of his hometown (a small eastern Iowa town, hint hint). He agrees to help her out with his knowledge of the town, and they begin to have a romance.

At the same time, he learns that some members of his school’s football team committed a sex crime against one of their classmates. (Taking a cue from a real-life incident in the national media, the first drafts had this person be a girl, but I eventually changed it to a guy and the secret boyfriend of my main character’s best male friend). As he’s trying to help out this girl, he’s also trying to help solve this case.

In the revised version of the story, which I re-titled Rough Boys, the main character gets to know the girl after he coincidentally finds the body of her mother washed up on the banks of the Mississippi River one day before the start of his senior year. He learns from both her and the police that the mother was a one-time con artist now working for the company his father works for. The question soon becomes: had she returned to the grifting life, and how might it have led to her death? I also kept the B-story about his friend and his secret boyfriend, as well.

So, I tried to shop the book around to several agents, but I never got anywhere with it. There was one agent who took an upfront fee but either she never got a publisher interested or, as many things now turn out to be on the Internet, it was a scam all along. After a while, my wife and I started a family, I dug into my journalism career for a time, and the book got set aside.

Book 2: Excitable Boy

It was sometime around the early 2000’s when I heard about National Novel Writing Month, or NaNoWriMo for short. This was the contest founded by writer Chris Baty back in 1999 as a way to encourage people to write. Every November, competitors around the world attempted to write 50,000 words in a single month5.

I have to give this competition credit for getting me thinking about being productive as a writer and getting me thinking about word counts. It would eventually be the inspiration for me keeping track of my word counts for fiction and nonfiction and eventually using them as motivation for kicking my productivity into a higher gear than ever before.

I ended up participating in the 2003 NaNoWriMo event and succeeded in producing a 50,000-word manuscript. Dear readers, you ask how is it possible to produce a 50,000-word novel in just 30 days? One of the secrets to doing it is simple: it doesn’t have to be a good novel6.

When I dipped into the creative stew for this story, I thought about the phenomenon of school shootings and violence which was even then becoming an epidemic. I asked myself, what would happen if one of these kids, these perpetrators, lived through the experience? What might happen if he served his time, got his release? Could there be any hope for them later?

That’s what I ended up exploring in the book which I would eventually title Excitable Boy. Again, I would try shopping it to some agents and publishers, but nothing ever came of it. I ended up setting it aside in the midst of my transition from living in Clinton, Iowa, and moving back to my hometown of Muscatine to raise our kids and my professional transition into teaching.

So, Now What?

One of the reasons it took me a little longer to get this post out than usual is because I was looking through these old stories today trying to get a handle on them.

I took a look at it yesterday… and it’s not horrific? It might be more than salvageable? And the thing is… at some point, maybe four years back, I changed the name of the town the story takes place in to the name I’m considering using for my new book idea. So… I had that idea for the past four years? Longer? Talk about a perpetual stew of ideas.

As for the second idea (Excitable Boy)… it’s probably not the kind of idea I’d explore now, but it might have some potential as well. Looking at it again, I might have to do some more work on it, but there’s some possibilities.

I’m not sure how, when, or what format I’ll be releasing these works, but I’m thinking about it more than I used to. There’s a lot more options out there now in this century than there was in the last one.

Watch this space for further (if any) updates.

While I do appreciate you following this blog, I really would like you to subscribe to my Substack page. By subscribing to that page, you’ll not only be receiving my Substack newsletter, The Writing Life With Jason Liegois (the companion blog to this one), but you’ll also be signing up for my email list. Just click the button below.

