Update on , Brothers, progress.

I've finished my rough draft of "Brothers, Tales of the River Rats" and have sent it out to several readers to see how it flows for them.  When I do that I always expect suggestions for plot changes, grammatical and typo catches, and general feedback.  It gives me a better idea and different perspective when evaluating my writing.  It has become an essential part of my writing process.

I have also contacted the young lady who designed my last book cover and am patiently waiting for what she comes up with.  I've given her my ideas of what I thought would work and she will take that and run.

I could be ready to go to print by April, but will see how much revision I might want to take on.  The other factor will be to gauge the interest from agents or traditional publishers that may be out there.  I plan to send out some query letters within a few weeks, or whenever I am confident enough in the first five chapters or so.

The interesting aspect of this book is that it is such a blend of real events that took place in my youth and the fictional plot I've built around those events, including my parents' backgrounds.
I've shared several of the youthful adventures with my siblings and mother to get their take on accuracy and readability and have been gratified by their feedback.

My mother, especially has been a great resource for her early life and knowledg of the areas I describe in the book.  Her help has allowed me to be as authentic as possible.

Kellan's story

Kellan began cutting his fingernails and then brought up a little story about how he and Jack had used to gather cigarette butts from the road in front of their house.  “Remember how we’d get up early and say we were going hunting for golf balls in the ditch in front of our place and then along the back nine of the golf course?” he asked.  

Jack nodded, sporting a tiny grin that also showed off the crows feet around his eyes.

“But we’d really just be looking for butts to smoke later.”  He was smiling now, very amused by the memory.  “Do you remember when we found a couple dozen butts, took them in back of the old house where we used to burn the trash, smoked them, and then Mr. Klipper caught us?”

Jack began laughing at that scene.  “Yeah, I remember he ratted us out to Mom and Dad, and then Dad lined us up in the living room where he had brought a one by three board that was eight feet long.  I seem to remember we blamed Sydney for the whole thing, saying it was all her idea, so Dad lined her up with us, which she protested so much about it that we wanted to laugh, but couldn’t.  Then he laid one smack on us all at the same time, and I remember thinking I could barely feel it, but I didn’t want to say anything because then he would have made it hurt.”

“Yeah, that was rich,” Kellan said.  “But you left out the part where Mr. Klipper asked us what the hell we were doing back there, and you just took a puff off your butt and said proudly, we’re smoking.” 

“Oh, god, yeah, I do remember that.  Remember he never said anything but just looked at us kind of funny and then left?  I’ll bet he walked around the house and started laughing to himself all the way to tell Mom and Dad.  I’ll bet they all got the biggest laugh out of that whole thing.”

Isle Royale memory from, Brothers, Tales of the River Rats

“What about our Isle Royale trip?  That was our longest hike.  We walked forty-three miles from one end of the island to the other.  Started out at Rockport on the eastern tip and hiked the Greenstone Ridge down the middle of the island for the entire length down to Windigo, a little settlement at the western tip of the island.” 

“The whole island is like a washboard with ridges running most of the length of the island.  The main ridge is the Greenstone.  It’s an up and down affair with switchbacks taking you to the higher points that are  about seven-hundred feet above the lake, but it’s enough to wear you out in a day of hiking, especially when you’re carrying a forty pound pack .”

“Hey, remember when we ran into those two young guys carrying gigantic backpacks?” asked Kellan.  Jack laughed at the vision the two had presented.  The two young men’s eyes had been glazed over as Jack and Kellan stopped and talked to them.  Perspiration ran from every sweat gland in their bodies, drenching them as if they had been swimming.  They didn’t say a word or appear to comprehend anything said to them.  Exhaustion seeped from every pore of their bodies.  

Five minutes after everyone had moved on, young men to the east, Jack and Kellan to the west, two, attractive twenty year olds in bikinis pranced on the trail toward the brothers, picking flowers and marveling at all the beauty of the forest.  They were not carrying packs and appeared to have nary a care in the world.  They were uninhibited, bubbly, and as unaware of their boyfriends’ agony as anyone could be as they spoke to the brothers. 

As Kellan and Jack admired the young women skipping away from them, they laughed quietly, thinking that the young men would not be in any shape for extracurricular activities that evening.

“We took our time on the first three days, never traveling more than five or six miles.  We’d hike off the main trail down to a lake and make camp for the evening and then move on the next morning.  The last day we hiked twenty miles to Windigo where we pretty much collapsed in exhaustion.  Lucky for us that some of the men that worked on the island had been fishing for lake trout and offered us some back at their cabins.  It seemed like the grilled trout was the sweetest tasting meal we had ever had.”  Kellan gazed wistfully up at the stars when he had finished talking.  It was clear, that trip had been one of his fondest.

