I can’t believe it’s been a year since I finished the bulk of my ninth novel, Day of the Dogwood. Well, I think it will be called that. There’s a greater-than-zero chance I will find a more suitable name by the end of the editing process.
Anyway, I finished in December of 2024 and shelved it, as I always do. My typical drawer-time for a book is about six months. I let myself forget about it a little while I move on to other projects. I only refer to it if I need something out of it. But after that six months, I will open it back up and read through it in one sitting, if possible. That helps in finding continuity issues.
Well, this time, I let it sit for a year – because I wanted to tell the story a different way. And for nearly the entire year, I’ve been fidgeting around with it in my head, trying to find the best way to achieve what I wanted: I want the entire story to take place in one day. Technically, a few hours.
Marcy Stedwin stands atop a hill, awaiting the arrival of some people. When they arrive, they walk down the stone steps into the valley, and into a copse of dogwoods to celebrate a birthday party. That’s it.
But of course, it’s not.
That is the over-arcing story line. The story you came to read is all told in flashback, or memory. Marcy will dive into her thoughts for a moment as she leans on the fence, watching the dogs play and waiting for her friends to arrive. There are several of these flashbacks, and some of them are quite long. Like 200-plus pages. That’s the meat of the book. But there is a somewhat important reason I wanted to tell the story in this manner – not just because it sounded interesting. And, well, it took work to arrange it that way.
Some major changes are introduced in this book. The greatest way to convey their gravity is to slip you the information at just the right time. You’ll see when you read it. I think you’ll enjoy it. If you enjoyed the other two Shawn Stedwin books, you’ll be quite happy with it.
But the important thing is, I achieved what I was going for. I was able to tell the story in the manner I wanted. Now comes the edit and prep for pub, which I will finish over the next month or so. The publication date is set for February 1, 2026. A very important date.
Another interesting thing happened in this book, though. One that I could not have possibly expected. One of my major characters from the Callie Simmons series makes an appearance. And it’s not just a cameo. This person becomes a pretty important character in Shawn’s life. When this happened, it inadvertantly triggered an event that sort of went back in time and suddenly made all the previous books ordinal. It’s almost like magic. But now, there is an order in which the books must be read to minimize spoilers and to make the most sense. That order can be found here.
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