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  1. I was born in Illinois (outside Chicago), but I’ve lived for the vast majority of my life in Iowa, so I consider it my home state. ↩︎
  2. By this I mean my prose writing. A good portion of the poetry I’ve written has been inspired by my Iowa surroundings, especially the rivers I’ve lived by. ↩︎
  3. The upcoming sequel (Working title: The Fool 2) will have at least a couple of scenes set in Iowa, however. Call it a homecoming for our main character, the veteran journalist Samuel “Sonny” Turner. ↩︎
  4. The links up here and below are shameless self-promotions for my work. Go ahead and click on them to find out more about what I’ve written. Spoiler alert: when it comes to subject matter, I’m all over the place, lol. ↩︎
  5. It’s now defunct as of last year due to a few controversies. ↩︎
  6. Ernest Hemingway always said the first (rough) draft was always the worst, right? ↩︎

I’m Going Back to Iowa (in my Fiction)

I might have mentioned previously that for someone who was raised and has lived primarily in Iowa for the vast majority of his life, I’ve not set much of the books I have written in the state.

My first book, The Holy Fool, had a protagonist who was born in Iowa but otherwise had little connection with the state

1

. The Yank Striker series has no connection whatsoever with Iowa. On the other hand, my poetry does have a pretty strong connection with the state.

I also wrote two unpublished manuscripts that were essentially young adult crime fiction, both of which were based in Iowa. I briefly wrote about one of those books way early in my time blogging (a few years ago) but not the second one in my A Writer’s Biography series that I bring out every once in a while over the past several years. Next month for Prose Night, I’m considering revisiting those books and rewriting that A Writer’s Biography entry to explain it in more detail.

The point is, for a while I tried to avoid writing fiction based in Iowa for the past several years. My plan here tonight is to explain in part why that was the case, and what changed my mind.

Why I Stayed Away From Iowa in My Fiction

If I was going to pinpoint the main reason, it would be I didn’t want to limit myself from a storytelling standpoint.

In all honesty, the book series I have published and am now working on getting published were very personal stories to me. The Holy Fool (which is now turning into The Fool series) was based on my experiences with and observations of American journalism. The Yank Striker series was based on my love for the sport of soccer and my interest in sports superstardom as well. Those stories never felt like they belonged in Iowa because, well, Iowa is a pretty modest-sized media market and we don’t have any top-flight non-collegiate teams in the state, much less soccer clubs. I wanted to tell my stories no matter what their settings were, and I’m glad I’ve gotten those opportunities.

What’s Changed, or Why Iowa Now?

If I’m to be honest with myself, I would say I have a few reasons to now consider writing fiction based in Iowa, which are a mix of the personal and the practical.

  1. As I’m getting older, I have more of a draw to the place I have spent a majority of my life. I in no way see Iowa as a paradise or a perfect place, but I have affection for many of the things (the land, the rivers, the pace of life) which are positive parts of my lifelong home. I will always be an Iowan, no matter where I live in the future, and thus I feel a compulsion to address in an artistic fashion something that helped make me who I am.
  2. After my previous attempts at creating home-based fiction, I’m feeling more confident in my skills as a writer not to screw up a story based in Iowa. I’m not worried that I’m not going to produce an “authentic” Iowa novel like The Bridges of Madison County, A Thousand Acres, or Gilead. My Iowa experience is just as valid as anyone else’s, despite the fact (as I often tell friends and students) I have never lived closer than three miles to a corn field.
  3. I finally feel like I have a few stories I’d be able to tell best here in Iowa. For years, my political viewpoints and philosophies have been poking through at various points in my published work in a subtle manner. For some time now, I’ve felt a creative urge to address what is going on in my country, what’s going on in my state, in a meaningful and original way. Rather than try to write some sort of meta-commentary on America or The Great American Novel (however it is or isn’t defined), I’ve gotten the idea to shrink my literary focus closer to home and how it does or might affect people on a local level. Frankly, most of our national leaders nowadays aren’t really intriguing characters to build a story around. I’d rather take a look at these themes from a different perspective, and I think there’s a lot of potential for an intriguing story.
  4. I would be remiss, however, if I didn’t mention one more, entirely practical, consideration:
hard cash on a briefcase
Photo by Pixabay on Pexels.com

Yes, financial. It has not gone unnoticed by me that many of the Iowan and Midwestern book enthusiasts I have encountered at book shows and events around the state over the past few years are particularly interested in fiction based in Iowa and the region. If I have some compelling stories to tell based in Iowa, why not tell them? Why not go after those local dollars and give these readers something compelling?
I don’t consider this selling out. I consider this to be a way to get more people reading my books and wanting more of them. If this is what gets reader’s attentions, then I’m all for it. I want readers, end of story, and if it is a financial benefit for me, all the better.