On the hunt

For sure, they’d make better time without Gabe slowing them down, but how could they leave their brother, especially after he’d always been there for them?  How?  He wrestled with his conflicting emotions until he finally took a stand.  They would not leave him.

“We’re not going anywhere without you, Gabe,” Jack said quietly.  “Deal with it.”

For a moment, it looked as if Gabe was going to cut loose a cacophony of epithets and insults, but his face calmed and he finally said, “River rats, that’s what we are.”  He smiled.  The warmth he felt toward his brothers had never filled his heart more than at that moment in the woods.

  Kellan spoke, “Let’s use the rest of the hour they gave us and get ready for them.  They’re gonna rue the day they messed with the Hulas.”  

Angus checked his watch, “It’s been an hour, Billy.”
Billy had been sitting on rocks near the shoreline, chewing on a stem of grass and watching two loons as they surfaced and then dove for their early evening meal.  It was seven pm and there would be two more hours of daylight in the northern sky and with any luck they would have the light from a three-quarter moon after that.

The mosquitoes were tolerable, probably because of the end of the latest hatch, and it was if the biting flies had already called it a day and turned in for the evening.  

“Billy, Billy!” Angus almost shouted his name.

He turned and stared at Angus.  “Jesus Christ, Angus, you don’t have to shout.  I’m right here.”

“You didn’t act like you heard me, though, and you told them an hour.  I figured you’d want to get going right on time.”  

Billy fiddled with the stem of grass as he returned his gaze to the lake and the loons.  “There’s no big hurry, we’ll catch ‘em.”  A few more minutes passed as Angus appeared anxious to ask Billy a question.

At the risk of interrupting Billy’s contemplation, Angus finally asked, “You didn’t really mean we’d kill ‘em, when you said it, did you, Billy?”  His eyes were pleading for his friend to say no.

Billy noticed the concern in Angus’s voice and saw the dread in his eyes when he asked.  “How long you known me, Angus?”

“Six years, give or take.”

“Have I killed anyone?”

Angus appeared to be thinking.  “Not… that I know of,” he said with a degree of hesitation and fear in his voice.  Billy was pleased by the hint of fear.  That made him feel powerful and in control.

“Well, I’ve never killed anyone, Angus, and I don’t plan on starting tonight.  When I said that, I just wanted to put some fear into those guys, especially the fat one who crushed my nuts.”  He looked directly into Angus’s eyes, “Know what I mean?”

Angus dropped his gaze.  “I…guess so.”

Billy retrieved a flask from a pocket in his jacket, unscrewed the cap and downed a slug.  He wiped his mouth with his sleeve and then held the flask out to Angus.  “Take a swig, Angus.”  Reluctantly, Angus took it and tossed a swallow down his throat.

new writings from Brothers

Billy felt a nudge to his shoulder.  He ignored it.  The nudge became a push, and his eyes sprang open.  Angus was bent over him, hand still on his shoulder.

“You said five am, Billy.”  He lay motionless for moment, head still pounding as badly as he knew it would.

“You got some ibuprofen?”  

Angus smiled.  “I never run outta that stuff,” laughing as he strode off to get it.  Billy knew why.  The two of them got drunk a lot.  It was their go-to medication.  He pushed himself up into a sitting position and stretched his arms upward.  Several moments later, Angus re-entered the living space and gave four ibuprofens to Billy.

Billy turned his head up, looked at Angus crookedly and said, “nothing to drink with this?”

“Oh, uh, yeah, I’ll get you something.”  He came back holding a bottle of Surly Darkness, a beer made in Brooklyn Center.  Billy downed the pills while taking a full swig of the beer.  He belched, and then downed the rest.

“So much for breakfast.   We’d better get doing,” Billy said as he pulled a short sleeved T-shirt over his head.  They readied the canoe and enough gear to last for a few days.

They had been driving for about thirty minutes when Angus said, “We don’t even know where they are right now.  How we gonna catch up to them in this rain?” Angus asked the question while finishing off one of the two-day old donuts they had just picked up at the gas station on their way out of Ely.  

“We know they’re going to Agnes Lake.  You know the launch is off the Echo Trail, right?” Billy asked.

“Yeah, you put in at the Nina Moose River.”

“Well, I’m betting with this rain that they stayed at Nina Moose Lake last night.  They got off to a late start yesterday and it would have been stupid to go all the way to Agnes.  And they didn’t seem like the stupid kind.”

