A Major Personal Anniversary

In today’s Journal

* Quotes of the Day
* A Major Personal Anniversary
* You’re Seeing This in Your Inbox
* And Some Exciting News for Readers
* Of Interest

Quotes of the Day

“A contract is always cheaper than a lawsuit.” The Passive Guy

“If one does not know to which port one is sailing, no wind is favorable.” Seneca ‘the Younger’, Roman philosopher and poet, c.4 bc–ad 65

“So yesterday, without the slightest bit of fanfare or the nano-slightest bit of intent on my part, I started writing my first novel. When I realized what was going on about 1500 words later, I almost succumbed to ‘Oh Hell No.’ Instead I took a deep breath, remembered nobody would nuke my house if I failed or succeeded, and set a release date of 8 December (45 days).” Harvey Stanbrough in the Journal entry for Oct 26, 2014 (Thanks to Frank for mentioning this.)

Update: I actually published Leaving Amarillo on November 11, 2014. Then I published Longing for Mexico on December 12, 2014 (four days after my original self-imposed deadline for Leaving Amarillo), and South to Mexico on December 27, 2014.

I’m not bragging, folks. When I started this journey, I’d been mired in the myths up to that point. This is what you can do when you trust yourself and give WITD a real, honest try. I was amazed when it actually worked, and most of the time I still am even 8 years later.

A Major Personal Anniversary

A reader, Frank, left a comment on yesterday’s post: “Hey there, just reading the archives, and it looks like you started writing Leaving Amarillo 8 years ago today! Congrats!”

For some reason, I’d always thought I’d started writing that novel, my very first, on either October 19 or 21. Still, that’s kind’a cool, and I appreciated Frank passing along that tidbit.

For a limited time, if you’d like to read my very first novel, email me at harveystanbrough@gmail.com. Let me know whether you want it in PDF, .mobi or .epub format and I’ll send it right out.

To date, I’ve written 17 novels centered around Wes Crowley. That was the very first one.

A couple of maybe interesting tidbits:

1. That first novel resulted from a short story I wrote titled “Adobe Walls.” (The name of the real town is Charleston, Arizona. Over the years, unfortunately, the army used it for gunnery practice. Today, only adobe walls remain.) After I published that story in October 2014, ol’ Wes kept tugging on my sleeve. He said, “Wouldn’t you like to know how all that came to happen?”

Why yes. Yes I would. (grin) So I wrote Leaving Amarillo, then Longing for Mexico, and then South to Mexico. And silly me, I thought that trilogy would be all the Wes Crowley books I’d ever write. Shows you what I know. It really is all up to the characters.

2. After that (while also writing short stories and novels in other genres like crime and SF) I wrote three prequels to Leaving Amarillo. So even though Leaving Amarillo was my first novel, three others come before it chronologically. And then I wrote six more novels later to finish out the Wes Crowley saga in 12 novels.

Um, but then I realized (happily) there was a 16-year gap between Books 2 & 3 (or 3 & 4, I forget). And frankly, I missed writing about Wes and his friends and his loves and his enemies. And so the Wes Crowley Gap Series was born. I’ve written five novels in that series so far, with (I hope) a lot more to come.

So there you have it. The whole history of Wes Crowley and how he came to be. And yes, I like to think I would have been him in the late 19th and early 20th century. There is nothing like the thrill of riding wild on a good horse in a just cause. (grin)

Oh, there were a few spin-offs too. Rider Jones of the novel by the same name met Wes one time down in Palominas, Arizona (if I remember right) and then saw him later again at Wes’ home in the state of Guerrero along the Pacific coast in Mexico.

And in No Kind’a Time, Wes’s great-grandson and his great-great-granddaughter star. And they’re both pretty much as tough as ol’ Wes is. Another descencent of Wes’ might have starred in The Day the Earth Shuddered and Stood Still too, but I can’t remember for sure. Anyway, it’s a good story. (grin)

You’re Seeing This in Your Inbox

because I didn’t get MailerLite canceled yesterday. I’ll definitely do that today, right after this goes out at 10 a.m. my (Arizona) time.

So starting tomorrow, drop by the Journal site at https://hestanbrough.com if you want to see whether anything good’s going on. I’ll be as descriptive as I can in the title, and then there will be an excerpt.

And Some Exciting News for Readers

If you read my fiction, or if you’re just interested in something you might do yourself as a writer for your own readers, stop by https://harveystanbroughwrites.com and read the Welcome page.

I bought Harvey Stanbrough Writes quite awhile back and was hoping eventually to find a good use for it. I think it’s a perfect title for a website for my readers.

Over there, I plan to fire up my Free Short Story of the Week again. Additionally, I plan to write at least one blog post per week about my characters or settings or pretty much anything else readers might be interested in. I might even serialize some of my novels. (grin) Of course, all of those will appear on the Blog page (or whatever), but they’ll also be separated by category. And the categories are all individual tabs in the menu.

Any thoughts on free story of the week or free serialized novels or anything else over there, feel free to chime in either in a comment or via email at harveystanbrough@gmail.com.

Talk with you again soon.

Of Interest

See “What You Should Know About Writing a Co-Authored Book” at https://www.thepassivevoice.com/what-you-should-know-about-writing-a-co-authored-book/. Especially for PG’s take. Informative, and hilarious.

See “The Forgotten Sisters Who Pioneered the Historical Novel” at https://www.thepassivevoice.com/the-forgotten-sisters-who-pioneered-the-historical-novel/.

The Numbers

The Journal…………………………………… 1010 words

Writing of The Stirchians (novel, tentative title)

Day 10… 1330 words. Total words to date…… 28459

Total fiction words for October……… 36691
Total fiction words for the year………… 157073
Total nonfiction words for October… 18130
Total nonfiction words for the year…… 171350
Total words for the year (fiction and this blog)…… 328423

Calendar Year 2022 Novels to Date…………………… 2
Calendar Year 2022 Novellas to Date……………… 0
Calendar Year 2022 Short Stories to Date… 0
Novels (since Oct 19, 2014)…………………………………… 68
Novellas (since Nov 1, 2015)………………………………… 8
Short stories (since Apr 15, 2014)………………… 217
Short story collections……………………………………………… 31

Disclaimer: In this Journal, among many other things, I promote Writing Into the Dark. WITD greatly increases productivity and practice, and provides a rapid ascension along the learning curve of Craft. This is not opinion. It is all numbers and facts.

6 thoughts on “A Major Personal Anniversary”

  1. “…As I wrote the Wes Crowley novels I realized fairly early that Wes isn’t a good type to be a recurring main character. I like Wes a lot, but you can only have so many shootouts, so many Indian attacks, etc…”
    -The Journal December 30, 2014

    “Goes to show you never can tell.”
    -Chuck Berry

    • How very cool! Yep. The Chuck Berry quote fits well. Or as I wrote in today’s edition of the Journal,, “Shows you what I know. It really is all up to the characters.” Thanks for sharing these old gems from the past, Frank.

  2. Hi Harvey,

    Any chance you’ll change your pic to the cowboy one with blue jeans, boots, and a cowboy hat? The one you’re using now with the baseball cap is a bit Freddy Krueger-ish, don’t ya think? If not, ask your wife. I’m sure she knows you catch more flies with honey than salt. Just trying to be helpful, my friend.

    • Thanks, Diane. I’d like very much to reach at least age 82, and I’d like very much to have written 200 novels before I stop. 🙂 That’s only 11 novels per year (I wrote 13 last year in only 7 months) after I finish #70, which I hope to do in early to mid-November.

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