Travis Thrasher's Blog, page 22

Something Epic

              So here’s what I want to do.             I want to tell an epic story in an improbable way.             I want to surprise, with characters and chapters and sub-plots and storylines.             I want you to think of THIS when I’m really talking about THAT.            I want to give it all away on the first page but require you to keep reading until the very last one.             I want the truth to be mysterious and hidden and hard to see, then to have it hit you between the eyes and over the head when you’re finally done.             The end is there—I can see it. I have a picture of it. Multiple pictures of it in my office. I’ve been there and seen it with my own eyes. I know where I’m going without a doubt.             I have the names on my board. Peggy Nelson, she’s one. Jeff Reichard, he’s another. Quite a few, actually. So many. I have most figured out, most already cast, most with their story arcs fully-formed.             I’ve begun numerous times but I keep struggling because I want to tell just enough. Not too much and not too little.             I want to keep readers interested. I don’t want them giving up after the first section because lots more are coming.             I want comparisons to The Stand and to Lost. Of course. But I want mine to be totally and completely different.             In both of those works, the endings left more to be desired. I say that noting that those two works have truly helped to shape my creative journey, so I don’t mean to rip them in any way.             My ending is rock solid and I know exactly the meaning and the point. It won’t be vague and I truly hope it won’t be a letdown.             The goal isn’t to mess around with style or point-of-view. The goal is to move ahead a massive story to the finish line. I want to create something big and powerful and moving. I want to exhaust readers in a good way.             The pieces are all there, messy and broken. The trick is to create a beautiful canvas with all the pieces in various places.             That’s what I’m hoping to do and what I’m currently working on right now.             We’ll see what happens.  

Stories Built From Songs

Are You Gonna Kiss Me or Not is the third book I've written with a musician or a band based on their song. This one is based on Thompson Square's song by the same name. The book releases June 4, 2013. 
The two others I've done are Jimmy Wayne's Paper Angels and Mark Schultz's Letters From War. 




The cool thing is that these aren't the only books I've done based on songs. As many of you know, music always plays an important role in my stories. Sometimes a song fits the mood the novel. Sometimes I wrap an entire around it. 
I first started doing this with my second novel, The Watermark. Enya has a haunting instrumental that just fit Sheridan's story. Turns out, an actual watermark is a great example of the theme of the story. 


I always intended to follow-up my first two novels with another love story called Somebody. The interested publisher actually wanted to do an omnibus, so they asked for three stories and called it Three Roads Home. But Somebody is based on the Depeche Mode song that also happened to be the song my wife and I danced to on a wedding day. 

I worked on a novel for a long time that eventually was called Sky Blue. The Peter Gabriel song was perfect for this, and since it's not well known, I decided to use it. If you've read that novel, listen to the song and see if it fits Colin's journey. The lyrics are really perfect. It's a very melancholy song that builds and builds. It's a beautiful song for a novel that I feel is equally beautiful. 

Next came a love letter to our firstborn daughter, Kylie, who was two at the time. If Coldplay had a song that fit, I would have used one by them since this is also an ode to that group. But I couldn't exactly call this novel The Scientist or Clocks. So I used the famous Police song to title Every Breath You Take. 

Since my novel 40 is ALL about music, it was fitting to have it also be a song title. The title is really used because of the character's upcoming fortieth birthday, the day he's been promised to die. But 40 is also a great song by U2.

For the final two books in The Solitary Tales, I chose song titles. Temptation is a classic song by New Order that fits. And Hurt is the bleak, hopeless song by Nine Inch Nails. Both fit really well. 




For the 7 Hours project, I chose Teardrop as the title. It's based on the haunting and beautiful song by Massive Attack. 



I love marrying music and stories together and hope to continue to do so for a long time! 

