Tonight, I brag. In a modest, spiritual way, of course.
The latest issue of my church body’s magazine, The Lutheran Ambassador, contains a review of my novel Hailstone Mountain. The writer of the review compares it to biblical narratives, saying:
He manages to make the characters both likable and realistic, simultaneously saint and sinner, wrestling against evil around them and wrestling within themselves. Their lives are raw, sometimes offensively so, but also fully human. Like the Bible, the books are not rated G, but I would rate them five stars because somehow Walker manages to make God the hero and Savior rather than the human characters.
I’m not sure whether it’s a good thing or a bad thing that it never occurred to me before that God is the hero of the Erling books. But having that said is about the highest accolade I can think of for them.
It should be mentioned, in full disclosure, that the author of the review, Pastor Brian Lunn of Upsala, Minnesota, is a friend of mine.
The Norwegian word for “busy” is “travelt,” which always makes me thing of a crowded road. Which is pretty much what I feel like right now. I have a) my “novel writing” work, which currently means formatting books for paperback, b), the magazine I’m editing for the Valdres Samband, the ethnic organization that hired me for this purpose, c) my translation work on the Sigrid Undset biography, and d) the monthly newsletter for my Sons of Norway lodge (which won’t take long but should have been finished by now).
This morning it rained. The first rain we’ve had around here in months. It’s been raining all day, except for when it snowed (alas for the trick-or-treaters!). When I was done with my novel writing this morning, I happened to look outside and found that the first four of my cartons of orphaned books had arrived from Nordskog (see last night’s story). I have an idea the mail carrier was unhappy about being made to carry those heavy cartons, because he left them on the very outside edge of the porch, where the drip from the awning would pour straight down on them.
Some of the cartons were soaking wet; all were damp. I brought them in immediately and freed the books from the cartons. They’re air drying in my living room now, as are the cartons.
Most of the books are fine. A few have covers curled. But I’m getting these things for pennies on the dollar, and don’t expect to outlive the supply anyway.
Ten more cartons arrived this afternoon (perfectly dry, I’m happy to say). Also I finally got my paperback copies of The Elder King from Amazon. I’d been looking forward to that – photo above.
And… I got a surprise. Some moron – and there’s no moron but me on this job – accidentally put the wrong title in the page headers. All the right-hand pages in this edition say at the top that the book is Hailstone Mountain, which it is not.
I wouldn’t have this problem if I’d done the prudent thing and ordered a review copy for myself before releasing it. But I lack the patience. Now I have this.
It’s easily fixed. I’ll republish it tomorrow. Which means the book will be briefly unavailable. The few copies already sold will go down in history as errata, no doubt to become sought-after collectors’ items.
The package arrived yesterday. At last, after many a year, I can hold a paper version of Hailstone Mountain in my tremblous hand.
The book is thinner than I expected. I suppose that’s because of the 6”x9” format – more words per page. I’m used to thinking in terms of what’s called “mass market paperbacks,” the roughly pocket-sized books you generally see on racks in stores (or used to). For some reason, we self-publishers seem to gravitate toward a larger size. Perhaps we’re compensating.
Maybe the cream paper that I didn’t select would have been a little thicker, too.
In any case, my books are my children, and I’ve known this one only electronically up to now. Like having a kid whose mother took custody and then moved to California – you only know him through Zoom calls. Now at last he’s made his way to my doorstep. He needs money, of course.
I wonder how I should deal with selling these things at Viking events, as one by one they get instantiated in the physical universe. My bestseller at events is Viking Legacy. After that, it’s The Year of the Warrior (the paper version I have printed, not yet available on Amazon). West Oversea comes in third. This one follows in the sequence. I figure demand for each successive book should be smaller than for the previous one. I anticipate carrying a couple cartons of the later books of the saga with me to events, but I don’t imagine I’ll have to stock as many of those. It’s already a lot of cartons to lug around.
At the festival in Green Bay, I was signing somebody’s book and they complimented my handwriting. This surprised me. I’ve always considered my handwriting awful, for the practical reason that it’s hard to read. My writing may possess a certain grace of form, but it’s not pragmatically effective.
I wish my art to be useful as well as aesthetic. But not enough to write slower.
I squandered more than an hour today, I think, fixing my laptop keyboard. And by “fixing” I mean af-fixing. Putting snazzy little high contrast stickers on the keys. Why did I feel I must do this thing?
I bought a laptop some years ago, and I liked it well enough except for the keys. The letters were inscribed in them so lightly, and in such a thin typeface, that they actually vanished in low light. So I sent away for stickers with big bright letters on a black background.
Then, one day I broke that laptop’s screen. I went in and bought a replacement, which turned out to be the exact same model (because I’m cheap and so was it). Then, also because I’m cheap, I pried the stickers off the old keys and stuck them onto the new ones.
But this apparently lowered the viscosity value of the adhesive, and the amount of typing I’m doing on this translation job seems to put too much pressure on the stickers. Some of them started sliding loose, and I knew this could not go on. So I splurged on a new set of stickers. Today I squandered potentially profitable time making the replacements. You wouldn’t think it would take long, but it does.
And that raises (not begs, I must insist) the question, why didn’t novel writing put the same wear and tear on the stickers? I do not know. Perhaps I’m not as intense when I’m writing a novel.
Formatting Hailstone Mountain for paperback has been a slightly bizarre experience. It meant reading it through, for the first time in more than a decade. I was prepared to find passages that I now felt could have been done better. Those I left mostly alone. I only fixed small and serious (in my opinion) errors. Like an odd letter “g” that sat wedged into in one sentence for no reason at all, apparently the result of a finger twitch on my last revision. The most radical change I made was to add three words to a setting description, because I thought the passage not as clear as it should have been, and possibly confusing to the reader.
