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Ian Lewis's Blog: Ian Lewis Fiction - Posts Tagged "the-camaro-murders"
The Evolution of the Driver
Readers may find the Driver to be a conflicted character, and rightly so. He’s dead in the classic sense, yet lives on in the Upper Territory—an in-between place where time spent fuels his desire to immerse himself in the living. He dutifully carries out his charge as a member of Abel’s Fold, but not without straying onto tangents where he interferes with the natural way of things. He seeks solitude and isolation, though often carries on a semblance of friendship with aborted fetuses who wander the Territory. And now that he has appeared in two novellas, the Driver has taken up permanent residence in my mind. He matters to me as a character…but this was not always the case.
The Driver began as a device, an instrument. He was never meant to be something as flimsy as a symbol, but rather a concrete method by which I could tell the flip side of a murder mystery—The Camaro Murders. He didn’t even need a real name; he was only a shadowy figure who slipped in and out of the living and provided glimpses into what happens after a murder. His voice was no more important than the other characters’ voices.
My intent had always been to write The Camaro Murders as a multi-character, first person story. I was listening to a lot of Coheed and Cambria as well as The Prizefighter Inferno at the time, both of which tell multifaceted stories with multiple narratives and subplots. With only the lyrics to help piece together the backstory, I as the listener felt compelled to delve into the online forums to understand more about how this world worked. In turn, I wanted to achieve a similar effect with The Camaro Murders: tell a story from different perspectives as well as leave room for the reader’s inquisitive mind to piece things together.
So I started with the force that would propel the rest of the characters—the Driver. I wrote the last chapter, “The Wicked and Despair,” first. Even though it occurs early in the story from a chronology perspective, I wanted the Driver’s defining moment to serve as the finish to the story. However, in doing so, I realized I had very easily set myself up for future stories with him. The question of whether he ever finds his ghost and what might happen up until that point was too interesting to pass up.
Enter “Lady in Flames.” We see an “older” Driver, arguably more mature and wizened from an experience point of view. We assume he’s seen it all by now. And yet he resembles his reckless self from fifteen years prior. He looks the same as when he died and he’s still motivated by his own sense of right and wrong. The trappings of his role of retrieving murdered souls afford him opportunities to meddle in the physical world just as he did in The Camaro Murders. And he still shoulders guilt for his part in Ezra Mendelssohn’s death.
You see, the Driver needs saving just as much as the people he tries to help. He’s adrift in his own sea of obsessive tendencies which keep him in constant conflict with the purpose of Abel’s Fold. He knows he cannot be whole until he finds his ghost, yet despises himself for wanting to find it. He rails against the injustice of the murder of innocent people and in some desperate way hopes he will be able to earn salvation with his good intentions.
The Driver is a character with which I could potentially grow old. I don’t know whether he’ll stick with me for that long, but someday I would like to see him find redemption of some kind. So if you’ll forgive me the pun, I’ll ask that you ride along with the Driver to see where the road takes him.
The Driver began as a device, an instrument. He was never meant to be something as flimsy as a symbol, but rather a concrete method by which I could tell the flip side of a murder mystery—The Camaro Murders. He didn’t even need a real name; he was only a shadowy figure who slipped in and out of the living and provided glimpses into what happens after a murder. His voice was no more important than the other characters’ voices.
My intent had always been to write The Camaro Murders as a multi-character, first person story. I was listening to a lot of Coheed and Cambria as well as The Prizefighter Inferno at the time, both of which tell multifaceted stories with multiple narratives and subplots. With only the lyrics to help piece together the backstory, I as the listener felt compelled to delve into the online forums to understand more about how this world worked. In turn, I wanted to achieve a similar effect with The Camaro Murders: tell a story from different perspectives as well as leave room for the reader’s inquisitive mind to piece things together.
So I started with the force that would propel the rest of the characters—the Driver. I wrote the last chapter, “The Wicked and Despair,” first. Even though it occurs early in the story from a chronology perspective, I wanted the Driver’s defining moment to serve as the finish to the story. However, in doing so, I realized I had very easily set myself up for future stories with him. The question of whether he ever finds his ghost and what might happen up until that point was too interesting to pass up.