The Hurting

            I was attending a new school after having gotten kicked out of my sophomore year at Ben Lippen High School. Long story.             I was hanging out at the empty house of my girlfriend’s best friend. Even longer story.             Even though she lived in Mars Hill, North Carolina, she didn’t look or act like she lived around there. I remember her putting on an album that spoke to me in every single way. Yeah, I’d heard of Tears For Fears by then. Everybody who listened to the radio had. “Shout” and “Everybody Wants To Rule The World” were huge hits they played over and over. But she put on their first album and I remember the moment on the couch in her house listening to it blasted on massive speakers.             The first song was “The Hurting”. Forget the stuff on the radio—this was way better. Way deeper.             Then the second song came on and it was haunting. Absolutely haunting.             “I find it kinda funny, I find it kinda sad. The dreams in which I’m dying are the best I ever had.”            Wow.             Yeah, this sort of pop depression summed up my life very nicely. I loved it.             “Went to school and I was very nervous. No one knew me. No one knew me.”            Had this singer been reading my mind or seeing my life? I went from having lots of friends to having nobody. Nobody but three girls who didn’t fit in and singled me out to be their new found friend.             I was grounded for like forever and everybody in the school seemed to hate me. But I made things worse because I refused to give in to them, wearing The Smiths t-shirts and orange Converse high-tops and my grandfather’s overcoat. Yeah, they wanted to pound me. Some of them even did.             That moment in the living room, and other small moments, were the small graces I had during that period. I was an outcast and yet I kept thinking to myself I shouldn’t be an outcast and there’s no real reason I’m one but here I am nonetheless.             Love kept me going. Teen love, sure, but love nonetheless.             The music kept me going too. The Smiths and The Cure and New Order and Depeche Mode. And gems like The Hurting by Tears For Fears.             They say memories fade. Yeah, I guess they do. But sometimes, I can still smell those hallways of Madison High. I can still feel the isolation of walking through them. I can still see myself as this solitary figure in a crowded high school. I can feel myself wondering when I’d ever get out of this prison and this hole.             “I cannot grow. I cannot move. I cannot feel my age            .”            So Tears For Fears said in a song. And I said to myself yeah, I know. I so know. That’s how I feel. And it’s all my stinkin’ fault.             Where did I come up with the idea for The Solitary Tales? It came when a guy who just wanted to have fun decided to sneak into a girl’s dorm with some buddies. After word got around, a group of us got expelled. I ended up being sent to Madison Gulag—I mean Madison High. And I didn’t make things easy for the other students to accept me.             The Solitary Tales are about so much more than my experience at a new school in North Carolina. But tales always have a starting point.             So do playlists. 

Be Still With Me

            I don’t know how many words I’ve written yet I seem to want to write a few more. On rainy nights when the snow should be falling, the words feel right when there are none that I really need to say.             What I want to do is unload and share what I really feel. To not just burn a bridge but nuke the sucker down and laugh on the other side.             What I want to do is to write for myself once more knowing nobody will ever read these words and nobody really cares. To simply fill the lines of a notebook while a teenager sits and wonders what’s out there and why the stars look so bright in the country night sky. To only see a light from the dim bulb behind me and not from the glow of the Macbook mocking me once more.             I want the silence instead of the sounds. The interruptions. The voices. The whispers. The guffaws. The sighs. The chuckles. The buzz.             There are a hundred things I refrain from saying, even when it seems like I’ve said quite enough thank you very much. There are a thousand questions I want to ask, yet I need to just shut up and have faith.             Oh the faith of a child. I have the faith of a teen, the doubt setting in but not quite grown up just yet.             The keys and chords of a piano makes sense. The three acts of a movie are easy to follows. The division of chapters in a novel seem quite logical. But stepping out of that into the real world with the real worries and the real wonders only produce real woes. The infinite questions, the infinitesimal answers.              Faith.             Be still and let go of the words.             Faith.             Shush and don’t keep asking.             Faith.             Just let go of another day and another grip that’s so tight and so tough and so tired.             Faith.             Found in words I keep writing. In order to make sense.             Writing in order to stay quiet.             Writing to release the worry.             Writing to let go and let . . .             Yeah.             Be still with me.  

Get Some Cheap Love Now

From now until Valentine's Day, I'm discounting a couple of my books that are love stories. If you haven't read these yet or don't own actual copies, this would be a great time to get signed editions!

The Promise Remains/The Watermark collection is a softcover edition of my first two published novels. These are in the vein of Nicholas Sparks. Francine Rivers said this about The Promise Remains: "It's a sweet love story of uncompromising faith." The Watermark happens to be one of my favorite books I've written.

