There's a story that Alfred Hitchcock said the essence of suspense was a bomb under a table--and the audience knows it. If the audience doesn't know there's a bomb, then there's a surprise (when it goes off) but we missed out on the anticipation. I decided to take Hitchcock's advice and wrote a prologue to my story setting up Watson as a dangerous person (Is Watson too similar to Winsor?), and more specifically setting up the large stock of depleted uranium he has in Texas. Then my friend Tom called and suggested a downtown lunch so I grabbed the train (downtown is only a few stops away and I can walk to the train--isn't urban living great) and headed down. As I rode in, though, I thought about what I'd written and decided it was too talky and not dangerous enough.

Back home, I simply scrapped the entire prologue and started over. Since I knew what I wanted to say, it was a lot easier the second time--and a fair bit longer. I got my ten pages written while hardly writing anything at the actual tail end of where I am.

Riding the train gave me a chance to finish IN AT THE DEATH by Harry Turtledove (I'll review it after I post the blog. The URL will be www.booksforabuck.com/sfpages/sf_07/in_at_the_death.html. Overall, I think this was one of Turtledove's better efforts in this massive and compelling series. Turtledove isn't exactly a master of prose and sometimes we get repeated thougths and expressions, but he shines when it comes to story. Next up--FORTUNE'S GOLD by Mercedes Lackey.

I'm going to make DEAD ON by Michael Paulson the www.BooksForABuck.com book of the day. In the first P.I. Deacon Bishop story, Bishop heads out to west Texas--only to find that his client has been murdered. Bishop decides to stick around to see what happens--a decision that creates a lot of what happens as he gradually uncovers the town's ugly secrets. The entire eNovel is only $3.99. Learn more, read the free excerpt, or buy the entire eNovel here: www.booksforabuck.com/mystery/mys_06/dead_on.html. Here's the cover (cover design by Karen Leabo):

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