Enter “Lady in Flames.” We see an “older” Driver, arguably more mature and wizened from an experience point of view. We assume he’s seen it all by now. And yet he resembles his reckless self from fifteen years prior. He looks the same as when he died and he’s still motivated by his own sense of right and wrong. The trappings of his role of retrieving murdered souls afford him opportunities to meddle in the physical world just as he did in The Camaro Murders. And he still shoulders guilt for his part in Ezra Mendelssohn’s death.
You see, the Driver needs saving just as much as the people he tries to help. He’s adrift in his own sea of obsessive tendencies which keep him in constant conflict with the purpose of Abel’s Fold. He knows he cannot be whole until he finds his ghost, yet despises himself for wanting to find it. He rails against the injustice of the murder of innocent people and in some desperate way hopes he will be able to earn salvation with his good intentions.
The Driver is a character with which I could potentially grow old. I don’t know whether he’ll stick with me for that long, but someday I would like to see him find redemption of some kind. So if you’ll forgive me the pun, I’ll ask that you ride along with the Driver to see where the road takes him.
New release: Beacon Road Bedlam
I'm excited to announce the release of Beacon Road Bedlam. This is the third Driver story, and the first full-length novel in the series (the previous two books are novellas).
This book has been in the works for a while, its release delayed by the birth and rearing of children, the decision to independently release Godspeed, Carry My Bullet last year, as well as managing the re-release of my back catalog earlier this year. It was slow-going at first.
BRB continues the experimental approach of the series, albeit in a different format this time. I had written The Camaro Murders and Lady in Flames in the first person point of view; each had their own nuances with regard to timeline. So I wanted to try third person with BRB. I had just come off of Godspeed and was thinking of narratives from that perspective, but it just wasn't flowing.
The voices of certain characters (primarily the Sheriff) were so ingrained in my head, it was difficult for those voices to not come through in the narrative. I think a character's voice should come through in dialogue or inner monologue, but not the actual narrative. It took around six months to get some traction on this front.
However, I still couldn't leave the first person POV alone. I ended up writing some first person flashbacks into the story which I hope were done in an original way. I guess you could say that's the experimental part of this book. The Driver series is where I have freedom to try new and sometimes unorthodox things. And I want each Driver story to be a little different.
Is the book more accessible because of the third person? Probably, but that wasn't a primary motivation. I really wanted to explore the Upper Territory in greater detail. It's difficult to be poetic with description when things are told from first person, since I'm limited to the character's thoughts, and the character may not think anything that would pass as prose. With third person, I can be detached and paint a picture for the reader. Since the Upper Territory is a dream world of sorts, there were nuances that merited some more descriptive details that were lacking in the previous books.
Conceptually, "layers" were important to the story. The intertwining threads of the mystery are told in layers comprised of different characters' experiences, both living and dead. No one layer tells the whole story. The reader has to see them all together.
Thematically, "truth," or the search of, is something that drives all three viewpoint characters. It becomes an obsession for each in their own way: the Driver, Sheriff Hildersham, and Tad Ozzel (a pesky reporter).
I have to make mention of Ozzel. He was a lot of fun to write. He's named for Admiral Ozzel from Empire Strikes Back. According to Vader, he's "as clumsy as he is stupid." Similarly, Tad Ozzel is an over-confident fool with an inflated sense of self-importance. He was also partially modeled on Schwarzwald/Michael Seebach from The Big O, a reporter who's search for truth becomes a destructive obsession.
A good portion of the story takes place in the 50s (see flashbacks), which lent a pulpy/noir vibe, I thought. I wanted to capture that feeling in the cover, and Justin Adams at Varia Studios did a phenomenal job in doing so.
Another fun/interesting fact is that two short stories I wrote (well, technically one of them isn't finished) contributed details to the storyline. This happens quite frequently, and I hope to someday release an anthology of short stories so you as the reader can see how some of this stuff takes root.
There's a lot going on here! How would I classify this book? I'd say it's a supernatural thriller/murder mystery with rural noir overtones. If that doesn't get you interested, I don't know what will.
Thanks for reading, and as always, please take the time to leave a rating or review.
This book has been in the works for a while, its release delayed by the birth and rearing of children, the decision to independently release Godspeed, Carry My Bullet last year, as well as managing the re-release of my back catalog earlier this year. It was slow-going at first.