Every Breath You Take is basically a love letter I wrote to our firstborn daughter, Kylie, when she was only two years old. I call it a cross between Father of the Bride and It's A Wonderful Life. It's the only book I have ever self published, and I'm still glad I did.

These books will be priced at $4.99 from now until Valentine's Day! Order The Promise Remains/The Watermark here and Every Breath You Take here. Enjoy!!

I Want To HURT You

            It’s never a good thing to show up to one of your booksignings and see a poster of another author greeting you by the front door.             This happened to me in Greenville, South Carolina the summer of 2008. I had scheduled a booksigning at a store I’d visited numerous times. I knew the lady who set the signings up well. I didn’t happen to double check with her right before the signing, something I always do. I just didn’t want to bother her.                         Turns out I probably should have. My aunt dropped me off at the store and seconds after her car left the parking lot, I noticed an Author Booksigning poster. Except the author pictured looked twice my age. And his name wasn’t Travis Thrasher.             I sighed and then chuckled. Stuff like this usually happens to me.             After I made sure that I wasn’t signing (and discovering the woman who set it up had left the bookstore a month ago), I politely excused myself feeling like a complete loser. I usually brace for feeling like this during signings, but this was a travesty. Travesty . . . hmmm, that makes me think of a particular author.            Next door to this bookstore sits a great Mexican restaurant, so I went over there to have some chips and salsa and a margarita. Or ten. As I sat there in the afternoon sun, my mind wandered to the setting of Greenville and then to story ideas.             This was the place and the moment I came up with the idea for The Solitary Tales.             I thought it would be fun to do a combination of my first novel (teen love) and one of my latest (horror). So the ideas began to turn around and around. I had my writing notebook with me so I jotted down the idea. Just one of a thousand ideas I’ve had.             Some ideas stick, however. And this one certainly stayed with me.             Now, four and a half years later, the final book of that series is officially out. No, this hasn’t turned out to be Twilight or The Hunger Games. But I think these four books are the best thing I’ve done to date. The clearest picture of my true voice and my style. And I’ve created something far bigger and far deeper than I ever could have imagined sitting in the patio of that Mexican restaurant feeling like a real winner.             After having twenty books in print (and more published as eBook only releases), I know one thing by now. There’s no way I can convince you to buy my latest book. I like to remind people Stephen King gave The Hunger Games a huge endorsement to help give it a nice little push upon publication. Authors can’t convince readers to buy their books. Well, I take that back. When they’re in bookstores, some authors have a knack for convincing strangers to buy books. I’m one of them. When, of course, they actually have me scheduled to do the signing.             If you’re a fan of YA/teen fiction, then check these books out if you haven’t already. The first book in the series is called Solitary and will be free on all eReaders this Thursday and Friday, January 3 and 4. Download it and read some chapters. Hopefully you’ll find something interesting about the tone and the style and the storyline.             For those fans of The Solitary Tales, all I can say is I’m just getting warmed up. The story of Solitary has been finished. But a bigger story exists. And I don’t need an afternoon in a Mexican restaurant to figure out the rest of the storyline.             I’ve had four and a half years to work on it.  

Now Is The Time (Redskins 2012 Season)

            You’ve forgotten how long you’ve waited. But now is the time.             For years you’ve done the work and paid your dues but the end result has been the same. But today is different.             The breaks haven’t gone your way and the fates have seemed to be against you.             Sometimes, at the end of a season, you’ve stared at the past year and wondered why. Why and how and what? What are you going to do? Which direction are you going to go?             But today is different.             The future has arrived, and you finally know your place.             The hard work and the talent and the persistence are finally going to pay off. Yes, you’ve gotten some nice breaks. Some sweet deals that have allowed fortuitous things to happen. But you’ve also found hidden gems. Little projects that have big payoffs. Things that change the game plan and the team and the whole arc of your future.             Yeah, now is the time.             Regardless of what happens in the next few weeks, you have a bright future to look forward to. The home run has already happened. And today it’s been sealed with a kiss.             Your takeaway is this: never let go.             Never let go of the dream and the fight and the goal and the dream.            Because sometimes football can mirror life and vice versa            Work hard. Have faith. And don’t ever, ever stop. 

