News: Novel

So... yes, I am going to be a published author for fiction. I've already been published as a scholar, but this is new territory for me. I've written a novel, that's due to be published in 2012. I'm waiting on a specific date, because I'm just about to start the editing process with my official editor.

When I know more, I'll pass it along. I am very pleased and excited about this: it is certainly what I would term a "popular" novel, not intended to be considered great literary fare. But I wrote a compelling story with interesting characters. In my opinion.

And frankly my aspirations are not to be literary--which I consider in most senses to be pretentious--but read.

Many of my favorite authors "aspired" to the stature of popular or "low culture" status: Charles Dickens, George Sand, Edith Wharton, Raymond Chandler, Dashiell Hammett, Robert Crais, and J. K. Rowling, for example. And every playwright prior to the advent of the avant-garde in the late 19th century.

A wonderful gallery of colleagues.