On Writing & Storytelling: The (Hopefully) LAST Update on the Updates to ‘Reunion: A Story’…and Moving Onward with ‘Reunion: Coda’

A Hot Day in Tampa Bay…What Else is New?

Hi, there, Dear Reader.

It’s late morning here in Lithia, Florida, on Thursday, July 6, 2023 (a Thursday that, after the long, long Fourth of July weekend, feels like a Tuesday). As you might expect, it’s a hot (88°F/31°C) summer day in the Tampa Bay area: sunny, humid, and stifling outside. The heat index (at 10:44 AM) is 99°F/37°C, and a heat advisory is in place till 7 PM EDT. The forecast for today is typically Florida-in-summer: hot (a high of 94°F/34°C with a good chance of light rain showers throughout the area) and muggy. Okay, yeah…I’m definitely not going outside.

Moving on…

Update on the Updates…(Hopefully the Last One!)

 

I am pleased to announce that the last batch of updates to Reunion: A Story has filtered through Amazon’s Kindle Direct Publishing system and, at least in the Kindle e-book, and has replaced the previous version of the novella. I’m not sure about the paperback edition; I checked the book’s product page and clicked on the cover image and the “Read a Sample” button, and everything looks all right. However, having had the unhappy experience of ordering a copy of a supposedly updated version back in March and receiving a copy of the original 2018 release instead, I am hesitant to get a newer version. I am tempted to, of course; I need the royalties (badly), but I also live on a fixed income, and I hate wasting money – even though I’d get $2.99 or so of that back. (I don’t ever get the full $8.50 of the MSRP, ever.)

I’m going to wait till Saturday to order the “new” reissue. In the meantime, I can always read the Kindle e-book without bumping into cringeworthy typos, missing punctuation marks, or the wrong calendar dates for events that happened both in real life and in the fictional world based on my experience at South Miami High School in 1983.

Even though I was not thrilled that somewhere along the line Reunion: A Story still had mistakes that I thought I’d corrected back in March – trust me, I did not want to tinker with this story again! – I am glad that I had an opportunity to go back and fix things. First, I needed to correct the calendar dates mentioned explicitly in the text, especially the crucial Wednesday, June 15, 1983 in which the central story takes place.

Second, because Reunion: Coda, the duology’s second volume (and first novel-length entry), adheres more closely to reality as far as calendar dates are concerned, I had to change certain “established facts” in Reunion for both “historical accuracy” and consistency’s sake.

For instance, when I wrote the first version of Reunion as it now exists, I suggested that – unlike me – Jim and Marty joined the school chorus at the start of the 1980-81 school year. That’s why, when Jim writes her The Letter, it originally “established” that the two met in 1980.

For Reunion: Coda, however, I decided to include some extremely autobiographical details, such as my joining South Miami High School’s men’s chorus in mid-year (after the “Christmas” break). I thought it might be more authentic – and interesting – if I based Jim’s stint as a Singing Cobra on my own.

I also thought it made dramatic sense to have Marty join the chorus on the same day as Jim, both to give them a deeper connection and to clarify to the reader how on Earth Jim could have seen Marty’s audition for the girls’ choir.

So, rather than stick to what I had written in 1998 and keep the original calendar date of 1980 in The Letter, I changed it to “1981.” A small, seemingly trivial detail, but I didn’t want to “explain” the discrepancy between what I’d written in the first book of the Reunion Duology and what I am writing for the second. (I did have a somewhat convoluted idea to “explain” the divergence between the two stories, like having Maddie make a joke about Jim confusing the dates, to which Jim would have replied, “Hey, I was distraught and in a rush when I was writing that letter!”)

The big takeaway about the Saga of the (Seemingly) Never Ending Updates is this: I take my job as a writer/storyteller seriously, and “quality control” is one of the biggest concerns that I have both as a content creator and a reader. I care about the quality of the work that I do, not just out of personal pride in what I do, but because I want you, the reader, to have the best experience possible with my “stuff.” It doesn’t matter if it’s a blog post, a poem, a script for a short film (such as, say, Ronnie and the Pursuit of the Elusive Bliss), or a book that I’m hoping you will buy and read.

I did not particularly enjoy seeing mistakes and inconsistent details in Reunion, especially after I had already revised it almost four months ago. I would rather have spent time on my current “work-in-progress” so I can move from “first draft” mode to other phases in the production of my first novel. But since I have, as a consumer, purchased several self-published books that seemed promising but turned out to be…unfulfilling, I wanted to avoid doing that to you. (And, since I do read my own work, especially if it’s judged to be good by others, I also want my reading experience to be enjoyable and not annoying.)

Action This Day

Now that the revisions to Reunion: A Story have – hopefully – become a thing of the past, I can now focus my efforts on Reunion: Coda. It’s still early in the day and within my 9-5 writing window, so even though I must take a break (for lunch as well as to rest), I plan to go over the manuscript, especially Scene One, Chapter 10, then begin work on Scene Two.

I don’t foresee having to make too many edits, adjustments, or revisions of the pages between the Prologue and the chapter I’m writing now. One of the reasons why I did not write a first draft in three months – per Stephen King’s recommendation in On Writing: A Memoir of the Craft – is that I’m not just a slow typist, but also I “edit as I go” rather than rush through a rough draft at a fast clip and then revise and edit in the next phase of production. It’s what works for me, I guess – just like writing stories without an outline – but it does slow things down a bit.

So, if the “light rain showers” don’t morph into thunderstorm cells, I will be working on the new novel and stop worrying about Reunion: A Story.

Before I Go…A Reminder!

Kindle fans! My current Fourth of July promotion for Reunion: A Story is still valid till July 10, 2023. You still have a few days to buy the e-book edition for only $1.99. That’s $2 off the regular price! So, if you don’t yet have Reunion in your Kindle library, this would be a great time to add it at a reduced price.

Of course, if you are a member of Kindle Unlimited, you can read Reunion for free! Yes, free! As in $0.00!

And, on this note, I will take your leave so I can take my midday break. Until next time, stay safe, stay healthy, and I’ll see you on the sunny side of things.