The End Is Just The Beginning

              This is a snapshot of the end.             But the journey is just about to begin.                         For 18 lost and broken souls.             For the fate the world as we know it. 

"Christmas Lights" Author Note

            Just a few last thoughts on this short story called “Christmas Lights.” As I said, I got the idea behind this after working on Paper Angels with Jimmy Wayne. But really, the idea came to me after hearing Coldplay’s beautiful song released at the end of 2010. I’m going to share the lyrics here and highlight the places that helped shape this story.             If I had written this story back then, I think it would have been about a man getting away from his family and going to have a drink. You end up discovering the truth of why he’s so sad this Christmas day. The twist would be the same. But it wouldn’t have the whole alcoholic-about-to-relapse element.             Stories—especially those you really want to tell—stay with you until you either officially abandon them on the side of the road or get them written. This year, the story began to change as I thought of adding an element of Celebrate Recovery to it. The stakes suddenly became higher for dear Arthur. I thought his visit to the pub could be quite dangerous for him and his family.             One final note—this wasn’t edited or proofread except by yours truly. Maybe I’ll get those done and put this in an eBook for future Christmas holidays. I really wanted to tell this story and share it with my devoted readers. I’d do a lot more to say thanks if I could. For now, this will have to do.             I love putting stories to songs. In a sense, I’ve been doing that my entire life.             Here are those lyrics. Again, note the places I highlight.                         “Christmas Lights” by Coldplay
            Christmas night, another fight            Tears we cried a flood            Got all kinds of poison in            Poison in my blood
            I took my feet            To Oxford Street            Trying to right a wrong            Just walk away             Those windows say            But I can't believe she's gone
            When you're still waiting for the snow to fall            Doesn't really feel like Christmas at all
            Up above candles on air flicker            Oh they flicker and they float            But I'm up here holding on            To all those chandeliers of hope
            Like some drunken Elvis singing            I go singing out of tune            Saying how I always loved you darling            And I always will
            Oh when you're still waiting for the snow to fall            Doesn't really feel like Christmas at all
            Still waiting for the snow to fall            It doesn't really feel like Christmas at all
            Those Christmas lights            Light up the street            Down where the sea and city meet            May all your troubles soon be gone            Oh Christmas lights keep shining on
            Those Christmas lights            Light up the street            Maybe they'll bring her back to me            Then all my troubles will be gone            Oh Christmas lights keep shining on
            Oh Christmas lights            Light up the street            Light up the fireworks in me            May all your troubles soon be gone            Those Christmas lights keep shining on

"Christmas Lights" Part Five (Final)

