The latest book is three quarters complete. I’m now on the rope bridge over the chasm, where it’s either make it to the other side or plunge. This is always the scariest part of the story, where the main event is imminent.

I’m now as nervous as my protagonist as expectations have been raised and a guywire tension has been built. I assure myself that it’s only the first draft and I’ll end up chucking the ending or climax or even remodel the whole lot into a script about a motocross racer who competes in the Tour de France while battling hemorrhoids.

***

My chest bulges with pride as I declare I’m among the winners of The TerribleMinds Flash Fiction Challenge: The Bullies and the Bullied. My prize is Chuck Wendig’s Shotgun Gravy which I’m eager to read. I’ve been a fan of his site and his Top 25 lists. His weekly Flash Fiction Challenges are a welcome break from the writing regimen.

From what I know of it, it’s about a teenage girl, Atlanta Burns,  who’s answer to bulling begins with a shotgun chuck and the setting is Atlanta. Some of you who know me personally know I get irritated with novels set in New York City, because that’s where all the interesting stuff happens, y’ know. Everywhere else is just cow-tippers, Mega Wal Marts and pyres of flaming biology textbooks. Since the publishing industry is NYC centric, the Big Apple often becomes the setting. If you look at most popular media and especially many critically acclaimed novels of late, they are set in one place. It doesn’t help that most TV and film writers come from the Northeast.

I’ve always championed Flyover states in media. My town of Atlanta is becoming a major location for TV and movies, especially The Walking Dead series. The characters don’t bury the setting, but make it know they’re grits-eating, Waffle House loitering, gridlocked in the 285 loop Atlantans running from undead former Chick-fil-A cashiers, Alpharetta Stay-at-Home-Mom Mafioso and Megachruch deacons.

Hail Atlanta! Back to the writing.