I have a post up today at MaineCrimeWriters.com in honor of National Library Week. The library was the place where I decided to cross the line from reading books to writing them my myself. Being surrounded by all those wonderful stories opened up my imagination in surprising ways (sometimes exhilerating, sometimes disturbing). I know we're all supposed to be excited by the infinite possibilities of the internet, but there's a lot to be said for having limited choices at hand—being forced, in my case, to read Catch-22 because I'd run through all the other paperbacks on the free shelf and then discovering it spoke to me in ways I never would have imagined. Today, libraries are going through a period of deep soul-searching, as they increasingly become places where patrons come to browse the web and not the books. That's fodder for another post. But I would be remiss, given my success as an author, not to pay homage to the libraries that helped form my sensibility.
Transported
It's not every day you hear your wife's poetry being recited by our own twenty-first century Will Rogers. Today, however, was such a day for me. On this morning's "Writer's Almanac," Garrison Keillor read the title poem of my wife's new collection, Transportation. I am immensely proud of her and hope you will give the segment a listen.
A Map of Mike Bowditch's Investigations
I've added a couple of new features to my website, including a Maine map showing some of the real locations depicted in The Poacher's Son and Trespasser. In the coming months I'll be adding landmarks for Bad Little Falls, as well, so be sure to check back over the summer.
Here's a screen grab. To use the interactive map, click here.
Mud Season in Maine
Last week we had temperatures in the eighties; this morning it is snowing....
The action of my second novel, Trespasser, takes place in this week of the year, and the recent weather made me rememeber something I wrote about the season:
Late March. Mud season in Maine. Not yet springtime but no longer winter either—a slippery, seasonal limbo. Weather even more freakish than usual. Rain, snow, ice, and sun, all within the span of an hour. A meteorologist's worst nightmare.
The only constant is mud. Mud creeping up your boots, splattering your pant legs, finding its way onto clothes you never even wear outdoors. Your fingernails jammed black with it. The impossibility of ever feeling clean. The inside of your truck transformed each day into a pigpen. Mud splashed onto the windshield, then smeared back and forth by the wipers. The wheels gummed up with mire and packed with gravel into the axles. Every car on the road painted the same shit brown.
Wherever you look a mottled, melting landscape. Snow banks rotting along the roadsides and melt-water streams the color of urine. Everything that was hidden is now exposed. Beer cans, trash bags, emptied ashtrays. Fur and feathers from creatures unidentifiable, things long dead.
Winter's aftermath. The dirtiest season.
Freakish, indeed.
PS. The paperback for Trespasser hits stores on April 10.
Pete Kilpatrick Sings "Trespasser"
The Pete Kilpatrick Band has a new album out on March 27, Heavy Fire, and I'm humbled to say that closing track is titled "Trespasser." Pete told me the song was inspired by my Mike Bowditch novels.
The band has an amazing resume. You've probably heard their music even if the name isn't instantly familiar (it will be):
The Pete Kilpatrick Band hails from the music mecca of the northeast, Portland, Maine. They have been writing, recording, and performing regularly since 2004 and have released six independent albums to date including their most recent, Heavy Fire (2012). They have been named Maine’s best act four times in the Portland Best Music Awards and have performed over 1,000 shows since their formation, sharing the stage with such notable acts as Dave Matthews Band, David Gray, Jason Mraz, Ray Lamontagne, Guster, Amos Lee, Grace Potter and the Nocturnals, Michael Franti and Spearhead, Brett Dennen, The Wailers, Dawes, Blues Traveler, and DJ Logic, among countless others.
The thought that my books inspired another artist to interpret and riff on its themes is so amazing and gratifying. The song is fantastic (I can't wait to hear it live). Give it a listen and let me know what you think.
And buy the album! If you can't find it locally, you can download it next month; it'll be available on iTunes on April 24.
Update on 2012-03-20 18:11 by Paul Doiron
As if this song isn't cool enough, here's something that really blows my mind. "Trespasser" was mastered by the legendary Bob Ludwig of Gateway Studios, the man who cut Janis Joplin's "Me and Bobby McGee," Led Zeppelin II and Houses of the Holy, most of the Band's famous recordings, and almost all of Bruce Springsteen's entire catalog of songs—among many others. Humbling, like I said.