In the last
couple of weeks I have reread my four unpublished novels back to back to back.
I had previously read each of them at least once after completing my final
revisions, but I had not taken them in together as a chronological corpus. I
started writing in 2011 as I embarked on my “retirement” as pastor of Central
Christian Church of Dallas, Texas. I completed them in 2017 not long after my
wife Candy’s Alzheimer’s diagnosis. We had come to Milwaukee, Wisconsin to share
a duplex with our son David, his wife Rachel and their children Sam and
Elizabeth.
I found fiction
was a helpful tool with which I could process a retrospective on my pastoral
career and the forces, people, and events that shaped me over nearly a half
century. I wouldn’t say that this is a closed canon, but no other urges are
simmering within me pleading to take shape in narrative. Now with about two
years out of my active congregational career and into the Alzheimer’s caregiver
journey with Candy, I am finding a new equilibrium. As I reread my novels as a
body, I found a different perspective on them and on myself has emerged in this
interval of life transition.
I was actually
a bit surprised to discover a certain objectivity as I read. This was not in
terms of evaluating the quality of what I had written. Rather, I found my focus
had shifted from the issues I was working on when I wrote them to empathy with
the characters. I suppose that the writing had enabled me to get some
perspective on my career and the meaning of retiring from the role that had
defined me for most of my adult life. Now that I was with Candy basically
around the clock those issues, while perhaps not fully resolved, were no longer
tugging at me. Instead, in the role of caregiver (though Candy is doing well
enough that it is not yet arduous), my attention was drawn into the experiences
of these characters. Interestingly, though I knew they were fictional, and
though I knew I had created them in my imagination, I found myself drawn into
their joys and struggles much more intensely than when I wrote. A few times I
even caught myself choking back tears.
Right now my
publishing focus is on promotion of my non-fiction story collection Ripples. I suppose that if Ripples gained a suitable readership, I
might consider adding from my fiction, though the novels are substantially different.
Here is a brief description of each of the novels.
The first half of Sure and Certain follows a pastor’s (Ben Davis) journey with a
woman of the church from hospice to funeral, along the way with some hints of
his health concerns. After her funeral he gets his own pancreatic cancer
terminal diagnosis and the second half follows him through his funeral. The
story is told through conversations with his spiritual director (Steve) and
adult skeptic son (Phil) in alternating chapters. The last 2 chapters are the
reflections of the spiritual director and the son on his funeral, and the son
makes an appointment to talk with the spiritual director.
What
Comes After the Best Day of My Life?
tells the story of a first year high school English teacher (Greg Lewis) through
the eyes of his unintentional mentor (Dr. Robert Morgan) whose classroom is
across the hall. The new teacher has been a children’s magazine editor before
teaching. Besides standard English classes, he teaches journalism and is the
faculty advisor to the student newspaper and yearbook. The veteran English
teacher teaches literature classes and is the faculty advisor to the poetry
club and the student literary magazine. Each chapter covers a month of the
school year, September through June. The two teachers interact about the
ambitions, failures, conflicts, loves, triumphs and tragedies of high school
students, including a student death.
The
Ghosts of Mystic Hills Cemetery
tells the story of the once small town of Mystic Hills that is eventually
surrounded by suburbs. The debate over how to balance the history and future of
the cemetery mirrors the issues for the town. The story is told through ten
first person narratives. Five of whom are contemporary adults living in the
town, and five of whom are their grandparents who are now interred in Mystic
Hills Cemetery. A Story Teller (Peter Hultgren) introduces Mystic Hills with
the story of his grandparents homesteading in the Mystic Hills before the town
came. In between each of the first person chapters, he tells a folk story,
fairy tale, local legend to illuminate the human and generational experience
with mystical connections. In the last chapter the Story Teller passes the role
to his grandson and new wife who announces her pregnancy.
Standing Outside the Door is the spiritual journal entries of
Steve Shepherd, spiritual director and pastor, basically from Ash Wednesday
through Epiphany of the year that Lynne Carter, a woman in his congregation, comes
to him to confess having had an affair with his clergy colleague and friend Ron
Beckmann. Steve is on the denomination’s committee on ministry, responsible for
discipline of clergy at the time, so is in the conflicted center of his
relationship with a parishioner, a friend, and his official responsibility.
During that same time, families from another congregation bring to the
committee on ministry a complaint of sexual abuse of children to by their
pastor, Henry Nelson. Steve is doing a retrospective on how this affected him
as he begins his retirement a dozen years later.
Ripples, however, is readily available now.
Learn about it and order at www.ripplesthroughlives.com
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