Randall Wisehart

I’m pleased to announce that my publisher Friends United Press has released a hardback version of Luke’s Summer Secret and also a second printing of A Winding Road to Freedom with a new cover. You can order copies through the link to Friends United Press on my website or through Amazon.

I am also pleased to announce that I will be doing a book talk and book signing at Two Sisters Books and More in Richmond on Saturday April 7 at 2:00 PM. I will talk a little about how I included events from local history in Luke’s Summer Secret as well as what went into revising the book for the newly published revised edition. Please spread the word.

I have heard from the Indiana Historical Press that they will publish my most recent book tentatively entitled Hoosier Beginnings in 2019. I’ll work with them on some final revising later this year. Stay tuned for more news when my new book comes out.

In the meantime, here’s a teaser for my book talk:

How did I get back into my characters minds after so many years? It was easier than you might think. Naturally I read the original book again. Several times. I did the proofreading that needed to be done but I also wanted to make sure the new opening chapter I added was true to the characters I had originally created based on my research. I wanted to make sure every word said by Levi Coffin, Catharine Coffin, Cassie, and William Bush was consistent with who they had become when I first wrote the book. I wanted to make sure any thought or gesture was consistent with what I had originally written. So once again, I listened to my characters. I waited until I again got the sense that I knew my characters – until I could hear them talking, until I could see them in my mind’s eye.

Then I was ready to write the revised edition.

If you’d like to hear more about the local history connections in Luke’s Summer Secret, I’ll be saying more on Saturday April 7 at The Two Sisters Book and More, 193 Fort Wayne Avenue in Richmond.

As far as publishing news, a hardback edition of the revised Luke’s Summer Secret will be coming out soon and available through Friends United Press as well as Amazon. In addition, Friends United Press is doing another printing of A Winding Road to Freedom with a new cover and that should be available later this spring. I will also have news about my new book tentatively called Hoosier Beginnings later this month.

But I’m ready for another fiction project. Although I will be carving out some time to do professional writing, I keep thinking about writing a mystery. I have a lot of notes, character sketches, and background material I have written over the past few years but have not felt clear to begin a draft of a mystery. Over the past few weeks, an idea is taking shape. I’m not 100% certain this will grow into a mystery. But it just might.

Character is where I always begin. Who will solve the mystery? Who will help? Who are the suspects? Why should anyone care about the main characters?

But along with character I think about setting. Where will this take place? Will it take place in real places or a town I create? Or some of both? What specific scenes will be important in the development of the mystery?

And of course the plot. What happened? How does the main character get involved in this mystery when she is not in law enforcement? What clues does she follow? What clues lead her in the wrong direction? How do I keep the reader’s interest along the way so they can’t wait to see how the mystery ends?

For now the ideas are still swirling. Soon, I’ll make some choices and then the ideas will simmer until a point, hopefully soon, when my main character will tell me she’s ready to tell the story and off we’ll go on another adventure. This time a mystery.

I am posting a slightly revised version of a blog post I wrote on the blog I was doing specifically about a new book about George Holman and Richard Rue,  two of the earliest white settlers of the Whitewater Valley in east central Indiana. (I should have news about the publication date for my newest book in early February.) Whether I’m writing historical fiction or fiction, I remind myself regularly to listen to my characters. I wrote this post about a year ago, when I was revising my initial draft.

It’s time to make some decisions about revising. As I get feedback from readers, I’m finding that they are reinforcing places where I suspected there are gaps (there are) and places where I need to simplify for clarity (I most definitely do). But I’m pleased with the overall vision that is emerging in the form of a novel. As I talk to readers, I’m actually a bit amazed at what they are finding in the novel in terms of themes and characterization. Did I really intend to do all that?

The answer, of course, is both yes and no. There are certain themes and character traits that I knew I wanted to include and thought about a lot. But I was really taken aback when one of my readers identified additional themes that I hadn’t really thought about explicitly. Of course, after listening to her, I recognize the themes and how they emerged. But as I was writing, I was often too busy telling a story to think about themes. The themes emerged as I thought about my characters and allowed them to tell me what they should say and what they would be thinking.