“Yeah, so when do we catch ‘em?”

“We don’t, we get ahead of ‘em.”

“How we gonna do that?  We can’t catch ‘em in the canoes.”

Billy Bobtail smiled thickly.  “We’ll take the old logging road and head ‘em off, wait for ‘em, and then, bam,” he took his hands off the wheel and slammed them together.  “Then we got ‘em.”

Angus gazed over at Billy in amazement.  “I never would have thought of that, Billy.  Most people don’t give that old logging road a lick of thought and here we are, using it to catch them dumb nut grabbers.”

“You know I don’t appreciate you bringing up unpleasant stuff like that, especially since I was the victim of that turd whacker.”

Angus laughed.  “You calling yourself a turd?  You said turd whacker, so that must make you a turd.”  He laughed again.

This was exactly what Billy didn’t like about Angus.  The guy was an idiot with a child’s sense of humor, but a useful idiot who bought drinks and allowed Billy to crash at his place on a fairly regular basis.  He glanced over at Angus and allowed him a smile accompanied by a slight chuckle, as if to say, ‘you got me there, Angus’.

The Echo Trail started out as a paved road, but quickly turned into a serpentine, gravel surface that contained many jump-off points for various lakes in the Boundary Waters Canoe Area.  Billy guided the 2004 Jeep well past the Nina Moose River parking area and continued on for several miles before turning off on a little used logging road that would take them past Ramshead Lake.  He knew the river was much higher than normal, and he knew by experience that the waterslide portage would be impassable.  

Billy was banking on the portage area to hold the brothers up just enough for Angus and him to get ahead and lay in wait for them on the other side.  He hadn’t counted on the logging road being quite as rough and wet as it was, but thank the lucky stars for the four-wheel drive on his Jeep.  

The Jeep dived into a deep rut, causing Angus’s coffee to spill over his leg.  Angus cried out in expectant pain that never came from the now cooled coffee.

“What’d ya think it would still be hot after an hour of driving out here?” Billy asked in disgust.

“I, uh,uh, don’t know what I was thinking.”  

The road devolved into something more resembling a moose trail, rather than something loggers had last used thirty years ago.

“I think we’re where we need to be.”  Billy peered through an area where the trees appeared to be thinning.  Opening his door and then slamming it with a vengeance, Billy began to unstrap the canoe.

“Get the gear and paddles out.  I’ll get the canoe off the rack and take it to the river.”  Angus did as he was told.

“Bring the rifle, too.”  

“I can only carry so much.  I’ll come back for it,” Angus said in a whiney voice.

“Whatever,” Billy said as he hoisted the canoe onto his broad shoulders and carted it to the river bank. 

The rifle was a Remington bolt-action 700, a favorite of hunters in the area.  It had a Kwik Klip magazine conversion clip that Billy had bought two years ago.  The clip held ten rounds, which seemed inadequate to Billy, but he took what he could get at the time.  It certainly would be enough for what he was planning over the next few days.  

He stopped before he came to the river bank and set the canoe down and waited for Angus.  A minute later, Angus arrived with a pack containing sleeping bags, tent, and some edibles.  He then went back to the Jeep for the rifle.

book club meeting in Montana

I had a fantastic time interacting with  thirteen members of a book club in Billings, Mt.  They had read my last book, The Book Club Murders.
I began my presentation by explaining how and why I began writing and they responded with dozens of questions and comments.  They were a delightful group of present and former educators.  It was clear they enjoyed reading and they had many, many questions about the characters and their motivations in my book.
We began with my presentation, questions, discussion, and then dinner at the country club.  The entire experience was extremely enjoyable with a wonderful group of people who are intelligent, caring, and kind.
The next week, my family and I went to Red Lodge and stayed at the Pollard Hotel where we enjoyed a fantastic Thanksgiving Day buffet, overnight stay playing games and experiencing the new pub.  The next day we did some Black Friday shopping in town and left.
It was a great mini vacation!!

My older brother fought for three years in Vietnam and I have used him as a source of information, however, the following is completely fabricated.

Chapter 18, Gabe’s Lament

Kellan and Jack turned in about midnight.  Gabe stayed up for another hour poking at the fire, gazing at the stars, and remembering a friend who had died in Vietnam.  Bill Poulan had been killed in Pleiku Province, and it was Gabe’s fault, or at least he thought it was.

It was 1968 near the Song Xan River.  Gabe was leading a night patrol through the jungle, one of the things that he loved doing.  In a way, it reminded him of exploring the woods back home in southern Minnesota, only here, his life was in danger every minute, and the feeling enthralled him.