(Photo used by permission from the talented Tori Watson at Marvelousthingsphotoblog.com)
5. GOLD            Every single glowing light I pass reflects a choice and a chance. In every life, there are so many that we’re almost blinded by them. Every day there are so many choices to make. Every day there are so many chances we’re given.             My choice for this night has been made, but I have tomorrow and the next day after that.             But I have someone who will help me out in times of trouble. And I’m not talking about Linda either.             The street is lined with strands of glistening pearls. Pieces of the stars and the moon hanging over this little town. I think of Linda again and smile.             I remember someone said that Christmas doesn’t have to happen once a year. Not the spirit of Christmas, the reason we celebrate, the idea behind it.             A gift. A tiny breath of a gift.             A tiny gift that would burst forth the brightest light ever shone in this dark and decaying world.             There’s still hope inside and still light outside. These troubles outside, the ones that find me in the morning and figure out how to get deep inside by nighttime, have been left behind. They’re long gone.            I’m heading back home. There’s still time left. There’s still life to be lived.
            Molly answers the door before I get a chance to open it. She swallows me in her arms, asking me if I’m okay and wondering where I’ve been. When I step inside and finally look at her, it appears she’s been to a funeral. Her eyes are swollen and red and drained.             “Why are you crying?”            “Why did you take off like that?” she asks. I can tell she’s trying to see if I’m drunk or not.             “I’m fine.”            “Where did you go?”            “I needed a break.”            She shakes her head, a habit she picked up from her mother.             “I’m fine, Molly.”            “We’ve been waiting to open presents—the kids went ahead and opened them. Rick went out to look for you. We’ve been calling everybody we know. We’ve been worried sick.”            I exhale and put a hand on her arm. “I’m sorry.”            She starts to cry again.             “Molly—I’m sorry. I just . . .”            There’s more I want to say. Lots more. But there’s no point in it. This lovely woman who I have known since she took her first few breaths as a baby shouldn’t be crying. Not tonight, not because of me. Anything I can say to justify why I got angry and why I left and why I wanted to get blind drunk—none of those things matter. To share any of them would be wrong. So I just apologize again.             “I’m here. I messed up but I’m here. And I’m okay. I didn’t drive off the deep end.”            She gets a text on her phone and then she sighs. “It’s Rick. He’s pulling back in the driveway. I texted him when your car showed up.”            We look at each other. She knows the history between Rick and myself. I can only imagine the fury that he’s holding back inside. He might not be an alcoholic like his father, and he might be able to control the rage, but he still has my DNA. Nothing I can do about that. Nothing at all.             A voice calls out “Mom” from the other room and I tell Molly I’ll be in there in a minute. I make it clear I need to talk to Rick and straighten things out before this night continues.             Molly’s almost gone before I call out her name.             “I love you,” I tell her. “Even if I don’t show it.”            She nods and wipes a tear off her cheek, then disappears into the kitchen and family room.              I wait in the entry way for Rick to walk inside. I’m not sure exactly what I’m going to tell him. There’s a lot I’d like to say. A lot. But I don’t know. I just don’t know.             I don’t know what to think myself.
            “What were you thinking?”             Rick unzips his jacket as if he’s trying to tear it off of himself. There’s no “Hello” or no “You finally made it”. I can tell he’s angry. He’s a man who likes to be in control, and his father has given him a lifetime of feeling out of control.             “I went to a bar.”            He pauses for a minute, doing the same thing Molly was just doing. That examination I used to always detest, the look and held breath and the subtle smelling and studying. I deserved it every time I showed up late to home when they were teenagers. I deserve this now.             “I’m fine,” I tell him. “I didn’t have anything.”            “I went over to Lenny’s because I figured he would lie even if I called. Then I drove to a few other places.”            I nod. “Your mother always had a knack of finding me, regardless of where I went. Always.”            “Yeah, when she actually wanted to go looking.”            Rick takes off his coat and tosses it in a chair near the entrance to a study. I see him stand there for a moment, probably composing himself before going back in to see everybody else.             “I’m sorry,” I say. “Rick, I’m sorry. For messing up Christmas Day. For making you and the rest of the family worry. For causing any concern you had.”            “You’ve been doing good. Real good. I just—I just don’t want anything to happen to you.”            These are not words that have come easily to either of us.             This is the man I refused to back down to when confronted with a platter of my mistakes and failures during the intervention. I was angry and I blamed him first and foremost.             But not anymore.             “God’s watching out for me,” I tell him.             We look at each other and I know what he’s going to say before he says it. Even now, after apologizing and knowing the error of my ways, I want to sprint back outside again. I don’t him to say anything else. I don’t him to utter the reality of the situation.             Yet knowing Rick . . .             “I’ve been worried ever since mom died. I know it’s been hard for you.”            This is what I didn’t want to hear. The words. The actual words still tear me up inside. I don’t like to even acknowledge them. I keep them out of my head because the reminder still claws at my heart and soul.             “It’s been hard for all of us, not just me. I’m the only one who wants to take this grief and drown it in some way.”            “Mom always loved Christmas,” Rick says.             “Yes she did.”            “Dad—I know—there’s nothing I can do or say—I know today feels just odd. Every bit of it. It’s not the same with Mom not here. Molly and I—we’ve been talking ever since you left. Crying and apologizing and crying more. It’s just--”                        “I understand.”            “We all miss her.”            I do something I can’t remember doing last.             I hug my firstborn son.             There’s nothing awkward about it. I used to hold him when he was just a little guy, a toddler still running around in his diapers.             “What is your fondest memory of our family?”            I said the toddler years because all the kids were still young enough to be held in my arms. I blinked and they were adults and they weren’t mine to hold anymore. I blinked and suddenly they were smarter than me. I blinked and I’d lost them.             Maybe not.             I let go of Rick and wipe tears away from my eyes. He does the same.             Neither of us are big on tears. Or emotion like this.            “It’s been a heavy day,” he says.             “Yeah. I’d say.”            “Let’s go open presents.”            I nod, then tell him I’ll be in there in a minute.             I want to go in his office and see the picture of Linda he has on his desk.             It was the photo we used of her at her funeral three months ago.             I want to look at it again to remember and to remind myself what I had. I also want to look at it to make sure I’m not losing my mind.
            In the silence and muted light of the den just to the right of the entryway, I look at Linda’s photo and think about what happened back at Pete’s Pub. I think about everything she said. Yes, I know it sounds crazy, but she was there talking to me. She was there and I was speechless because I didn’t know what to think or what to say.             Sometimes there’s too much you want to tell someone.             Sometimes there’s just not enough time.             Yeah, and then sometimes you’re approached by the wife you buried months earlier and you’re a bit freaked out so you don’t know what to do or say.             There’s all that. But in reality, I didn’t get a chance to tell Linda what I wanted to simply because she was there to talk to me. To guide me out of the darkness. To bring light on this Christmas day.             There are many things that come to mind now that I’m thinking of Linda. Nothing too eloquent or sweet or profound. Just the sort of things that really matter when you look out an office window at night and see a dim reflection staring back at you. The shadow shows an old man with little hair and narrow shoulders. But more than that, the shadow shows him alone. No one is next to him to look out and notice those lights across the street.            I liked having you by my side even when it never seemed like it.              Yeah, I’d like to say something like that.            I notice the small things you did that once annoyed me and now only sadden me because they’re no longer around.                       Yeah, something like that too.            I miss that girl I fell in love with then took for granted until I couldn’t anymore.            Yeah.            I can go on but the problem and the reality is that I can’t. I won’t.            I saw her and I believe Linda was there in that pub. But she wasn’t there in order for me to finally say all the things I needed to get off my chest. She was there because of all of the rest of this group in this home. Our children, their spouses, the grandkids.            I lost myself for a while yet found myself one more time. God let her come back so I didn’t lose myself again.            Or was it just a lonely and frustrated old man talking to himself before relapsing?            I don’t believe that. Christmas started as a miracle so this was just a minor one on a major day.            Linda was there. I know it. I felt it. I felt her touch my hand.             “Dad?”            I turn and see Rick at the entrance to the office.             “Are you okay?” he asks.                         “Yeah.”            He sees the photo in my hand.             “You think she’s watching over us?”
            I’ve never been more confident in telling my son something. “Your mother is watching over me. And us.”            He just stares at me, looking like a younger and more sad version of myself.            “God’s watching over us too, Rick. And He was working overtime tonight.”            “I don’t like you having to go back to that empty home tonight.”            I hear the laughter in the other room where the kids are playing.            “So I’ll stay.”            “Yeah, right,” Rick says with a mock laugh.            “No, I mean it—I’ll use that guest bedroom that’s so nice and decorated.”            I can tell I’ve surprised him. Maybe I’ve surprised myself. I don’t know.            “I don’t feel like going back home either,” I say. “It’s starting to snow. Maybe we can—I don’t know. Maybe we can have pancakes in the morning with the kids.”            “Okay, now I know you were drinking somewhere.”            “I’m more sober than I’ve ever been.”            He looks at me, but he doesn’t look as sad now.            I can’t make up for those lost years. But I’m here, and I still have my kids, and I’m sober.            These are the things I can celebrate. So I will.            There are things I wish I could have said and done that I never got a chance to. But I still have chance to say things and do things and be a different man. I don’t have to jump on the bed with the kids and be someone I’m not, but I can try.            I’m going to try, Linda. I’m going to keep trying.            A good man told me when I first got into recovery that it’s not too late. It’s never too late to do the right thing.            I follow Rick in the glow of the family room where the rest of the family waits. And where those Christmas lights keep shining on.