Weekly Preview: Dec 21, 2020

Monday, December 21, 2020 at 2:35am

What a week!

I finished The Cave and the Light. I am able to forgive a lot of things for a good review of the history of Western literature. The Closing of the American Mind fell squarely for me within those bounds. The Cave and the Light, unfortunately, pushed me well past the limit of what I am able to forgive. You can look forward to more details in my review of the book, which will be up first thing next week. The review’s working title is “Libertarianism, the Prime Mover.” I feel it to be my near-sacred duty to reclaim Aristotle from this madman.

With Voyage Embarkation out the door and my 2020 re-issues wrapped up, I can fully turn my attention to Intersection Thirteen, which I’ve finally, finally begun to edit. Long time followers of this blog will recall that I finished the first draft back in late May. Things that derailed previous attempts to get this done: forest fire smoke bathing the Pacific Northwest; a doctor prescribing me crazy ass drugs I didn’t need and which messed up my ability to concentrate; gym closures for lockdown #2. However, with no apparent natural disasters imminent (besides the one we’re already dealing with), my health in a good state (knock on wood), and my newfound immunity to gym closures, there is nothing standing between me and my editing, which is now proceeding at a good clip. I’m making it a goal to have drafts out to beta readers by the second week of January.

Speaking of Intersection Thirteen, you’ll be getting to see the cover tomorrow and also an illustration of a scene from the novel. Here’s this week’s full plan:

• Tuesday: Cover Reveal for Intersection Thirteen
• Wednesday: Nurture Your Darlings, a refutation of the common bad writing advice that writers should “kill their darlings”
• Thursday: The Typography of Voyage Embarkation
• Friday: Merry Christmas, some thoughts on where we’ve been, where we’re going, and my belief that no matter how dark things get, there is always hope