aroslav: Blog

I made my end turn in Columbus, OH Tuesday and headed back across the heartland. I don't move very rapidly when I'm traveling, so I don't expect to make it back to Las Vegas until mid-September. (2200 miles) Tonight and tomorrow, I'm camped about fifty miles east of Columbia, MO and then I'll spend three days in Lee Summit so I can get a reservation at Jess and Jim's for a porterhouse steak this week. Yum!

Bob's Memoir: 4,000 Years as a Free Demon, Volume 3 is posting and has been released on Bookapy. That one will finish up on SOL in mid-October. Team Manager CHAMP! and the entire Team Manager series will finish up October 2. Thirteen more chapters in that series is all she wrote.

But do not despair. The final edits of Full Frame have been received from the editors and I'm in the process of reading one more time for errors and corrections. And to code and format for posting and eBook release. I'm making sure names are correct, descriptions are consistent, distances and times are realistic, and that camera and film designations actually existed and were a reasonable choice for my young photographer to have in his arsenal. I expect to release the book and start posting it on SOL on October 2.

I am also preparing an advance review eBook copy for established reviewers who would like to review this when it comes out. There are a limited number or these, but if you would like to review the new book, send me a message. Don't bother if this subject matter doesn't appeal to you:

Nate Hart, class of 1968, has just been uprooted from his lifelong home in Chicago by his mother’s new career: Methodist minister. Moving to a small town in northwestern Illinois just before his junior year in high school, is going to mean starting over in life. But Nate’s passion for photography will lead him to other passions as he becomes his new school’s official photographer. It seems the girls in his school think it’s okay to expose themselves more than current standards would allow, because he’s just the photographer. No one else will see them, right? What Nate sees in the full frame of his photographs, however, will change the town.

This book contains explicit sexuality as experienced by and related by a teenage male in the 1960s. Things do not always have the same delicate handling that they do today. "Explicit sexuality" does not mean there is fucking in every chapter. It will take quite a while before young Nate manages to maneuver his girlfriend into bed. Or vice versa. It is a long book, intended both for eBook and serialization on SOL (260,000 words). If you'd like to review Full Frame, send me a link to one of your reviews to be considered.

At the same time that I'm preparing Full Frame for release on SOL on October 2, I'm 230,000 words into writing the sequel, Shutter Speed, which will be even longer. It covers a bit more time for the story arc and will be followed by a third volume, f/stop, as soon as I can start writing it.

So, obviously, the reason I don't travel very fast when I'm out crawling across the country is because I have to stop a couple of days and write after each little drive. Very talkative characters!

Hope your summer is going well (or winter down-under).

I'm currently in Columbus Ohio, getting ready to retreat to the west on Tuesday toward Las Vegas. It will take me close to a month to get there, so don't assume I'll be there next week. Probably someplace in Missouri.

I've just uploaded the first chapter of Bob's Memoir: 4,000 Years as a Free Demon, Volume 3, so it will post automatically three days after the last chapter of Volume 2 posts on Tuesday. With luck, I'll have the eBook ready to go by then, too.

I spent a day in Chicago this week, exploring some of the places where my book Shutter Speed will be set. Shutter Speed is the second in the "Photo Finish" series that will begin with Full Frame the first of October.

When I was preparing for the book, I needed to have the hero get advice and help from a camera store in Chicago. I remembered a camera store that had been in business on Wabash since 1899 and decided it was a huge old store and would be perfect for the hero's contact. So, I decided to visit it again this week.

On May 30, 2020, Central Camera was burned in the riots following the murder of George Floyd by Minneapolis police. While he watched fire fighters as the store burned, owner Don Flesch didn't cast recriminations against the rioters, but said, “I’m angered about what started it.” In the midst of vowing that he would rebuild better than ever, he also offered this advice:

We also encourage you to learn about and support organizations working for justice and accountability:
George Floyd Memorial Fund
Chicago Community Bond Fund
Know Your Rights Camp
The Bail Project
The National Bail Fund Network
NAACP Legal Defense Fund
Communities United Against Police Brutality
Minnesota Freedom Fund
Black Visions Collective
Reclaim The Block
Sincere thanks to everyone who has contacted us with well-wishes and encouragement. We’ll be posting updates about progress with re-opening our business. Look forward to seeing you again soon!

I visited the store on Monday this week, open now during limited hours and not quite as expansive as it was, but continuing to push the space and fill it. The people were friendly and happy to talk with me. I saw the exact model Nikon F camera that my main character uses in 1968 sitting on a counter. Same Nikkor lens. The paper and chemicals have been refilled. Film is available. The store was bustling.

It is exactly the kind of place I imagined my hero encountering in his move to Chicago in 1968. I am glad to have chosen that store as the model for my fictional store in Full Frame and Shutter Speed.

More adventures forthcoming, I'm sure!

As part of my research trip, I have camped all this week in Northern Illinois. Tonight finds me at Illinois Beach State Park, north of Chicago. I've had a great time exploring the region that my next epic series, Photo Finish, will be based on.

Photo Finish is the series name. The three books I have planned for it are Full Frame, Shutter Speed, and F/stop. The first is finished and edited, but I'll do one more read-through now that I've visited the area. I'm over halfway through drafting the second. I expect to start writing the third in September. I'm loving the way this is coming together.