As of right now, I don’t have a publisher for these Iowa stories. I very well might go the self-publishing route, although I’m not sure about it at the moment. There are some Midwest-based publishers I might try to pitch on this, especially a couple I’ve been interested in working with for a while.

With that in mind, I will continue to update you on these as well as my other projects. Hope you (especially all my subscribers in the Midwest) might be interested in them when they come to fruition.

While I do appreciate you following this blog, I really would like you to subscribe to my Substack page. By subscribing to that page, you’ll not only be receiving my Substack newsletter, The Writing Life With Jason Liegois (the companion blog to this one), but you’ll also be signing up for my email list. Just click the button below.

Subscribe to my Substack here.
  1. The upcoming sequel (Working title: The Fool 2) will have at least a couple of scenes set in Iowa, however. Call it a homecoming for our main character, the veteran journalist Samuel “Sonny” Turner. ↩︎

Returning to the River: A brief announcement

Hi, everyone.

I know I promised you some original writing, maybe even fiction, this weekend. Let me assure you it is coming – at 5 p.m. Central Time today. However, I wanted to take a moment now and let everyone know about some personal news.

It turns out I’m soon to be on the move, and both my wife and I will be returning to more familiar territory and a very familiar river.

My wife Laura has just accepted a new job as a city manager for Fort Madison, Iowa. It’s two hours away from where I’m living in Chariton, Iowa, right in south central Iowa. It will be much closer to our hometown of Muscatine, Iowa, where my parents, her mother, and eventually my daughter will be living. It’s a great opportunity for her, and I couldn’t be prouder.

As for me, I’ll be joining her after the school year’s over and seeing what opportunities present themselves. I will miss my school district, as it was a good one (Twin Cedars) and I have been having a good year working with a great group of colleagues. However, Laura’s been my home for 25-plus years, so I go where she does.

I do plan to keep in touch with those I’ve made friends and acquaintances with in Chariton and the area, especially some of my work colleagues and area writers I’ve had a chance to meet here during the past three years. However, I’m hoping to reconnect with some of my old friends and writing enthusiasts from the Muscatine/Quad Cities area, as well as any new ones from around the Fort Madison/Burlington area.

My current home.

Chariton will always be a part of my life, I believe. It will be the place where I finished my second book, started a few other projects, and started writing on Substack. It is likely going to be the last home me, Laura, and our two children ever live in again after a brief period when my son came to stay with us and work in Chariton and my daughter was attending the University of Iowa from her laptop.

Downtown Chariton, Iowa

However, I’m going to be closer to more of my family, and closer to the Mississippi River, where I’ve lived next to more than forty years. The older I’ve gotten, the more I have been fascinated by rivers in general and the Mississippi in particular, and visitors to this page might have seen a poem or two inspired by river life. When I had the chance to tour Fort Madison recently and watched the sun dancing off the surface of the waters, the sight felt so much like home to me I could barely shake it.

The Fort Madison, Iowa riverfront.

I can’t wait to get started on the new adventure. I’ll probably tell you a bit about it here, too.

While I do appreciate you following this blog, I really would like you to subscribe to my Substack page. By subscribing to that page, you’ll not only be receiving my Substack newsletter, The Writing Life With Jason Liegois (the companion blog to this one), but you’ll also be signing up for my email list. Just click the button below.

Subscribe to my Substack here.