And so, my first ‘Book of Snark’ is published and spreading across the country. Most of my immediate fanbase has bought it. I hope they get a chuckle. Now the book faces the real test of the open market- which is flooded and has an ever-shrinking audience of readers. It will succeed or fail based on its own merit and how much suppression of organic reach FaceBook can muster. The book probably won’t win any awards or change the world, but I believe in its quality and value.

And frankly, in this year of 2020 we could all use a laugh.

But what’s next? I am taking a poetry class to fill in the gaps in my education. When I was at the University of Iowa, I didn’t yet understand that I was a closet poet and studying it seemed irrelevant. I have been writing poetry since I was a child and I adore the artform, yet I did not see my place within it until about two years ago. So, I am making up for this misstep. I know in my heart that the road to come to terms with my often difficult relationship with my mother and her death is lined with beautiful poems.

But this is a very personal project that I expect will take years. I am still a blogger with blog fans, obviously. I will continue to post my musings here. Afterall, this is the only place I talk about my writing career, such as it is.

I share my life with an accomplished storyteller and author who has made his wishes clear: He does not care what I am working on, but I must be working on something. He will nag me at breakfast so I can’t get out of it. He’s also a retired professor and you know what they say… “Old teachers never die, they just lose their class”…

If you are not aware, November is National Novel Writing Month, and the goal is to write 50,000 words in 30 days. I know it can be done because I have completed it more than once. Which brings up a whole series of novels, seven shitty first drafts I wrote between 2003-2008. I lost all electronic copies of these novels in a fire in 2013 but… I write long hand first and those rough ideas, those skeletons of novels survived in sooty notebooks. I even have print outs of some of them.

So, what would it be to read though these notes and create new, better manuscripts based on whatever good ideas are among them? Books written by a more mature and skilled writer. I am driven to write either way, the great gift I was born with. It would give me happiness to finally just see them finished.

So, expect a beautiful collection of poetry some time in the future. Expect additional volumes of snark because that just comes pouring out of my mouth whether I want it to or not. And the Great American Novel? Probably not, but what is COVID-19 social isolation good for if not to slow me down enough to write books?

Here’s hoping I can make the grade.

-Copyright C.M.Mounts, November 2020