Recently, people have mentioned their dissatisfaction with the endings of any number of novels they’ve read – books that were well paced with compelling characters and settings and premises.  Good plots – until the end.  Just as the reader is engrossed in exactly how the author will tie the carefully woven threads together… the authors appear to just stop writing.

I came very close to doing it myself.  The new version of Foreseen requires a different ending, and I couldn’t make it work.  But I have a deadline – I need to get Foreseen out.  I started to write a sequence that would end the story, although it didn’t come close to what it should be.  Thankfully, I stopped.  And I pulled the ace out of my sleeve:

John C. Brewer.

To say that John is a master of story and plot does not do him justice.  He has explained to me before how to carefully craft each event up through the resolution.  I understood the theory, but it’s hard to do.  Then, Saturday night, I sat at the foot of the master for the experience of a lifetime.  Technically, I was on a couch across from him, but you get the idea.  John had read my partially written novel and initially had no more thoughts than I did.  But we hammered it out “together.”  That is, he talked, sometimes asking questions, always explaining his thought process as he went.  I took notes. Occasionally chimed in.  Not only did we resolve the problems with Foreseen, but by listening to him, I understood how he was doing it.  It was the difference between reading a static blog on how to throw a pot and having a skilled potter take your hands and guide you through it.  Invaluable.

Multiplayer, John’s first release, is due out next month.  His skill comes through loud and clear in this, and all of his novels.  It is tight.  It is compelling.  Everything comes together in the end.  The readers will be satisfied.  And in the meantime, I learned more in those few hours I spent with John than I could have in a year of seminars and workshops.

Thank you, John.