A million years ago I wanted to write a novel about border collies. I’d just published a detective novel (my first and only) and a couple of nonfiction books on detective stuff, so I was able to wrangle an invitation to spend a few days on a sheep ranch in the Appalachians. It was a wonderful and fascinating experience, and it helped clarify the story I wanted to write. I wrote the first couple of chapters over a weekend.

But the world, as Lula Pace Fortune pointed out, is wild at heart and weird on top. Stuff happened, I moved away from Washington, DC, and the manuscript ended up as a mostly-forgotten file on a thumb drive. I continued to write, but my focus became short detective fiction. Short stories are a more difficult form than novels; they require more discipline to write well, but are more elegant when they work. They also pay considerably less.

I didn’t write a lot of them, but I sold every manuscript I submitted. Well, all but one–and, of course, I like to think the editors made a mistake there. I even won an Edgar for Best Short Story in 2023. But a part of me still wanted to carve out enough time to write another novel-length manuscript. So after Mr. Poe’s head was delivered to my door, I plugged in that ancient thumb drive with the border collie story, downloaded the early partial draft, and started thinking about it.

After reading it, I decided to scrap everything–the plot, the characters, the style. I scrapped everything but the setting and the border collies. I added two sisters–one who’d left rural Appalachia to become a conflict photographer, one who’d stayed home and raised sheep. I added a Civil War diary, whose author died mysteriously after surviving the war. I added a writer for a monthly American history magazine who was interested in the diary. I added a rural community worried about the future of their Civil War memorial, a community suspicious of an outsider poking around in their past. I added an escalating plague of vandalism and racist graffiti. I added a sheriff who tries to cope with the unrest disrupting the community he loves. I added a wealthy, gentleman farmer–a relative newcomer to the community who wants to fit in. And I added townsfolk, some of whom struggle to be decent while being conflicted about their community’s racist past.

Then I killed one of them. Which brings in the State Police, whose presence isn’t entirely welcome and whose agenda differs from that of the sheriff.

It’s taken me about a year to write, edit, and revise the manuscript, but early this afternoon, I put the final period on it. Now I can relax, right? Nope. Now comes the hard part. Now I have to find the energy to start the agony and humiliation of an agent search, which is SO MUCH WORSE than writing.

You know, short fiction may be harder, it may pay poorly, but once you’re done with a short story, you send it off and forget about it. This novel business is work.