The Story About These Stories

Pink Victorian is a house in the novel That Old Pink Victorian on Main Street , one I published in early 2021. And in many ways the story is told from the point of view of this house. The house is in many ways a character The story's first scene takes place at an upstairs window and looks out on the principal character of the story, a young girl named Lily.  And the story's last scene takes place with Lily looking out a window of that house. This house has a story to tell. It is old. It has had many owners. It was the pride of the founders of the city in which it was one of the first houses built. It overlooks harbor, industry, and the whole of downtown. And it is a wreck inside. Lily's mother Katherine has been admonished to keep an eye on the house and whoever might be living there at this moment, and if she does, it will be hers again. She's fourth-generation and she owes it to her great grandfather... I didn't quite realize how much like eyes the back windows ar...

In a story someone has to be the storyteller and it seems to me that that's a place where writers have tough decisions to make. It's as easy as can be to take on the role of storyteller, the old sage holding everyone in his or her spell at the evening campfire. The storyteller knows everything. But a more realistic story has the various characters know this and that and never the whole picture. It's more realistic because that's how we all are. We know only what we experience ourselves, what we learn from others, and what we research (or snoop out). I once wrote a book with an old bloodhound, Ernest, as an important character. The actual main character, a widow named Maggie, adopted Ernest from an old-dog rescue facility.  She wanted to know his background. But no one knew where he came from. He was found out on the streets.  I could have created a coincidence and someone who had seen him lying in the gutter might have known the person who left him there. But that would...

The Lewis Library, 3 generations of books and comfort  As we all know, 2020 was a different sort of year.  In late 2020 I wrote a novel called  That Old Pink Victorian on Main Street .  This Victorian a real house, not exactly on Main Street, but on one of the major offshoots of downtown in a real but tiny city in the Pacific Northwest. I used to walk past this house on my way to the farmers market. I fell in love with it, and almost bought it. The real house is not pink, it's yellow. I'm a sucker for yellow houses. But 'yellow' would not fit well into the title.  "That old yellow Victorian", whether it's on Main Street or not, sounds like old yellowed curtains smelly with age. Not to mention being a bit awkward to say.  This house is indeed old. It was built in the earliest years of the 20th century, in the founding years of the city.  In the story I have it built and owned by the founder of the city. But that is fiction. That's how writing fiction wo...