by Shelt Garner
@shetgarner
I’m a man of peace. A man of ideas.
I also feel extremely powerless right now. Trump is burning the country I love to the ground and, really, all I got is the ability to tell a good story. That’s the origin of me working on this novel for two years.
Every time I feel a bit uninspired or discouraged, Trump and MAGA do something that so enrages me that I redouble my efforts to explicate the Trump Era in an allegorical thriller. Though, to be honest, to call this an “allegorical” thriller is more how-the-sausage-is-made talk than anything else.
I *see* it as an “allegorical thriller” when, in fact, if I do my job right you, the audience, will simply see it as a thriller with an interesting conceit and that will be that.
I do need to hurry up with this thing, though. I simply have no idea what the context will be when I try to sell it. It will be a lot different if Trump is still in office than if he’s not. And there is the issue of setting. This is not “A Confederacy of Dunces” — my sister can’t sell it 11 years after my death.
This thing needs to be sold sooner rather than later. If it isn’t, then I will simply self-publish, finish the second book in the story and then, I dunno, maybe write a screenplay?
