Following Atticus: Forty-Eight High Peaks, One Little Dog, and an Extraordinary Friendship by Tom Ryan is published by William Morrow. It tells the story of my adventures with Atticus M. Finch, a little dog of some distinction. You can also find our column in the NorthCountry News.

Saturday, May 29, 2010

Dog Held Hostage

In case you couldn't tell by the lack of posts on here lately, the picture of Atticus above should let you know I'm still writing "Following Atticus". The deadline to turn my manuscript over to the publisher is June 1st. I'll be nipping and tucking right up until that point.

I didn't expect it to take this long, but some horrible unforeseen circumstances exploded this past winter and things came to a grinding halt. I lost my writing voice and stumbled around in the dark trying to find it for quite a while. Eventually I started writing again, but the words came from my head and not my heart. That never works for me. They have to come out of my heart, and then be edited by the head.

Not to fear, though. Slowly but surely I found what I was looking for and it feels wonderful to be tapping away on the keys again. When it feels right, like it does now, it almost feels like I'm composing music. I get into it. I'll be writing and I'll laugh out loud at something I've written or feel tears running down my cheeks if it's a sad piece.

I've already promised Atticus he won't be held hostage starting this Tuesday, once our story is turned over to Cassie Jones at William Morrow. While she goes through it with a fine-tooth comb, we'll have three weeks or so where we won't be doing anything but walking, reading and sleeping. It's going to be great to get out on the trails again.

I expect June to be the most active month we've had in quite some time. That's good news for you if you come to our blog looking for photos because there will be plenty of them.

For now, allow me
to direct you to a superb column by David Shribman concerning the Mount Clay debate. In case you don't know about it, there's been an ill-advised movement afoot to change the name of Mount Clay in the Presidential Range to Mount Reagan. Shribman, a Pulitizer Prize-winning journalist, is the editor of the Pittsburgh Post Gazette and he summers up here in Kearsage. (*Note that we could have linked to many different papers, but we chose our friend Dave Olson's, aka. The Fat Man of the Mountains.)

2 comments:

David Olson said...

Hey! Thanks for the link. We're big fans of Shribman here. He grew up in Marblehead, so he's another one of those writers with one foot on the North Shore and one foot in the White Mountains...

The boy and I are headed for Monadnock tomorrow. If all goes well, our next stop(s) will be in the White Mountains...

Thomas F. Ryan said...

Look forward to seeing you two up in the Whites, Dave. (I'll keep my eyes peeled when we drive by Dairy Queen.)