Week of 18 March 2002

Nights in Rodanthe is just about done. . .

It's a good thing, too. Due to varying publishing schedules around the world, my novels are published in Italy and Germany before they're published in the United States, and my publishers there need time to translate the novel. They'll get their first glimpse of the novel on either Thursday or Friday.

I received my editor's notes on Tuesday and much of this week was spent making those changes, but just as I'd hoped, the suggested edits were relatively minor, primarily line edits. In addition, I worked in a few paragraphs in the middle of the novel, then rearrange the text on the final page, but other than that, it was the easiest edit I've gone through.

I know there are some people who want some "hints" as to what the novel is about, and I'll be offering those as the publication date nears. Look for the information over the summer. As a teaser though, I'll quote a couple of lines from my editor's letter to me. "As I reread and worked on Nights in Rodanthe over the weekend, I think I loved it even more than on my first reading of the novel (which is saying a lot). I caught subtle things I missed the first go-round, and I was even more deeply moved by certain scenes (and, yes, I cried. . . again) It's a simple love story, beautifully told and incredibly touching. I think your fans are going to adore it. I do." And, "Thank you for writing this book."

I'd also like to mention two wonderful books I read: The Analyst by John Katzenbach, and "Cold Spring Harbor" by Richard Yates. I read The Analyst in one sitting. John Katzenbach (who also wrote Hart's War, one of the contemporary novels I recommended -- see Reading List) has put together a page-turning thriller, with the best "bad-guy" since Hannibal Lecter in Silence of the Lambs. What a book! If you want a great read, try it. It nails all four elements perfectly. (See Writer's Corner for explanation of the four elements).

Cold Spring Harbor, though fairly weak on the plot, has some of the best writing I've ever read. Richard Yates's style efficient and concise, original without seeming to strain for originality -- and breath-taking. I'll offer a couple of lines of description to show you what I mean:

"She may not have been more than fifty, but there wasn't much left of whatever she'd had in the way of looks. Her hair was a blend of faded yellow and light gray, as if dyed by many years of drifting cigarette smoke, and although you could say she'd kept her figure, it was such a frail, slack little figure that you couldn't picture it doing anything but sitting right here, on this coffee-stained sofa. Her very way of sitting suggested an anxious need to be heard and understood, and to be liked if possible: hunched forward with her forearms on her knees and her clasped hands writhing to the rhythms of her own talk."

Or:

"Soon the sherry was flowing again for everyone except the boy, Phil, a melancholy kid who didn't seem to mind being left out. He was fooling around on the floor with the cat."

What Richard Yates did with those descriptions, in just a few words, was incredible. Lesser writers -- most writers -- would have needed pages to capture the same elements. If you want to see writing at its finest, give the novel a try.

previous update  |  next update