BRB continues the experimental approach of the series, albeit in a different format this time. I had written The Camaro Murders and Lady in Flames in the first person point of view; each had their own nuances with regard to timeline. So I wanted to try third person with BRB. I had just come off of Godspeed and was thinking of narratives from that perspective, but it just wasn't flowing.
The voices of certain characters (primarily the Sheriff) were so ingrained in my head, it was difficult for those voices to not come through in the narrative. I think a character's voice should come through in dialogue or inner monologue, but not the actual narrative. It took around six months to get some traction on this front.
However, I still couldn't leave the first person POV alone. I ended up writing some first person flashbacks into the story which I hope were done in an original way. I guess you could say that's the experimental part of this book. The Driver series is where I have freedom to try new and sometimes unorthodox things. And I want each Driver story to be a little different.
Is the book more accessible because of the third person? Probably, but that wasn't a primary motivation. I really wanted to explore the Upper Territory in greater detail. It's difficult to be poetic with description when things are told from first person, since I'm limited to the character's thoughts, and the character may not think anything that would pass as prose. With third person, I can be detached and paint a picture for the reader. Since the Upper Territory is a dream world of sorts, there were nuances that merited some more descriptive details that were lacking in the previous books.
Conceptually, "layers" were important to the story. The intertwining threads of the mystery are told in layers comprised of different characters' experiences, both living and dead. No one layer tells the whole story. The reader has to see them all together.
Thematically, "truth," or the search of, is something that drives all three viewpoint characters. It becomes an obsession for each in their own way: the Driver, Sheriff Hildersham, and Tad Ozzel (a pesky reporter).
I have to make mention of Ozzel. He was a lot of fun to write. He's named for Admiral Ozzel from Empire Strikes Back. According to Vader, he's "as clumsy as he is stupid." Similarly, Tad Ozzel is an over-confident fool with an inflated sense of self-importance. He was also partially modeled on Schwarzwald/Michael Seebach from The Big O, a reporter who's search for truth becomes a destructive obsession.
A good portion of the story takes place in the 50s (see flashbacks), which lent a pulpy/noir vibe, I thought. I wanted to capture that feeling in the cover, and Justin Adams at Varia Studios did a phenomenal job in doing so.
Another fun/interesting fact is that two short stories I wrote (well, technically one of them isn't finished) contributed details to the storyline. This happens quite frequently, and I hope to someday release an anthology of short stories so you as the reader can see how some of this stuff takes root.
There's a lot going on here! How would I classify this book? I'd say it's a supernatural thriller/murder mystery with rural noir overtones. If that doesn't get you interested, I don't know what will.
Thanks for reading, and as always, please take the time to leave a rating or review.
The writing process
The more I write, the more the creative process changes. My first foray into fiction resulted in short stories for the most part. They were written organically, with simple, abstract ideas in mind. Literally, I would sit down and try to write with no outline at all. I was repulsed by the idea of approaching something creative as if it were something clinical. It needed to be pure. Three novellas and almost three novels later, I've found the outline is indispensable.
How did I get there? It was, well, organic I guess. My ideas became more complex, notably with the impetus that drove The Camaro Murders. It was high concept, yet literary and grounded, multi-character and to a certain point plot-driven. Timeline was critical because the story is told out of order.
With all that in mind, what evolved into an "outline" was hardly what I'd call an outline today. A semblance of that didn't evolve until I wrote Lady in Flames. It's continued to evolve with each release, to the point where now I typically write a paragraph for each chapter and create a cast of characters, like I did for Godspeed, Carry My Bullet and Beacon Road Bedlam.
However, it's not only the outlining process that's changed. The actual writing itself comes together in an entirely different way than before. I never used to advance past a paragraph without it being perfect, or at least what seemed perfect at that moment. This of course slowed down the writing process, sometimes to the point of me losing interest in what I was writing. So I let go a bit, realizing that moving past the thought and hammering out the story was more important. Revisiting the weaker, underdeveloped writing at a later stage, even as late as the editing process, resulted in stronger writing because you see things different with fresh eyes.
My current endeavor is another high concept story with a lot of abstract ideas that I can see clearly in my head. Because it's easy to take that for granted, It's hard not to "tell" rather than "show." So I've found myself laying out the skeleton of the story, getting the ideas out in the narrative without weaving the rich detail and evocative prose that I want to be there in the end. That will come later.
