A sudden idea came to me a moment ago. I found myself brooding unexpectedly about Brinkley and CJ, the main characters in my new novel/novella struggling to be born. What I know about it is this: CJ is on the road, as at the end of my last novel, Sodom, Gomorrah & Jones ("This book surprised me. It is intelligent, funny, bawdy and real. The protagonist is such a likable fellow adrift in an America he no longer understands, that one cannot help but root for him." Amazon), and meets another old fart, Brinkley, and they begin traveling together, each in his own rig. CJ is concerned about dying: he thinks it should be his right as a citizen to get a "peaceful pill" for the purpose when it's time. Brinkley, a Catholic, does not agree with him. CJ ends up dying of natural causes. Brinkley brings his ashes home to Portland.
What I've been struggling with is the point of view. I tried omnipotent. I tried first person Brinkley, which was better. But what just flashed into my brain is a very disjointed first person "journal" of a book, in which Brinkley says up front that he's not a writer, that his grandson is going to publish this as a free ebook on Amazon ... but that Brinkley has thoughts about CJ and what they argued about that he wants to share because he thinks the issue is important. He tried to get a couple writer friends interested but they dismissed him. As best he can, he'll now do it on his own.
Of course, this is all bullshit, this will be a highly crafted, carefully wrought delivery of "amateur writing," but this will be the premise to the reader. What I like about this approach is its non-linearity, it's easy movement to vignettes and aphorisms, its lightness of spirit, its Nietzsche-like approach to the most serious question we can ask, How do we die? Of course, this would be a hell of a lot harder to write than a traditional novel. I like the challenge as well. I usually opt for the more difficult alternative. I easily bore myself ha ha.
So! Will this stick? I have no idea. I won't be doing anything serious, I suspect, until summer.