Traversing that bridge between thinking like an English teacher and thinking like a writer is fascinating when it comes to theme. As an English teacher (and reader) I often ask “What did the writer do to suggest something about a character’s motivations? Why did the writer choose to put in that detail? What does that suggest regarding a theme?”

But as a writer I’m chuckling. Perhaps I wasn’t quite as intentional when writing this book as the English teacher in me thinks. Have I thought about themes as I have been writing the book? Yes. Definitely. Well, perhaps not the word “theme” but I have certainly thought a lot about the what my characters should say and do that is consistent with who they are. So in some sense I am thinking about theme as I write. But to a much greater extent I am simply creating characters and letting them tell a story. So the themes that emerge from my book are not written down on an outline somewhere. I am not holding my breath waiting to see if my readers will “discover” a theme I carefully crafted. Instead, I keep thinking about my characters and the stories that they want to tell. Any themes in my book emerge from my characters.

I am creating characters partly from what I am finding out about them historically and partly from my imagination. But when it comes to themes, my hope is that my readers’ own imaginations tap into the story my characters are telling and that themes emerge – not totally from clues my characters suggested but from that fascinating mix or reader and character,

So as I head into another stage of revision, I’m aware that part of what I am doing is very intentional “I need to add more details there. I need to say something about another incident here.” But part of what I am doing is simply reading and listening to the story my characters are telling and letting my revising emerge from what my characters continue to tell me about the story they are telling.

As I reread this post on January 26, 2018, I am now working on another idea. Does one of my characters from Luke’s Summer Secret have more to say? William Bush was a real person. He escaped from slavery and came to Newport, Indiana where he married and raised a family. I included parts of his story in Luke’s Summer Secret. But I can’t find much more about him other than what I have already read in Levi Coffin’s Reminiscences. So. Do I have enough to write another book? Perhaps a story focused more fully on William Bush?

Then I realize something important. There I go again. Thinking about writing before listening to my characters. There may not be more facts about William Bush for another book or even another story. But might he have a story to tell wrapped around other facts of the time? Perhaps. So I go back to doing the two things I do when writing historical fiction. Learn more about the time period. And listen to my characters.

The title of this blog is a little misleading. In reality I’m always writing, always thinking about new projects. It’s more a situation of: When do I focus on starting a draft of a piece. knowing I’ve done enough pre-writing work to feel as though I can finish the project?

The new revised edition of Luke’s Summer Secret has just been published. The manuscript for Hoosier Beginnings is still in the hands of a publisher and has already made it through two steps of a four step approval process. I’ve just talked with my current publisher and decided not to do a revised edition of A Winding Road to Freedom but instead I have ideas for a story that tells more of the life of William Bush…. and perhaps one last mention of Cassie on her way to pick up her son in Newport (now Fountain City), Indiana. I’m also working on a book proposal related to the Earlham College Master of Arts in Teaching program. And I’ve been reviewing dozens of pages of notes about two different ideas for a mysteries, one of them set in Richmond, Indiana in the 1920’s when so many Jazz musicians were coming to Richmond for recording sessions.

So in a way, I’ve already “begun” a number of writing projects. But no one idea has really jumped out at me and screamed “I’m ready!” All of the ideas are still simmering, still percolating. I know from experience that if I try writing a draft too soon, I get stuck. I actually have two ideas at the top of the list competing for my attention: An expanded William Bush story, and the book proposal about our teacher preparation program. For now, I need to sit back and relax and let one of the ideas emerge. It has nothing to do with logic or organization. I can’t plan my way into a project. I have to relax and let my gut tell me which project is ready to go.

For fiction projects, it’s easier. Keep fleshing out a major character until she (or he) tells me it’s time to rock and roll. For non-fiction projects, it’s different. Continue to write reflections and thoughts, continue to read other books on the subject, reread notes – until themes emerge that let me know the project is ready to take off.

All in all, it can be a frustrating time. Being in between projects. But it’s also exciting to know I’m getting close to a point where that next project is going to emerge. Time now to stop writing and listen.