Happenstances

One of the unusual aspects of the serialized books in Amazon Vella is the author’s comments at the end of each episode.  As an example, one of mine in Doctor Hightower: Lost Soul:

“Coincidences happen in real life daily but are not believable in fiction.  But without these happenstances, life would be extraordinarily dull.” 

And, I might add, fiction, especially murder mysteries, would be almost impossible to write.

This author note was related to some “small world” coincidences I had incorporated into the story.  Sure, some people can say shit like that will never happen in the real world; but it does.  How often in your life have you said, “can you believe that happen, what are the odds?”  We all have things that seemed too good to be true or were horrible bad luck, all because they were unexpected.  Coincidence means, “a remarkable concurrence of events or circumstances without apparent causal connection.”

In Lost Soul, the coincidences are the story.  A murder 20 years ago is still driving events in the present.  It’s a classic story line, one thing happens, and it builds into hundreds of other things happening; none of which might have happened if not for the first thing.  None of them obviously connected.  I think I understood that?

In this second Hightower story, the Doctor is going through complications due to his brain being over 125 years old, but his body is still middle aged, the way it was back in 1938 when he first took the miracle youth drug.  He is now questioning the whole enterprise; is this a good drug or a curse.  Of course, everyone wants to live forever; but do they really.  What if everyone did.  The world would be incredibly overcrowded, and deaths by accidents would be so consequential.  The biggest problem Hightower is trying to deal with is being alone.  No compatriots, no one to confide in because of his secret.

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Ugh!

Lots of anguish being felt over the end of the Afghanistan war, or whatever it was.  Deflecting blame from your side to the other side seems to be more like a game than any well thought out discussion.  The core problem of the middle east after WWII has been analyzed by many great minds and the only logical conclusion is that if it wasn’t for oil none of this would have happened.  But the need for oil created the rationalization that supported one wrong decision after another by counties that had little understanding of the dynamics of these countries and felt the answer was to make them all look like western countries.  All complete nonsense and doomed to failure. 

Today, the pressing need for negotiations and peace building may be at its greatest in our own country between warring parties that cannot stand one another.  That internal need for some sort of civil discourse to resolve problems will take precedence over any foreign misadventures, and maybe that is good. 

We should have learned something from our misplaced military intervention into other countries.  Mainly that if the country is already screwed up with too many people hating their neighbors there is not much anyone else can do to fix the mess.  Without national unity there isn’t a country only an inevitable civil war.  Not sure how we can regain national unity in this country, but we better.

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Author Update

I have three mystery series: Pacheco & Chino (including The Bootlegger’s Legacy), Vincent Malone and the Muckraker series.  This excludes Dr. Hightower which is just getting started.  Also, I have a business book about selling a business, but that is also excluded here because it is not related.

My books sales on average are 63% Pacheco & Chino, 25% Malone and 12% Muckraker.  All three series have been out for some time, and they continue this pattern.  I have no idea why.

I could say P&C are super sellers because they are terrific books or the subject matter is more popular; but those books are no different in quality, or subject matter than the other two series.  I had thought that the Malone books would be the best sellers by now.  I really liked the Malone character and had thought he would be more broadly appealing than Ray Pacheco.  Most of my plans for writing more books were either Malone or Dr. Hightower.

I also was optimistic for the Muckraker series.  I thought Tommy Jacks was an interesting protagonist who would appeal to many readers.  Thousands of Muckrakers have sold, but it’s nothing like Pacheco & Chino.

Well, I’m not stupid.  So, I’m changing direction and will spend most of my time writing the fourth Pacheco & Chino book, Vegas Dead End.  This means Durango Two Step will be put on hold for the hundredth time—but I will return to it after VDE, I hope.

Prolog-Vegas Dead End (Pacheco & Chino #4)

“Big Chief” Chino knew he had fucked up.  Hoodoo Brown was the meanest son-of-a-bitchin’ white man he had ever met.  He had known a couple of loco Apache warriors who could have matched his violence, but few could have matched his lack of humanity.  If Brown discovered the gold Chino had hidden; “Big Chief” would suffer the vilest death possible; nobody fucked Hoodoo Brown.

It was the late 1800’s and much of the uncivilized portions of the United States were a dog-eat-dog existence.  That existence was dramatically demonstrated in Las Vegas, New Mexico.  The town had come into being as part of the Santa Fe trail; but once the railroad reach this ‘at the edge of the world’ location, a whole new level of prosperity arrived.  This great fortune was accompanied by some of the worst elements in all of humankind.  Each one looking for a fast buck or at least a moment of guilt free pleasure. 

Some of the most notorious characters of their time found their way to Vegas.  The lure was money and sex.  Often it was also a place to hide.  No lawman entered Vegas without the permission of Hoodoo Brown, who was the Justice of the Peace and County Coroner.  He ran everything with the help of his gang.  He was the law and the law breaker, all wrapped up in one neat package.

The railroad executives eventually brought a certain form of law and order but for a time this was a wide-open town, with Brown in charge.  It attracted the famous and worst the country had to offer; Doc Holliday, Big-Nose Kate, Jesse James, Billy the Kid, Bob Ford, Wyatt Earp, Rattlesnake Sam, Cock-Eyed Frank, Web-Fingered Billy, Hook Nose Jim, Stuttering Tom, Durango Kid, and Handsome Harry the Dancehall Rustler.

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