Spot

Heh heh. Just went back and reread the other blog posts from the summer. Maybe I should read in chronological order. I suppose the additional challenge of writing online and publish as you go is that you paint yourself into a corner. (See July 11 blog post). Had you saved posting the entire thing until you were done, you could have just rewritten the prologue. Like science writing--you write the intro last, after you know what you want to say. Which just makes the ending of CC that much better, in that you were able to make it all fit.

FWIW, I hadn't checked into GA or CC for awhile, so only today I noticed the last two chapters were up. I read them before coming to the blog, and I'm glad I did. From this perspective, I think you accomplished what you wanted. No WTF response from me. The ending is excellent. This story has always been more about what's going on in Andy's head than what was going on outside, and ending the story at the point where Andy takes a leap of emotional growth and awareness is a good point. I could imagine a few alternate endings, perhaps they would have been like your WTF endings. But I think this one is true to the story. There were other times along the way where Andy ignored/fought/overlooked a point of emotional awareness and that accepting that new awareness was OK. Eventually, he would end the struggle and move on. To end the book with the end of a struggle is a good end, IMO. I always kind of assumed that the last chapters didn't get written for so long because you weren't sure how they turned out in real life, even though you were past graduation. (I hope that doesn't sound condescending. Rereading my comment, I can't tell. Not my intent.) Retelling the facts of the 5th undergraduate year without a clearer understanding of the implications of what transpired would make the story seem hollow. How would you know what the implications were until you'd had some time to live them out? An interpretation of the 5th-yr spring break written 8 years ago may have been far different that the one written two months ago. Hindsight....

Wow

Funny! But there was one thing in the story that wasn't realistic. Squirrels don't bite penises, they go for nuts.

I'm not in the US right now, so maybe that's why I couldn't get the link to work. Same for others on that site. I could drone on and on about Lyle, but I think if you have to start with one album, Lyle Lovett and His Large Band is the one to start with. More of the songs there fit the quirky side, you have to listen closely to the lyrics, but you get a good intro to his sense of humor, and his range from country to jazz is all there too, plus two good bittersweets--If you were to wake up and Nobody knows me. But considering your bittersweet tastes, you might prefer Joshua Judges Ruth or Pontiac. Some folks really didn't like JJR because it seemed pretty downbeat. My wife calls it his funeral dirge album. I guess maybe Pontiac splits the difference between Large Band and JJR, but the more upbeats tends more toward country and is less jazzy. The Anthology is a good greatest hits collection too, but some of his better Bittersweet/melancholies are not on it. (If you were to wake up is on it though.) Finally, Step Inside this House is fantastic. It is all covers of other Texas songwriters like Townes van Zandt--so you don't get Lyle's songwriting, but it is still a great album (2 disc set). If you want more details on other albums let me know and I can add more here or by email as would be appropriate. On your blog you mentioned kd Lang and I like her a lot too. I think of both her and Lyle together, labeled as country, but really with more range than that. But I prefer her album Ingenue to the one you reviewed, though Shadowland is pretty good.

Thanks for the response Adam. I wasn't trying to dig for personal details. I assume that even in autobiography, especially when the events are 10-15 years old, there must be some creation of details and literary license, and really I was wondering more about the "wanna play" detail as an object of your literary approach, because I liked it. The warmth in the study scene was there, I thought, but more before and after the conversation, like in how quickly his/your dad responded to the request, etc. But hey, that's just my reading. As for offline/explicit identification of Drew, you could probably have said something like: It's a literary flaw because I have a real life friend that goes by Drew and sometimes I don't catch it. That'd've kept you from having to be too detailed and satisfied me. But the more detailed answer is certainly appreciated. Yes. Sooo much better than political blogs. There was already enough hurt in the world, and then political blogs and online comment sections to newspaper articles were created. (Hope that doesn't cheapen your line too much.)

I couldn't get that link to work, but did find it here: http://www.youtube.c...h?v=DTIbuaqDas0. But for me, I hear Lyle Lovett all through this story. He's Texan, the right vintage (mid 80s on), and he does melancholy/bittersweet as well as anyone. A song that might fit in various places for this story after "the night", maybe when Matt comes to Andy during his flu or at a Jock Posse trip or July 4 campfire, is Lyle Lovett, If You Were to Wake Up. Maybe the "dear" doesn't fit but if Matt were singing it, he could drop it. It could be from either character's perspective, Matt because of how Andy's hurt him, or Andy because he thinks Matt doesn't want him anymore. Matt can play it on his guitar like Lyle does. And it is the right vintage, from Lyle Lovett and His Large Band, 1989. If you were to wake up, And I were beside you Would you gently smile dear, And whisper my name And would you remember, The way that I held you And would you want me, To hold you again Time reaches to you, Just like a willow That bends to the water, And clings to the shore And there was a time dear, That once you did love me And there was a time, You loved me no more Rain on your window, Light on your pillow The way you lie sleeping, Is it like before For there was a time dear, That once you did love me And there was a time You loved me no more Adam asked in one of his blogs The Way Things Don't Always Work Out if others gravitate toward bittersweet music/movies/books. I do. That's why I like Lyle, his quirky stuff makes me laugh (If I had a boat, She's no lady, she's your wife, Church, Bears, Don't touch my hat), his melancholy (above, Nobody Knows Me, Step inside this house) reminds me of how my life is so not like what he sings about, and cheers me up. If you've never heard his version of Tammy Wynette's Stand by Your Man, you should check it out. The classic last line, "After all, he's just a man," gives the entire song a completely different meaning the way Lyle sings it.

