Tag Archive for: The Whole Truth

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By AB Plum

The picture of a woman with forefinger to her lips greets me as I enter Cedar Crest Nursing Facility. Rays of sunshine slant through the dim reception area. A woman at the desk whispers for me to sign in. Behind her is a duplicate picture of the shusher at the front door. I write my name, mimic the discreet tone, and ask for Room 40.

Quiet permeates the hallway. Residents in wheelchairs or walkers congregate in doorways and near the nurses’ station. A few of the residents make low, unobtrusive noises. Air freshener—intended to mask old age, sickness, and death—screeches from the corners like a badly tuned violin.

My first and longest writing partner lies in her bed at the end of the long corridor. She is dying. 

The silence in her room is broken only by a nearly inaudible whirr of a machine next to her bed. When I approach her, she doesn’t open her eyes. Frequent doses of morphine provide a buffer against the pain.

And, the drug suppresses her tendency to shatter the silence with non-stop Wagnerian arias. She loves opera almost more than she loves reading and writing.

Close to ninety, she has written often about death—usually about the Holocaust. Escaping to England as a young child, she grew up safe. But death haunted her lovely stories.

“I do hope,” she said, paraphrasing Dylan Thomas more than once, “that I can go gentle into that long night.”

Long night versus good night, I reckon. She came to Cedar Crest more than a month ago–long enough to transfer to another room. She clings to no false hopes of recovery. Time, however, is stretching out too long.

As if reading my mind, she opens her eyes and smiles, asking without a segue, “Have you read Jane Austen, The Secret Radical”?

This question reflects how so many of our writing sessions began that I’m caught off guard. Before I can answer, the morphine claims her again. She’s gone to a temporary place of silence, where I hope she remembers she lived a good, long, gentle life.

*****
AB Plum lives and writes in the shadow of Google in Silicon Valley. She is currently working on a light paranormal trilogy. WEIRd MAgIC features witches and warlocks. No vamps, weres, or zombies.


In Praise of Prologues

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By AB Plum

Do you skim prologues?

Dislike them?

Shrug when you finish and begin Chapter 1 (the real story)?

Feel “manipulated” when you finish the book?

Prologues stir up a lot of discussion among writers and readers. Personally, I like them if they’re more than hype. Winding up a seven-book series, I decided to use seven prologues in the final book. 

Crazy? Maybe. But. I think they work. Because they satisfy introducing unanswered background story questions from the previous books. 

Each of the min-prologues layers into the subsequent plot—though in one instance, the reader may get a surprise at the twist. In length, they range from three lines to one page. Two different backstories emerge. Ultimately, they tie the whole series together. 

Each mini-prologue falls under the general heading of Prologue. I used lowercase Roman numerals to distinguish each one.

Would I try this structure again?
Right now, I’ll say yes. As a writer, I really enjoyed the challenge. 

What about you? Would you take one look at those Roman numerals and throw the book against the wall? Would you read them and then delete the book from your eReader?

************
The Whole Truth marks a resting place for AB. Sliding down the slippery slope of writing noir has opened up a lot of ideas. This summer she plans to read more for pleasure, dance more for fun, walk more for health and write more about love.










MisFits, Psychopaths, and Late-Night Reading

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By AB Plum

On April 30, I’ll upload to Amazon The Whole Truth. TWT is the final—seventh—volume of The MisFit Series, dark psychological thrillers about a psychopath’s impact on innocents he meets along his twisted journey.

After seven books, two thousand pages, and half a million words, this has been a tough story-telling experience. I am glad to write: THE END!
7/2K/500K+/-
_______________
The MisFits

The End!

Here are a few of the issues/questions I explored in this series:
  • ·         Are psychopaths born or nurtured?
  • ·         What if a child grows up feeling/believing he’s unlovable?
  • ·         What are some signs of psychopathic behavior in children?
  • ·         How easy is it to identify a psychopath (as a child and as an adult)?
  • ·         Can a fictional psychopath elicit sympathy from readers?
  • ·         What impact does a psychopath’s behavior have after he dies?
  • ·         Can a shattered family of a psychopath regain equilibrium?

I am now looking forward to publishing a couple of more upbeat “romance” novels. Yes, I do still hope that loves makes the world go ‘round.  J

If you’d like to read the MisFit Prequel, The Boy Nobody Loved, grab your free copy here. Maybe, just maybe, the hints of complexities to follow will keep you up reading all night.

Until next month, when I plan to write about love in May!





The picture is just to prove that even though I write about the dark holes in the human heart, I can pass for “normal” when I go for my early morning walks in my ‘hood just off the fast lane in Silicon Valley.