There a number of authors whose work I both love and admire. One in particular has always interested me—but not so much as a favorite, as much as he is a grand example. He has always written by one name: Trevanian. His real name was Rodney Whitaker.
Most of his work was award winning, and it remains remarkable to me because Trevanian wrote in several genres successfully. This is important for yours truly since that is, exactly, what I am doing. Now, I’m not saying I can hold a candle with Trevanian. But he has shown me the way to do what I’m planning.
The Fabulous Feathermaye and I have discussed and theorized over sticking to one genre or using multiple. Neither of us came up with a definitive problem with cross-genre writers, other than how they build their fan base. Having just finished and being in production with Tormenta (a ghost story, essentially) we’re obviously concerned with which story to put out next.
The Agony, Texas series is a character study about a small, West Texas town that is extremely isolated. It is literally where the Old West and its myths have gone to die. The story also uses the framework of the “Passion Play” to humorous effect and is my vehicle for exposing all the thousands of ‘non-Texans’ out there with the reality of the place. Agony is sort of my response to the old bumper sticker that read: “I wasn’t born in Texas, but I got here as fast as I could!” The Agony series is something of a morphed Western/coming-of-age/social expose’ when you get right down to it. I’m not sure there is one particular genre slot for it. It is Peyton Place meets The Gunslinger, or Our Town meets The Oxbow Incident. Hey, that works for me…
When I first started to learn about this profession, I read, and continue to read everything I can get my hands on by other writers who were willing to talk about the process and the pitfalls of writing an American Novel. For years, I’ve absorbed so much information that I’m swimming in it, but I will admit to a certain sort of command of my story-lines now.
Often, the words simply boil right out as characters tell me what is going on with them and their lives, and just how they feel about it. It’s like dunking your brain into the collective consciousness of life; that river of thought that we all feed from. I like to call it the slipstream. When I’m there, the keyboard keys are popping like staccato machine gun fire and I can hardly come up for air. When I do, I’m often surprised by what has come through me. That is why I write, why I tell these tales; to just let them wink out of existing thought feels like the epitome of waste.
And yet…I’m still vacillating between following “Tormenta” with something from another genre, or coming back with another of my ‘darker’ tales.
Stephen King writes in multiple genre to great effect, but he did not start to put out work like ‘Rita Heyworth and The Shawshank Redemption’ or ‘The Body’ (made into the movie Stand By Me) until he had well established himself at our King of Horror.
Then there are writers like Ken Koontz who write only in one genre, at least under that name. John Grisham is well-known for his courtroom novels, but he’s done a few character studies that have nothing to do with the law as well, like ‘Playing for Pizza’, ‘Bleachers’, or ‘The Painted House’.
Reason dictates that I can look at the names of these writers and easily see that they built their reputations in one genre or another, then branched off once they had a wide readership.
Except for Trevanian… He simply wrote good stories and seemed not to care about genre.
Lots of you have been following this blog for a year or so. Now that the books are coming out, if you could have a say in the career of S. Bond Herndon, what would you recommend? Should I remain dark for a few more tales? Or do you want to see where I’m going to take you next and just ride along?
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