So I read all the chapters to this point yesterday..a rare day on an even rarer weekend with no responsibilities and no family around. Not sure the etiquette for posting comments drawn from various chapters in one place--here in the forum? As a review of the last chapter? (Too many places to comment for one site?) So based on the few current events blogs I've commented on, I'll just post here on the most recent thread. Anyway, I'm enjoying the story. I echo the praise from others. I particularly think that Adam is doing an excellent job portraying Andy's blindness as to what/where the problem is between him and Matt. Though it is plain to others (Angie, Trey, Cole, Danny, Mr. Sharpe) and they've clearly pointed it out to Andy, he still was obsessing on ideas he'd made up in his head, and twisting minutia to support his make believe. Like obsessing on the word "were" in the email from Matt that he discussed with Trey. Having been on both sides of the "its as plain as the nose on your face" talk, I've found this thread in the story to be very realistic. (I realize now after browsing through some of the non-story content that CC is autobiographical, so maybe that makes it easier to describe Andy's cluelessness and struggle, but it still has to be done convincingly to the reader, and at least for me, this has been very well accomplished.) One thing I particularly enjoy in reading is how details advance the story or the characters. The "were" scene above is a good example. In chapter 30 there was another good one, I thought, when Andy asked his dad if he wanted to play ball with him and his brother. After years of being disengaged and racing to bury himself in his sports/substances/sex/studies, to me this signaled a broader re-engagement for Andy. He'd already started with Angie, but for me, this showed that Andy was doing a better job thinking about others too. That playing ball was more about dong something with Danny (and his dad) than just something to occupy his time and thoughts. Also, for me, it finally made his relationship with his dad a little more complete too. The scene where he talked about "the night on the beach" with his dad was good, but I thought it was a little coincidental that his dad would happen to have relevant books on the shelf and for me that scene was more about someone pointing out that Andy was projecting his fears/biases on Matt than it was a true discussion with his dad--it seemed too analytical. In my real life, I do technical writing, and any word or phrase that doesn't add meaning or content is cut. No fluff. (Adam can probably relate to that in his math/science life, maybe we'd be in the same department, but not if I had to move to Texas.) So maybe I'm obsessing about a line of fluff to move the scene along at the beginning of Chapter 30, or maybe it was intentional. Adam, I'd be curious about your intent there, even though it is a minor point. And one detail that confused me: early in chapter 28 Andy gets an email from Matt, in which he says: You don't get off as easy this school year. This is a game you're playing Andy and it's at my expense. It's like you wanna keep me at arms length to protect you. Protect you from ME. Jesus. WTF Drew. So I read this and thought: "Whoda F is Drew, eh? Oh yeah, Andy = AnDREW" But no one, particularly Matt, had referred to Andy as Drew in the previous 28 chapters (with Prologue), so where did this come from? Matt alternates between using Drew and Andy after this point. So what's up with this? By the way, I did a "find" for "drew" on the other chapters before posting this, just to be sure. If you post a comment with a factual error like that on the other blogs I read, you flamed hard. Told you I was into details in reading. Not so much in real life though, that's my wife's job. Adam, keep up the good work (and be strong in the face of the tests of a 4-yr-old <g>).

For what its worth, I disagree with TrevorTime and ghrays about Peter's money issues not being authentic, because I can totally relate. When my dad moved out, my mom was still finishing college and us kids were in jr. high. He never came through with support, mom didn't want to go to welfare or quit school to get a min wage job so my grandparents helped out (I found out later). It really hurt mom's pride. Us kids learned to be very frugal and independent and the example we had was not to take hand outs. I worked all through college, just like Peter. Even now, my wife and I are doing pretty good with cash. We certainly don't complain about having more than we had 15 years ago, as ghrays suggested. BUT, I am embarrassed and occasionally outraged by the money that her parents want to spend on us, particularly without asking. I admit that sometimes this reaction is some level of insecurity that even now my mom couldn't help like my in-laws could, even if we'd want her too. Occasionally my wife and I even bicker over it. If something happened and our "Royce" was paying the bills, I'd be very upset. Not necessarily at him, but at the situation, which would manifest itself through him. Peter's money issue isn't so much the amount of money, as the source. That leading to Peter's control issues, on top of feeling out of control by being beaten up, makes sense to me. Well, the nice thing about fiction is that you can interpret it and relate to it as you wish. So this isn't a dig at Trevortime or ghrays, just a counterpoint that I thought I'd sign up here to post. I'm glad a friend referred the story to me. It's been a good read these last 3 days.