It began at the controls of a Grasshopper mower under a hot sun in the summer of 2011. The TV in my ancient motorhome worked sporadically, and when neighbors moved into the slot next to me, the internet died.
An idea formed for a western inspired by episodes of Big Valley and Bonanza that I rented from the video store in the small town of Mobridge, South Dakota, where the Missouri River splits the tilled fields of the east from the rough arid land of the west.
The story was a hybrid between the two, primarily between the character of Heath Barkley and the dynamics of the Cartwright family.
Early on, the story started in what I eventually saw as the middle, and the first scene I wrote was practically a clone of Big Valley‘s first episode. The “first” rough draft read like an amateur’s attempt at a novelette, and I shelved it to let the idea marinade a little longer.
Then, on a forty below night in a thin-walled camper in the middle of the North Dakota prairie, the story finally started to take shape, thanks to finishing the only video game I’ve played to the end, Red Dead Redemption, and tedious hours spent working night shift on a safety job.
How long it took me to finish that draft, I don’t remember. When completed, it comprised the backstory of a man looking for a place to belong. I wanted him to find it, but that was a story by itself.
The sequel found its way to paper the following year. By then, I was working on the Upper Missouri River Breaks National Monument and had come to know the area well. While the pilot story started in Texas and worked its way north through areas I’d traveled through and worked in, I knew location for the Silver Sage Ranch had to be in central Montana.
Of course, I needed a name for the nearest town to the Silver Sage. As a tribute to the local volunteer fire department, I wanted to name it “Black Eagle” but realized that might create confusion for those history buffs who might know the area. So, I borrowed the last half, coulee, from an adjacent district whose namesake town offered the rough lay of what I imagined the town of Black Coulee looked.
A third installment of The Keeper is still brewing in my mind. Moving away from the area caused me to lose connection with the place which disrupted the creative flow of that project, but I promise it’s moving forward.
Three Brands is the most recent addition to my book list. It’s a standalone novel set in the Black Coulee country and tells the story of Millie Collingwood, a young woman homesteader whose quiet life is turned upside down when Jace Riddock, wounded and on the run, saves her from robbers. It’s my first “romance” novel, but I kept the action strong as I personally believe that relationships can’t build without background action.
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And as always, until next time!
TW