On Tue, 2 Mar 2004 18:13:14 -0800, "Stu & Kathy Fields"
wrote:

Bill: While you might say that it is a draft and could use a little polish,
and I might agree with you, I nevertheless was glued to the CRT reading it.
I like your style. I kept dumping collective for the last half looking for
a clearing. You need to tackle a book. You may be the next Tom Clancy
Stu Fields

Thanks Stu. I appreciate your comment. I need to tackle a book
alright. I've started three times but for some strange reason always
get bored doing it. I like short stories better because you can
finish them in a couple days and publish them. Magazine articles are
even easier, so I have always taken the path of least resistance.

But, my wife is harping at me to write a novel for real. And I think
it will be my next project. I have invented a character named Jack
Shawhan who has done it all. It will be an adventure story when I do
it. I only hope I can hold and grip the reader for a long period of
time. That's the task. When I get in the mood to write it's usually
only for an evening or so. I will expand that to do the book.

Books are a funny thing. I bought the book "Cold Mountain" and tried
to read it four times. I got into it 100 pages and just couldn't gag
it down anymore. It was well written, but there was no gripping plot
at that beginning level. I gave it to a buddy of mine (my mailman)
who, like me is an avid reader. I told him my problem with the book.
Being a physicist, I read slowly, about as fast as I talk. He reads
about three times faster so I figured he might enjoy it by speeding it
up three fold. He gaged on it in 130 pages too and brought it back.
It was in my mailbox one day with a note on it saying, "Bill, thanks,
but I agree with you, this book is a drag. I was bored for 130 pages
last night. I give up too."

Then the damn thing is made into a movie and it takes all the oscars.
I don't know how anybody could stomach reading it long enough to write
a screen play out of it.

It's funny how things work sometimes. I'd like to write a story like
that one that Meg Ryan did where she was a helicopter pilot that got
shot down, then there was an investigation. But, if I were to write
that story, I'd have more of it in the air. Too much of that was on
the ground watching people bicker. The beginning of it was great.
That's the spirit I'd like to capture all through a novel. Just like
my little story I posted here. Keep it exiciting all the way through.
That's the challenge, is to come up with enough that you can captivate
the reader for a long time, many days hopefully.

I appreciate your remarks. I need to kick myself in the ass and get
to it.

Bill Phillips