This means that there will be slight differences between the e-book and the printed version. I don’t like to think about that situation, but I’m not OCD enough to go in and change the e-book at this point. And I’m comforted to remember that there were inconsistencies in various editions of The Lord of the Rings for quite a long time – and I, at least, never noticed.
But what’s really strange is to find oneself – to one’s astonishment and shock – moved by a few passages. It feels narcissistic to admire my own writing. But sometimes, I must admit, I do make the old jalopy run smooth. I once read somewhere that it’s impossible to tickle yourself. Bringing tears to your own eyes seems as unlikely. But it can happen.
So what’s going on, you’re no doubt asking. Any progress on The Baldur Game? How’s the translation coming? How do you justify your barren existence?
The Baldur Game is essentially ready for publication. I don’t think I’ll even give it another read-through. A man has to say “enough” at some point.
The hang-up remains the cover. It is being delayed due to circumstances I don’t know, but am confident are good and sufficient. No doubt it’s God’s will that we have a pre-Christmas release. Or a post-Christmas release.
So what am I doing with my famous writing time? I’m preparing my first Amazon paperback edition.
I chose Hailstone Mountain for this experiment. It would be good to do The Year of the Warrior, but there are certain technical problems with that book that I’ll feel more comfortable confronting once I’ve done a simpler book first. A paperback TYOTW does exist; I’m having it printed privately and I lug it around to Viking events and hand-sell it. But I’ll want to get it on Amazon eventually. Sooner rather than later, I hope.
Then there’s West Oversea, the second (or technically third) book in the series. That work has been published both as an e-book and as a paperback by Nordskog Publishing of Ventura, California. But I recently got word that Nordskog is going out of business. The publication rights will revert to me, and I’ve made a deal to buy their entire stock of the paperback. These I plan to hand-sell at Viking events, as I have been doing. But there will need to be an Amazon paperback too – perhaps with a new cover. Can’t get at that until everything’s nailed down with Nordskog.
That leaves Hailstone Mountain. That one belongs to me alone, and has been published for Kindle since 2013. I’m now working the manuscript over to fit Amazon’s requirements, and I’m nearing the end of those revisions. I may manage to make it available on Amazon before the end of the month (barring glitches, which are always possible. Even likely) except…
I’ll be out of town most of next week. Off to Høstfest in Minot, North Dakota, as I have done for so many years. Four days of living like a Viking – except for minor technicalities like modern plumbing, sleeping in a host’s bed, and fast food. Stop in and see me if you’re in the Minot area. It’s convenient to… Devil’s Lake, North Dakota, I guess.
The following weekend I’ll be (God willing) at the Midwest Viking Festival in Green Bay, Wisconsin. Which is entirely unreasonable in terms of miles driven for a man of my age, I think, but my book sales were really good last year, and they’ve invited me to be more heavily involved in the program. Which is flattering, because this involves high-level reenactors and genuine scholars.
I won’t get a break the weekend after that, either, as I have a meeting to attend on Saturday in northwestern Minnesota. Which will seem like a short drive after the others. Also, thank goodness, I’ll get to wear modern clothes. (You’d think Viking clothes would be comfortable, but I find they get old pretty fast.)
As for the translation job, I’m feeling good about it. My plan requires me to do 100 pages-plus each month for the next five months. I’m up to about page 85 now, and I’ve still got a few days to fill up my measure for September, even with time off for festivals and frivolity. It’s looking okay.
(Note to potential house robbers – my renter is at home pretty much perpetually now. My place will not be empty, and the booby traps will be set.)
I also think this book blends together Lars Walker’s two types of writing: his Norse saga and more contemporary stuff more. I’m a big fan of both, but maybe it means this book contains a few extra surprises for those who haven’t read his other writings, set in more contemporary and/or futuristic times.
This book really played with tensions. The poor priest Ailill, whom you come to love as a man of faith and action and unabashedly real humanity, has to face three of the greatest challenges for a celibate Christian: romantic love, relics, and . . . Arianism! With a shockingly early possibility of Arianism in Norway!
Had a very nice moment on Facebook today. One of my readers posted a list of novels that affected his life, and The Year of the Warrior was at the top of the list. He said, “Each of these moved me spiritually and intellectually. I connected with the characters and the story surrounding them, and finished the book feeling emotionally deeper in my understanding of the world and others.”
Mark Twain said something along the lines of “I can live a whole month off a good compliment.” I think my food budget should be covered for most of June.
In a related matter, I guess I’ll mention that I’ve decided to bring out paperback versions of some of my novels through Create Space. (Actually Ori Pomerantz is doing the real work.) I’m starting with The Year of the Warrior, because then I’ll be able to sell it along with West Oversea at Viking events and have them in sequence. Hailstone Mountain should come later.
The e-book of TYOTW is published by Baen, but it turns out I have full rights to publish a palpable version. Can’t use Baen’s cover though, so our friend Jeremiah Humphries is working on a new one.
Oh yes, don’t forget that Viking Legacy, the book I translated, is now available!
In his podcast today, John Wilson of Books and Culture talks about how much he enjoyed Lars’ latest !!spell-binding!! novel, Hailstone Mountain, and a bit about how he was provoked to read it. The world feels smaller somehow.
If you too are brand new to Lars Walker’s novels, learn more by following this wonderful, insightful, and humility-inspiring blog or through the links below:
The strongest theme I saw was honor and duty in a person’s life. Duty means doing what needs to be done whether you like it or not. Especially if you like it not. The book revolves around honor. Men go to great lengths to gain or keep honor. Things they will not do for themselves, they do to help others. Men they would otherwise befriend they may not because of differences in spirit or blood. When people do their duty to God, the right things happen. When they forget, they and all those who serve under them suffer.
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