It's been too long, and that's on me. Wanted to share a bit about what's been going on and where I'm going with The Boys of East Harbor.
First, I wanted to share with you that I got to take Michael and the boys to Europe. I loved writing about the "European tour" so much, I just had to visit some of the cities and sites I'd studied for the story--especially Stavanger, London, and Hamburg.
I fell in love with Stavanger and Norway in general. I really enjoyed my time in Oslo, too. I'd planned to follow the hike Michael and Christian had taken, and visited the waterfall close to Frafjord from the story. But the night before the hike, I got a call from my guide. He'd fallen that day and injured himself. I would have to find another guide or trip for the next day and it was already 9:30 pm! That's how I ended up hiking to Pulpit Rock (see the image to the left). It was way more difficult than I should have even attempted, but it was the ONLY option I had for my last full day in Stavanger. Either way, it was an incredible experience. If you enjoy the Mission Impossible movies, apparently Tom Cruise hangs from Pulpit Rock in one of them. It's 3500 feet down to the water! And the hike isn't anything to sneeze at. Not only do you have to climb up to that elevation, part of the trail is only a few feet wide along the cliff!
It was a whirlwind of a trip. Here are some of the cities I made it to (in order of my visit):
Glasgow
Edinburgh
Stavanger
Oslo
Copenhagen
Helsingborg (Denmark)
Lund (Sweden)
Malmö
London
Amsterdam
Hamburg
In addition to the nearly 150 miles of hiking, I saw one musical (Billy Porter staring in Cabaret on London's West End), two rock concerts (Twenty One Pilots in Glasgow and then again in London) and three museums (Edvard Munch Museum in Oslo, Vincent Van Gogh Museum in Amsterdam, and Rijksmuseum, also in Amsterdam with paintings by all the Dutch masters).
It was the trip of a lifetime and I highly recommend Amsterdam and Stavanger (or anywhere in Norway).
The Boys of East Harbor
Not getting much time to write this year. Work is crazy and I'm trying to commit to continuing getting some walking or hiking in to stay in shape for another European adventure.
That being said, if you've been following the story update post, I'm working on the "back to school" chapters. I'm writing multiple chapters that start on Tuesday (the day before school starts) and ends Friday). With the simultaneous, I'm focusing on the boys in the different age groups: the sixth graders, the eighth graders, the freshman, and then the brothers (and Christian). As I've said several times before, this story is an exercise in exploring different types of storytelling and writing. This has creating some new challenges for me and I am expecting myself to nail. For example, if in the chapter with the sixth graders Derek goes to speak to Christian, then when I'm writing the chapter about the brothers and Christian, I need to account for when and where he is in the other chapter and what is transpires. With the chapters interwoven, it is taking me a while to write them, maintain the continuity of the story and the characters, and plan for next.
What can you expect?
Next, when these chapters are finished, I'll be publishing them in succession, one a day until all are posted.
After that, I think you'll see two things with this story:
You'll see the story speed up a bit. I think I'm going to pull back from writing almost a day-by-day story, to moving the story forward a bit quicker.
I think you'll also see many of the boys taking more of a backseat. That will allow me to focus on fewer characters at a time to help us all keep the characters and stories straight. The characters that take a backseat will most likely raise to the forefront for a story line and then drift into the background as other characters take their place in the spotlight for a bit. Otherwise, it will focus on the band.
Hope this is cool with everyone!
Be well and I hope to have more chapters soon...