Clinton, South Carolina, Sunday, August 11, 2019, 2:45 p.m. In Part Three, suspicion begins to intrude on the traveling camaraderie between the driverless SUV “Freddy” and the passenger “Horace.” It felt odd to become friends with a machine, but Freddy and I were getting along famously. We traveled all the way to Oregon and back, …
Category: Fiction
Adventures with Freddy, Part 2
Clinton, South Carolina, Wednesday, July 31, 2019, 12:15 a.m. When last we checked in on Freddy Frost, he and “Horace” were becoming well acquainted. As in the words of Johnny Cash, by way of Shel Silverstein, it was Gatlinburg in mid-July, and before continuing on to Nashville, after a day of writing in collaboration with …
Adventures with Freddy, Part 1
Clinton, South Carolina, Saturday, July 17 2019, 1:15 p.m. I haven't written a short story in quite a while, so I decided to work on this one in installments. This fiction takes place in the not-too-distant future. The idea grew out of my increasing hatred of air travel. For twenty years, I flew in those …
A Matter of Convenience
Clinton, South Carolina, Thursday, March 22, 2018, 11:30 a.m. Science fiction is hardly my field of expertise. I just happened to dream up this scenario overnight and felt compelled to write it all down in the form of a short story. Dagwood Brandt made a fine living preaching against preaching. The executive director of AFG …
A Long Trip Down a Rocky Road
Clinton, South Carolina, Thursday, September 14, 2017, 1:32 p.m. Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell* is going to be my most carefully composed, diligently examined, and thoroughly questioned novel to date. At the moment, I’m taking a break from the long slog of rewriting and reconsidering what will be my eighth novel. Twice I interrupted the process …
‘Life Gets Complicated’ for Fictional Stock Car Ace Barrie Jarman
Clinton, South Carolina, Wednesday, August 23, 2017, 8:53 p.m. The Clinton Chronicle was kind enough to run this today: Just five months after the release of Lightning in a Bottle, Barrie Jarman is back in a sequel. Life Gets Complicated takes Barrie into the top level of FASCAR. Monte Dutton’s seventh novel is the first …
Continue reading ‘Life Gets Complicated’ for Fictional Stock Car Ace Barrie Jarman
Daddy Downhill
I haven't had time to write short stories recently. With a seventh novel on the way to publication, and an eighth in an ongoing state of repair, I've been excising episodes from the latter manuscript. It's hard to remove items that are amusing but unnecessary. It occurred to me that I could turn them into short …
Keep the Line Moving
Clinton, South Carolina, Wednesday, July 26, 2017, 11:15 a.m. Yesterday I finished a manuscript. It’s just a first draft, but I doubt it will require much revision. Lightning in a Bottle just required two drafts. I think its sequel will, too. The other project nestled snugly in this laptop … ah, that’s a different matter. …
Invent the Track if You Must
Clinton, South Carolina, Friday, April 7, 2017, 9:45 a.m. A new novel’s out. It’s the one readers have been suggesting – hint, hint – I write for years. I’m hardheaded. I had to wait until it struck my fancy. It takes a story to write a novel, and it’s too damned hard to write one …
The Big Surprise Is Here
This blog is a news release. I'm sending it out to many people. Why am I making it available to you? Perhaps you have news to disseminate. Perhaps you have a blog. Perhaps you follow mine. Perhaps you are on social media. Perhaps you like reading. Perhaps you like fiction. Perhaps you like motorsports. …
Nightrider's Lament 