Confession

I think the reason I felt so compelled to write last night (a feeling which has lasted into today, by the way) is because I finally got around to reading Kurt Vonnegut's "Slaughterhouse Five" after starting it last fall, then losing the book when I was about halfway through. Having found the book again a few weeks ago, I slammed through it, cover to cover, in a few days. Then, yesterday, promptly started in on Vonnegut's "Bluebeard."

The thing about Vonnegut is that his style is so wonderfully, beautifully casual and simple, I find myself reading his stuff and thinking, "Damn, I wish I could write like that." Which usually leads me to think, "Hey, maybe I could write like that." Which usually leads me to think, "Hey, I should try writing like that."

Both last year's National Novel Writing Month Novel and the end of the world story, I think, could both benefit from a simple, casual style. I was even mapping out the next chapter of the novel in that style, in my head, before sitting down to finish the previous one. But, in the one page I did write, I got bogged down in boring details when a character started fumbling with a telephone because he was tired and hungover. It was the furthest thing from simple.

So I stopped.

Maybe tonight I'll take a crack at the end of the world story, if I have enough free time.