wiki update #7: it shall be archived

For those following along at home, I've put up the first compiled version of the story, incorporating Part One (in which Howard Wells goes crazy like Shaka Zulu).

The new archive section of the wiki will host such updates. Those particularly sharp-eyed will notice some very minor differences to the version posted up - this is because this is a work in progress.

Enjoy viewing the archive here.

More of Spencer LaSalle to come.

wiki update #6: organizized

I've cleaned up the front page of the wiki so that things are under their own category pages. I wanted to shoot out something more, but things conspired to get in the way.

The conclusion to Patrick's tale coming before the end of the month.

wiki update #5: Howard Wells

The last video store clerk has a name.

He was quiet for the most part, intelligent in this caustic and sarcastic kind of way, like he knew he was smarter and faster and had more nerve. But fuck, he never used it, not until that day lined up at the strip mall, the sun blotted out and the air fogged with mist and a line of crazy assholes out for all of us. When he started shooting it was like something he'd locked up inside came out to play – and since then he hasn't smiled.

So goddamned deadly quiet. Like a rattlesnake or a scorpion – the only warning given far too late.

wiki update #4: selection

Like many stories, The Last Clerks is intended to follow a tripartite arc. We will soon be finished with this current story arc and move on to the last part of "the beginning" and move more toward "the middle," as it were. But since we've come in en medias res, some things are a bit murky, and that's where the wiki and its exposition come in. My plan from now on is to fill in a new blank (or several of them) every week.

This week:

I never believed, as Howard did, that the mist and the resultant chaos were simply unleashed out of malice. The results might have appeared random and terrifying to us during the heat of the moment, in the wake of the fall of the towers – and yet.

Full article at the wiki.

wiki update #3: gunman testimonials

Wherever possible, I want to try to incorporate real experiences into The Last Clerks, at least where it's concerned with shooting guns. Firing weapons kind of sucks - it's hell on your ears, in an enclosed space you're inhaling lead gas (which is about as healthy for you as it sounds), and the best-engineered and most studiously maintained weapons are still prone to the occasional hangfire or jam.

Also, in movies and all-too-often in books, guns are just oversimplified. It takes much practice and painstaking maintenance to keep something designed to have things explode inside it from simply falling apart bit by bit. In that spirit, I try to seek out testimonials from folks who have actually fired the weapons (or something like them). My decision to arm Howard Wells with dual 1911s came about because I fired a 1911 in DeKalb, IL once long ago and immediately decided there is no other gun that simultaneously kicks a shitload of ass and best sums up the sort of shooting that character adopts.

My friend was kind enough to work on his birthday today, giving me a testimonial from his days of turkey-shooting with a 10-gauge, as it's the weapon an upcoming character will be using.

Dave's full comments can be found on the wiki, helpfully modifying my info on the Ithaca Mag-10 "Roadblocker" semi-auto shotgun. A sample here:

"When you first start shooting, your shoulder and forearm will be black and blue regardless of what you shoot. If you hold your gun tight to the shoulder and depending on the type of recoil pad you have on the gun, the severity of the bruise increases or decreases. Some autos have very little kick and some kick like a mule. Anything firing 10-gauge shells though you will have some nasty ( i.e. inability to move the arm ) recoil. They do make special shooting vests, which let you carry around 20 shells, game pouch, four large pockets and special extra padding in the shooting shoulder."

Thanks to Dave.

wiki update #2: guns

Writing about gunfighting has always been a problem for me because I am one of those guys who needs to be specific about what the heroes and villains are packing. It's annoying for a motorcycle buff to watch a movie and see bad guys on motorcycles suddenly taking their left hand off the clutch lever to open fire with an Uzi (What, is your bike automatic?). It's just as annoying for somebody well-versed in the poetry of Shakespeare to hear somebody flub the inflection on one of the bard's lines when they quote it in a movie ("wherefore art thou Romeo?" has got to be the single line in history most hated by drama teachers).

So my problem: How do I go into the specifics of a weapon without interrupting the flow of the narrative and inducing eye-rolls among those in the gallery who don't care when I (and other people) surely DO care about it?

While perusing one of my earlier incarnations of the Last Clerks, one friend of mine got to the paragraph where I went into Howard's armament and he saw a block of exposition that likely looked something akin to:

At his hips sat blah blah blah blah blah in .45 ACP blah blah blah Colt Python blah blah blah blah blah .38 Long Colt blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah single action...

and he said "This is WAY too much about his guns," and he would be absolutely correct.

It's a legitimate concern: My brother was once reading a book where the author only said "gun" in every instance, maddeningly never specifying if the broad term used for projectile-based weaponry referred to a rifle, or a pistol, or a shotgun, or an isolated soliton wave disruptor, or whatever. My brother had just cause to be pissed, because there are readers for whom a detail like that makes a huge difference - it would also seem to betray some ignorance on the part of the writer if they can't be bothered to look up just a little bit about firearms.

Author William Sanders, the source of my knowledge on the Nagant Model 1895 used by Patrick Lake, rather cogently vented his frustration in Hardboiled Magazine at authors who betray firearm ignorance in their works. Follow along on that last link and Sanders will even give you a crash-course on some basic firearms facts which for some writers is sure to be enlightening.

For me, a person who doesn't own a gun but can't get enough of writing about them, a wonderful solution has presented itself: The convenience of the Internet and hyperlinking has allowed me to easily link to detailed descriptions of the hardware a particular person is carrying while at the same time not throwing away a paragraph of writing that will bore the disinterested and at best interrupt the flow for those who actually care about the specifics.

I love progress. It's one of the ways I'd like to think web-based fiction can get a leg up on books. In that spirit, I've added some firearms specs to the wiki, including one on Howard's pistols and documentation on the shotgun of the as-yet-unseen Spencer LaSalle. More gun facts to come.

wiki update #1: the wiki exists

The idea here is that it's actually kind of difficult to follow along if you don't at least briefly peruse the wiki.

Somebody was talking to me and actually said "I thought the wiki was going to be stupid and lame, but you like, actually have cool stuff on it."

To that I say: "Aw, shucks."

If you want to hear Charles Clark get all post-apocalyptically lyrical, mosey on over there.