Bill was the Shakespeare quoting buddy who Gabe took an immediate liking to.  Gabe was two years younger, but ostensibly, wiser in the ways of killing because he had already been in Vietnam for two and a half years.

   Bill had joined the marines after graduating Summa cum laude from the University of Iowa.  He could have gone to officer school but insisted upon being a grunt and earning his way.  Gabe always liked him for that, in fact, he loved him in a way that only brothers could.  Most of their free time was spent together, Bill quoting Shakespeare, non-threateningly displaying his knowledge, and telling about his college conquests; Gabe, teaching poker games and bragging about his high school adventures.  They became brothers in every sense of the word, maybe even more.  

The jungle was hushed that night and everyone just had a feeling nothing was going to happen.  The boys were a little carefree and made  more noise than Gabe was comfortable with.  He was using more hand signals and verbals than usual to rein the men in as they patrolled their sector. 

As always, Gabe never relaxed when he was in charge.  The strange, delightful mixture of danger and the unknown kept him on point.  The men in the unit, including Bill, relied upon Gabe to crack down and get serious when it was necessary, but tonight seemed almost otherworldly.  Everyone just sensed this was a worthless patrol so their M16s were held loosely at their sides and they strolled, rather than sneaked, over the pathways of the jungle. 

Bill joined him in the lead, speaking low, but casually, as Gabe tried to remain alert to any movements ahead.  Normally, strict silence was observed as they stole through the moonlit pathways.  Charlie was always near they were told, and most of the time they believed it.

As Bill and Gabe prowled ahead, they whispered, Gabe’s eyes constantly straining to see any movement in advance of their continually changing position.  A snapped twig, a brush of leaves, the sound of a small animal parting the grasses as it escaped from the patrol’s onslaught, fed Gabe and Bill’s imagination.  

Leading a patrol was always the most dangerous position, because of the Vietcong’s penchant for laying booby traps.  Gabe always figured he couldn’t risk other men’s lives with a duty he himself should perform, so he always placed himself in the lead.  Bill often joined him.  Gabe appreciated the fact that Bill thought enough of him to share the burden, duty, and the fear that accompanied the lead.

Tonight, mostly Bill and Gabe seemed to be aware of the possible dangers, mainly because they were taking most of the risks.  As they approached an opening in the jungle, back home Gabe would refer to it as a meadow, he held his arm up, signaling the patrol to halt.  The boys milled about, although they were as noiseless as a nonchalant group of young men sensing no danger could be, the dull commotion of their movements alerted a small group of Vietcong.

They were thirteen and fourteen year old boys with AK47’s, dressed in pajamas; farmer’s children by day, guerrilla warriors by night.  Alerted by the unusual night sounds, the Vietcong tensed as they struggled to see what they assumed was an American patrol.  

Gabe hurried back to his boys, warning them of what possibly lay ahead.  While he did, Bill Poulan stealthily crept forward to the mouth of the meadow, carelessly exposing himself to the antsy group of teenaged Vietcong.  

The sons of farmers by day were without an older member of their Vietcong unit tonight, placing a virginal amount of stress upon them.  Usually, at least one member of the unit was an older, experienced veteran of guerrilla warfare.  There was no such luck for them tonight.

Bill Poulan’s last moments of life were painful and chaotic as he was nearly torn in half by the automatic fire from a frightened thirteen year old kid.  Gabe found himself screaming epithets as he and all his boys slammed themselves flat on the ground and began returning fire in every direction.  He knew it was too late for Bill, who had been in the lead. The only truth he didn’t know was how badly he had been injured.  In a few minutes, as the automatic fire lessened and then ceased completely, he found Bill still alive, but obviously dying, nearly sliced in half by the AK47 slugs that had invaded his body.  

Propping his head on his elbow, Gabe stroked Bill’s short hair, feeling his own tears tumble over his eyelids and alight upon Bill’s reddened cheeks.  

Two soldiers died that evening; one, who’s physical, emotional, and mental being was completely destroyed, and Gabe who left his emotional well-being in a jungle, in the depths of Vietnam.  

Gabe completed his tour in another few months in a different capacity.  It was clear to his commanding officer that he would not, or should not resume his regular combat duties.  He spent the few remaining months of his deployment in Saigon, procuring and filling orders for fighting units.  

When he returned to the states, he tried to be the same old Gabe, and he succeeded for more than two decades, until it all slithered back into his life, unwillingly and unwanted.  His descent into a netherworld was total and unrelenting.