I won't lie. The writing process has become more like work than it ever has. Striving to write at professional standards demands that much, but it's the creative impulse that provides motivation for all of it. I hope you as the reader enjoy reading it as much as I enjoy writing it.
How did I get there? It was, well, organic I guess. My ideas became more complex, notably with the impetus that drove The Camaro Murders. It was high concept, yet literary and grounded, multi-character and to a certain point plot-driven. Timeline was critical because the story is told out of order.
With all that in mind, what evolved into an "outline" was hardly what I'd call an outline today. A semblance of that didn't evolve until I wrote Lady in Flames. It's continued to evolve with each release, to the point where now I typically write a paragraph for each chapter and create a cast of characters, like I did for Godspeed, Carry My Bullet and Beacon Road Bedlam.
However, it's not only the outlining process that's changed. The actual writing itself comes together in an entirely different way than before. I never used to advance past a paragraph without it being perfect, or at least what seemed perfect at that moment. This of course slowed down the writing process, sometimes to the point of me losing interest in what I was writing. So I let go a bit, realizing that moving past the thought and hammering out the story was more important. Revisiting the weaker, underdeveloped writing at a later stage, even as late as the editing process, resulted in stronger writing because you see things different with fresh eyes.
My current endeavor is another high concept story with a lot of abstract ideas that I can see clearly in my head. Because it's easy to take that for granted, It's hard not to "tell" rather than "show." So I've found myself laying out the skeleton of the story, getting the ideas out in the narrative without weaving the rich detail and evocative prose that I want to be there in the end. That will come later.
I won't lie. The writing process has become more like work than it ever has. Striving to write at professional standards demands that much, but it's the creative impulse that provides motivation for all of it. I hope you as the reader enjoy reading it as much as I enjoy writing it.
New Release: Winterfield Nights
The Driver is back! Winterfield Nights is a short novel that stands as book four in the Driver series. It's also the second book in what will be a trilogy within the series, starting with Beacon Road Bedlam.
It's a great feeling to finally put the finishing touches on a book and be done with it. Even at 50,000 words, it's a lot of work, and there's always the question in the back of your mind of whether you effectively communicated your vision. A book can always "be better" I suppose, but at some point, you have to let go and call it done. Otherwise, you'll forever be pulling a George Lucas and tweaking things to death.
As usual, Winterfield Nights is a bit experimental in format since this series is sort of my sandbox to do whatever I want. I was going for something really moody and atmospheric and thought I could leverage multiple points of view to accomplish this: third-person for those poetic details and first-person to get the authentic character nuances to come through.
Each chapter begins in third-person to set the scene before shifting to the viewpoint character's first-person narration. Think of it as peeling back the outer narrative in order to get to the inner narrative. Originally, I wanted each chapter to seamlessly shift back and forth between third and first, sort of allowing the characters to provide their own commentary on different parts of the outer narrative. While that worked for some chapters, it didn't for others, and I didn't want to sacrifice readability for sake of the format. So, in the end I went with only one shift per chapter.
What's so cool about this book (for me, anyway) is that it sees two previously unpublished short stories come to life: "For the Taking" and "Vigilante." Since both stories take place in the same universe, it wasn't difficult to repurpose them for use in Winterfield Nights. I also wanted there to be an episodic feel from one chapter to another, which again, made it easy to weave these stories into the greater plot.
"For the Taking" was the story of Will Sparks and his townie friends' hasty plan to rob a bar on Thanksgiving Eve whereas "Vigilante" was the story of Eddie Slocumb, a family man who tracked a serial killer in the eighties. And for those of you paying attention, Sheriff Hildersham makes mention of the latter in The Camaro Murders ("Some folks still talk about the strangulations near the end of ’87.").
Both Will and Eddie round out a cast of desperate characters in Winterfield Nights that features the return of Tad Ozzel from Beacon Road Bedlam. Man, what a turd that Ozzel guy is. His single-minded focus on uncovering what he thinks is the suppression of truth makes him increasingly malevolent as he and the rest of the characters blindly race to their respective points of no return. Sheriff Hildersham comes along for the ride in this one, but while Beacon was more of a Sheriff story, Winterfield is more of an Ozzel story.
Of course, it's just as much a Driver story, as any Driver book always will be. And while the Driver is somewhat one-dimensional even after four books (he was first envisioned primarily as a plot device), he's sufficiently nonspecific to perhaps allow readers to identify with someone stuck in a situation they can't get out of, observing things they can't abide, even if said reader isn't pursued by a ghostly being named Malveinous.
