Keeping the Meat Fresh

New Website!

ABParr

Well. Here we are.

New website. Same writer. Probably the same amount of trouble.

I didn’t bring this place back from the dead -- the old site was fine. It just stopped fitting the way a good coat stops fitting. You don’t throw it away angry. You just know it’s time for something that fits where you are now, not where you were.

So here is where I am now.

There are books that have already made their way into the world. There are stories sitting on hard drives and in notebooks. There are half-finished projects that refuse to stay dead and characters I thought I said goodbye to who keep showing up at the door. And there are new stories coming. Some are dark. Some are funny. Some are strange. Some are probably a little too close to the bone.

That is the stuff I like.

I have never been particularly interested in writing things that behave themselves. I like flawed people. I like complicated choices. I like characters who are trying their best and still manage to screw everything up. I like the space between good and bad, where most of us actually live.

I like the American West and the Dirty South -- not the postcard versions. I like the dirt, the busted towns, the winding roads, the old buildings, the people who stay when everyone else leaves. I like mythology, but I also like pulling mythology apart to see what is underneath. I like horror because the genre gives us permission to look at the things we normally avoid. I like poetry because sometimes a few words can get closer to the truth than a thousand can.

And I like fiction because we can tell the truth without always having to admit we are doing it.

That last part is worth chewing on. There is a vulnerability in writing that I did not fully understand when I started. You can hide behind a character. You can hide behind a plot. You can pretend the story is about somebody else. But eventually somebody notices. Sometimes you notice. You realize the thing you wrote about grief was really about your own grief. The character who cannot forgive someone may have borrowed a little too much from you. The person wandering through a fictional desert might be carrying something you have been carrying for years.

That can be uncomfortable. It can also be damn wonderful.

Because occasionally, someone reads something you wrote and says, “I needed that.” That is the whole game. Not because writing is glamorous -- it isn’t. Not because books magically make you rich -- they generally don’t. Not because sitting alone with a laptop for hours is particularly good for your social life. I do it because somewhere out there is a person I will probably never meet who might read something I wrote at exactly the right moment. Maybe it makes them laugh. Maybe it makes them uncomfortable. Maybe it reminds them of somebody. Maybe it gives them permission to feel something they have been trying very hard not to feel.

Maybe they just think, “Well, that was weird.”

I’m okay with all those outcomes.

So this new website is more than a place to park my books. I want it to be a place where I can actually talk to people. About writing. About books. About the ridiculous things that happen when you spend your life making things up for a living. About the stories behind the stories. About what I am reading and what I am working on. About the places, people, music, mistakes, and strange little moments that occasionally convince me there is still something worth putting on a page.

And I want to hear from you. No kidding. If you have read something of mine, tell me what you think. Tell me which character you hate. Tell me which one you love. Tell me where I got it wrong. If you are a writer, tell me what you are working on. If you are a readerKeeping the Meat Fresh

Well. Here we are.

New website. Same writer. Probably the same amount of trouble.

I didn’t bring this place back from the dead -- the old site was fine. It just stopped fitting the way a good coat stops fitting. You don’t throw it away angry. You just know it’s time for something that fits where you are now, not where you were.

So here is where I am now.

There are books that have already made their way into the world. There are stories sitting on hard drives and in notebooks. There are half-finished projects that refuse to stay dead and characters I thought I said goodbye to who keep showing up at the door. And there are new stories coming. Some are dark. Some are funny. Some are strange. Some are probably a little too close to the bone.

That is the stuff I like.

I have never been particularly interested in writing things that behave themselves. I like flawed people. I like complicated choices. I like characters who are trying their best and still manage to screw everything up. I like the space between good and bad, where most of us actually live.

I like the American West and the Dirty South -- not the postcard versions. I like the dirt, the busted towns, the winding roads, the old buildings, the people who stay when everyone else leaves. I like mythology, but I also like pulling mythology apart to see what is underneath. I like horror because the genre gives us permission to look at the things we normally avoid. I like poetry because sometimes a few words can get closer to the truth than a thousand can.

And I like fiction because we can tell the truth without always having to admit we are doing it.

That last part is worth chewing on. There is a vulnerability in writing that I did not fully understand when I started. You can hide behind a character. You can hide behind a plot. You can pretend the story is about somebody else. But eventually somebody notices. Sometimes you notice. You realize the thing you wrote about grief was really about your own grief. The character who cannot forgive someone may have borrowed a little too much from you. The person wandering through a fictional desert might be carrying something you have been carrying for years.

That can be uncomfortable. It can also be damn wonderful.

Because occasionally, someone reads something you wrote and says, “I needed that.” That is the whole game. Not because writing is glamorous -- it isn’t. Not because books magically make you rich -- they generally don’t. Not because sitting alone with a laptop for hours is particularly good for your social life. I do it because somewhere out there is a person I will probably never meet who might read something I wrote at exactly the right moment. Maybe it makes them laugh. Maybe it makes them uncomfortable. Maybe it reminds them of somebody. Maybe it gives them permission to feel something they have been trying very hard not to feel.

Maybe they just think, “Well, that was weird.”

I’m okay with all those outcomes.

So this new website is more than a place to park my books. I want it to be a place where I can actually talk to people. About writing. About books. About the ridiculous things that happen when you spend your life making things up for a living. About the stories behind the stories. About what I am reading and what I am working on. About the places, people, music, mistakes, and strange little moments that occasionally convince me there is still something worth putting on a page.

And I want to hear from you. No kidding. If you have read something of mine, tell me what you think. Tell me which character you hate. Tell me which one you love. Tell me where I got it wrong. If you are a writer, tell me what you are working on. If you are a reader, tell me what I should be reading.

Just don’t quietly wander off without saying hello.

The internet is already full of people shouting into empty rooms. I would rather build something that feels like a conversation.

So. Welcome. The site is new. The books are here. The stories are still coming. And the meat -- as always -- is fresh.

Pull up a chair. I’ve got plenty more trouble planned.

-- A.B. Parr abparr.com