Let me say for the record that I LOVE librarians! I met two in a one-room library in Elizabeth, IL who listened to what I was writing about and set to work finding me a resource. I spent a couple of hours with an old-timer (like me) who told me stories of what it was like in the area in the 60s. A wonderful way to spend an afternoon. I drove all over the area taking pictures and making notes about the atmosphere.

I also spent a day in Dubuque, IA. There is a scene in Full Frame in which the hero takes his date to a Simon and Garfunkel concert at Loras College. (Actual fact. The duo played there in April 1967.) I wanted to check the place out. Wonderful! And such friendly and helpful people--both students and staff. Beautiful campus.

I just happened to poke my head in the gymnasium and take a few pictures so I'll be able to orient myself when I start watching basketball this fall.

You see, while researching basketball in Iowa for the Team Manager series, I accidentally became a fan of the American Rivers Conference Women's Basketball. That's the Div III conference in this area.

I've visited three of the campuses and gyms on this trip--Simpson College, Loras College, and University of Dubuque. Each visit has included poking my head in the field house. Simpson is being renovated this summer with new environmental systems. It will be beautiful. Loras and University of Dubuque are also beautiful facilities and now I know right where the camera is situated during the games.

My campsite here at Illinois Beach is beautiful, but is undoubtedly the most mosquito infested camp I've had all summer! That could be partially a result of the torrential rains that pelted this area last night from about midnight until one o'clock this afternoon. For the record, OFF tastes terrible, even if you don't get it near your face.

I will be doing a little investigating of the Chicago Loop tomorrow as much of the next series takes place there, as well. Then Tuesday, I'll move on to Indiana. Yes, the sacrifices I make to write entertaining stories for my fans at SOL! I'll be camped right near where Brian and the Clan of the Heart came from in LNDtH.

I guess that's the update for today. Carry on.

I'm sitting at the Bob Shetler Recreation Area where I've been camped the past few days just north of Des Moines. I've spent the past two days exploring the area that I set the Team Manager series in. Overall, I did a pretty good job of describing the area, perhaps underplaying the beautiful miles and miles of corn and soybean fields, the rolling hills, and the beautiful towns.

In particular, the town I loosely modeled Bartley after was a lovely little town, though about three times the size that I described in Team Manager. It was a lively place with a museum, a big event--I think it was supposed to be a tractor parade--happening on Saturday, people walking around town, kids playing in the playground, and generally being a nice place.

I might say that it was so real, I expected one of my characters to walk up and say hi!

I also visited some colleges on which I based the experiences the crew is facing. One in particular is an incredibly beautiful campus, beautiful facility. It reminded me a lot of my own alma mater back in Indiana. The fieldhouse is undergoing some work that will improve environmental controls and will be ready to host my favorite women's basketball team in October. I've even upgraded my hotspot so I will have enough bandwidth to watch basketball all I want this fall!

Tomorrow, I'm moving camp 200 miles to Mississippi Palisades State Park in Illinois on the Mississippi River. I'll be spending this week exploring the area I'm basing my next series, the Photo Finish Trilogy, on. I'm looking forward to this since I have plenty of time left yet before release of the first volume, Full Frame, to make changes if I discover things I've either erred in or that are so cool I need to include them.

That will also include slipping back across the border into Iowa to visit two more of my favorite Iowa Div III colleges in Dubuque. I plan to follow all 9 teams in the American Rivers Conference this fall.

Development of the Photo Finish Trilogy is moving along well. Full Frame is getting its final proofreading unless I decided to change something significant. I've begun formatting the first few chapters and plan to start posting at the end of September. I'm deep in the first draft of Shutter Speed and expect to finish that draft by September if all goes well. Then I'll start the third volume, F/stop, as soon as I've finished the draft of Shutter Speed.

All told, I'm having a great and creative summer. Avoiding the most severe heat and thunderstorms so far. Have been pushed around a bit by wind on occasion, but not yet a problem. Enjoy the reading!

At least it's a crime if you consider my writing to be criminal. I know some do.

Tomorrow (Thursday 7/28) I'm leaving my campsite in northern Minnesota and heading south to the Des Moines area where I'll be camped through the weekend. I'm planning to do a couple of driving tours through the area that I set SWISH!, SPRINT!, COACH!, and CHAMP! in. I have been through Iowa before, but I crossed the northern tier on US 20. Most of the "Team Manager" series takes place more centrally and I can't recall having ever visited Des Moines or that region.

Bartley, Iowa, the fictional town of Dennis and the Bartley High School Angelines, was created from research I did on several small towns in central Iowa. I'm going to drive through some of them and try to detect whether I got anything right in my descriptions.

Then I'll be going south of Des Moines a little to tour the Div III college campus on which I loosely based William Salter University and the Crusaders. William Salter was a pioneer preacher in Iowa and started many churches and some colleges. I believe the most famous of the colleges he helped found was Grinnell. I hope to tour it, too.

Monday August 1, I'll be moving east across the Illinois state line where I'll camp at the Mississippi Palisades State Park for the week. From there, I'll be exploring the small towns of northwestern Illinois on which I'm basing the locale for my upcoming trilogy, Full Frame, Shutter Speed, and F/stop. Much of the latter two will be set in Chicago, So I'll spend a couple of days doing some research there the following week.

It's all in the interest of making my stories have a more plausible setting in which to enact my implausible plots.

And also the fact that I'm traveling eastward to visit a sister in Columbus Ohio. But research is on the way!