Release: “Lost Mill Towns of North Georgia”
The third book in my “LOST” Series will be released by History Press on Monday, April 13, 2020. Release event will be at Dogwood Books on Broad Street in Rome. Stay Tuned
Articles with North Georgia
It’s always been about you – Cassville
Cassville or the story of Cassville has chased me for years. I went to Cassville Baptist just before 2000. We left just after 9/11. When I left the church, I carried the stories with me and a strong desire to write them down. I toyed with a fictionalized version of what happened to me there or what I thought was happening in the spirit realm
, but after I got it out of my system I put it away. I left “Ichabod” alone in a file.
The other day, I came across an advertisement calling for short-story authors to submit to a new anthology. They were in particular need of writers of historical fiction. I thought of “Ichabod” sitting in pieces and notes on napkins in my desk file drawer.
I have convinced myself that I am not a fiction writer. Creative non-fiction yes, but not the mysterious workings of fiction writing. Well, maybe it is time I stopped saying, “I do not write fiction.” Maybe I should take a chance and pull out that old textbook I borrowed (and never returned) from Professor and writer Melanie Sumner and learn the right way to write fiction. Perhaps I have learned something about fiction writing from the many sections of literature I teach.Maybe I can scrabble together a readable short story based on real things that happened at Cassville. Maybe old “Ichabod” needs a resurrection and lots of revision.
Oh Cassville, a lost town of little significance, you have so much more to share. I am listening.
Maybe I will do it, write a historical fiction short story. Maybe. Maybe not. There may be a fiction writer somewhere lurking within. I will keep you posted.
Note: The first chapter of my new book, Lost Towns of North Georgia is dedicated to the real story (written as a microhistory in the creative nonfiction style) of Cassville. The book began as a book only about Cassville, but the publishers asked me to write about other lost towns in North Georgia.