At the end of the day, Winterfield Nights is really a thriller at heart, as you'll see in the last quarter of the book as all the loose threads come together. I think that's what I've been doing all along with this series—writing thrillers—albeit in a roundabout, Gothic, noir-ish, Supernatural way. I'm not sure how else to classify them.
So, what is this story really about? I'll admit the blurb is intentionally vague. It's meant to reflect that episodic quality I mentioned further up where the reader gets to observe the goings-on of a dismal town called Winterfield. There's some crime (inspired by real life events from Youngstown, Ohio), vigilante antics, small-town desperation, and the Driver's ongoing fight for his soul.
Be sure to get your electronic or paperback copy of Winterfield Nights on Amazon, and if you enjoy the book, please leave a rating or review.
Next up, The Reeve Book Two.
It's a great feeling to finally put the finishing touches on a book and be done with it. Even at 50,000 words, it's a lot of work, and there's always the question in the back of your mind of whether you effectively communicated your vision. A book can always "be better" I suppose, but at some point, you have to let go and call it done. Otherwise, you'll forever be pulling a George Lucas and tweaking things to death.
As usual, Winterfield Nights is a bit experimental in format since this series is sort of my sandbox to do whatever I want. I was going for something really moody and atmospheric and thought I could leverage multiple points of view to accomplish this: third-person for those poetic details and first-person to get the authentic character nuances to come through.
Each chapter begins in third-person to set the scene before shifting to the viewpoint character's first-person narration. Think of it as peeling back the outer narrative in order to get to the inner narrative. Originally, I wanted each chapter to seamlessly shift back and forth between third and first, sort of allowing the characters to provide their own commentary on different parts of the outer narrative. While that worked for some chapters, it didn't for others, and I didn't want to sacrifice readability for sake of the format. So, in the end I went with only one shift per chapter.
What's so cool about this book (for me, anyway) is that it sees two previously unpublished short stories come to life: "For the Taking" and "Vigilante." Since both stories take place in the same universe, it wasn't difficult to repurpose them for use in Winterfield Nights. I also wanted there to be an episodic feel from one chapter to another, which again, made it easy to weave these stories into the greater plot.
"For the Taking" was the story of Will Sparks and his townie friends' hasty plan to rob a bar on Thanksgiving Eve whereas "Vigilante" was the story of Eddie Slocumb, a family man who tracked a serial killer in the eighties. And for those of you paying attention, Sheriff Hildersham makes mention of the latter in The Camaro Murders ("Some folks still talk about the strangulations near the end of ’87.").
Both Will and Eddie round out a cast of desperate characters in Winterfield Nights that features the return of Tad Ozzel from Beacon Road Bedlam. Man, what a turd that Ozzel guy is. His single-minded focus on uncovering what he thinks is the suppression of truth makes him increasingly malevolent as he and the rest of the characters blindly race to their respective points of no return. Sheriff Hildersham comes along for the ride in this one, but while Beacon was more of a Sheriff story, Winterfield is more of an Ozzel story.
Of course, it's just as much a Driver story, as any Driver book always will be. And while the Driver is somewhat one-dimensional even after four books (he was first envisioned primarily as a plot device), he's sufficiently nonspecific to perhaps allow readers to identify with someone stuck in a situation they can't get out of, observing things they can't abide, even if said reader isn't pursued by a ghostly being named Malveinous.
At the end of the day, Winterfield Nights is really a thriller at heart, as you'll see in the last quarter of the book as all the loose threads come together. I think that's what I've been doing all along with this series—writing thrillers—albeit in a roundabout, Gothic, noir-ish, Supernatural way. I'm not sure how else to classify them.
So, what is this story really about? I'll admit the blurb is intentionally vague. It's meant to reflect that episodic quality I mentioned further up where the reader gets to observe the goings-on of a dismal town called Winterfield. There's some crime (inspired by real life events from Youngstown, Ohio), vigilante antics, small-town desperation, and the Driver's ongoing fight for his soul.
Be sure to get your electronic or paperback copy of Winterfield Nights on Amazon, and if you enjoy the book, please leave a rating or review.
Next up, The Reeve Book Two.
