The Powells Blogs
I was recently asked to contribute to the Powells Books website as a guest blogger for the week of Monday, Oct. 19 through Friday the 23rd. Powell’s has kindly given me permission to repost my entries here.
John Finn 1: Stories
There were four feathers on the inside edge of the bar. Each of them were gray, black and iridescent in different ways. Pigeon feathers. They reminded me of a story.
John Finn 21: Blonds
March 02, 2010
It’s funny how you can recognize other people. It’s not always the hat, or the voice. Sometimes it’s the angle of a leg when they sit. That’s the way I knew who it was sitting on the bench down by the pond. It was a cold day. The sun had come out but the cold was left over from the night. There was a gray shell of ice on the water by the shore. Out beyond that the water looked black and blue, battered by a small wind. I had to think about how to approach the situation. It seemed to me that I should get it right for once. I could see she was smoking. That was my fault, I suppose. She leaned forward on the bench, her arms folded, her legs crossed in a way guys can’t do, with the hood of her coat pulled up over her head, looking out over the water. What was…
Posted in: Fiction, John Finn, Work-In-ProgressComments
Tales from the Athenaeum
February 02, 2010
We can assay the weight and substance of a given work and argue its merits, but essentially the value of the thing is in its power to move us and hold us and remain in our minds long after the event of our first reading. For example, Tarzan of the Apes is a silly work in almost any critical regard except in the way that matters. When art and craft are brought to a work that has that power to endure, we have the transcendent experience of stepping beyond our petty concerns into other places, in other times, and living larger lives than what we have managed by ourselves. Not every great work is a Moby Dick, or should be. Not every reader has the stamina, or the need for the quest of a Frodo, or a picaresque journey by raft on the Mississippi. And often enough, the best of our literature is not fiction but memoir–that assembly…
Posted in: Essays, On BooksComments
John Finn 20: Once I knew a cop
January 27, 2010
Once I knew a cop in Hingham who thought that it was the metal in guns that somehow short circuited the minute electrical impulses of the brain and made people act stupidly. This same guy also ate seaweed, kept a swarm of stray cats he had picked up on the job, and worked out for about three hours every day at the gym. Obviously he did not have a lot of time to think his theories through. But he had gotten me to think twice about guns. I didn’t own one. Connie offered to loan me one of his guns, but I refused. Nevertheless, I was going to the range every other week to take some shooting practice. I agreed with Connie that I should know how to use one, even if I didn’t want to carry it. Situations can change. My Army training was nearly twenty years old and mostly involved an M-16. Besides, it was paid…
Posted in: Fiction, John Finn, Work-In-ProgressComments
John Finn 19: What I said
January 14, 2010
I wiped my hands and answered the phone by the third ring. Mary Ellen did not say hello. She said, “What did you say to your daughter?” I said, “Which one?” “The only one who listens to you.” “That’s not true. Susie listens to me. She just disagrees with everything I say. She takes after you in that regard. And I had a pretty good conversation recently with Sarah about her plan to go to Europe next summer.” “What did you say to Matty?” “When?” “When you went to breakfast with them on Thanksgiving morning.” “I don’t remember. We talked about a lot of things. Her sisters were there. Why don’t you ask them. They listen. They seem to remember every adjective that comes out of my mouth.” “Susie said you told Matty she was old enough to make her own decisions now. Is that what you said.” “Yes. Exactly. Precisely. I don’t remember. If Susie says so.…
Posted in: Fiction, John Finn, Work-In-ProgressComments
John Finn 18: The whale
January 12, 2010
Becky was not happy to see me. It was in her face and eyes. She said, “I can’t. I have another appointment at three.” I said, “I’ll wait. I’ll wait if you’ll talk to me.” She had nodded and closed her door. Detective Wise had come by to speak with her that morning and I suppose he might have been a little rough with her. I assumed as much. He had been pretty blunt with me in his investigation, more than once. I accepted it as necessary, but I didn’t think Becky had ever been through an interrogation before. Desiree had been missing for more than four weeks and finding her would not be getting any easier. Wise had called me early that morning and asked, “Do you think your friend the Professor had a reason to hurt Miss Perry?” I said, “No. She’s not like that.” He said, “You sure?” I said, “Yes.” But, of course,…
Posted in: Fiction, John Finn, Work-In-ProgressComments
John Finn 17: Confrontations
January 08, 2010
Perhaps I could have gone to Burley’s for Thanksgiving. His mom is a wicked cook and still directs the kitchen traffic at home. But Becky’s request had struck me as something I had to do. Besides. It couldn’t be that bad. She’s a perfectionist. I was willing to bet she’d cook two turkeys, just to make sure she got one right. She did that with a lasagna she made for me in July. And I’m not that stupid. I know she’s keeping an eye on me. God knows why. The doorbell rang on Thanksgiving morning a little early. I assumed it was the girls and it was a little irritating. I was still shaving. They were going to take me out for breakfast and I was looking forward to the pancakes because I can’t seem to make a good batter just for myself these days–but I’m tired. I only got a couple of hours of sleep. And I’m…
Posted in: Fiction, John Finn, Work-In-ProgressComments
John Finn 16: Thanksgiving
January 05, 2010
November is a bleak month in Boston. The leaves come off the trees. The women are wearing coats. It rains a lot. They’ve invented Thanksgiving and football to raise it up from the dead, but it’s still pretty sad. I had tried to avoid thinking about Des, but it was a waste of effort and time. It meant lying in bed, wide-awake, with the same thoughts turning up. Wednesday night I found myself sitting in the dark with the radio on, wishing I had a pack of cigarettes to pass the time. I have some Jameson’s left, but I was not in the mood for getting drunk. I should be pleased, after all. Susannah had called. She was up from New York for a couple of days. Sarah was home from college, but both she and Matty were out visiting friends when I went by the house around noon. I stopped to talk to Mary Ellen because she…
Posted in: Fiction, John Finn, Work-In-ProgressComments
John Finn 15: Mr. Chekhov
January 01, 2010
It seems to me that if a novel isn’t about a man and a woman then it ought to be about why it’s not about a man and a woman. I’ve come to this conclusion rather slowly over the years. Still, the thought irritates me. It’s a little too pat. Wasn’t this just the kind of thing Chekhov liked to say? Appropriately, this was what played in my mind as I drove up interstate 93 toward Lebanon on Tuesday. I was trying to come to an understanding of the character I had created for Izaac Andrews without insinuating my own experience into the situation…No, that’s too strong. Insinuation is fine. You have to write what you know. What I did not want was for the situation in my own life to blind my understanding of what might have happened to Izaac. He was becoming a much more sympathetic character than I had originally imagined him to be. I…
Posted in: Fiction, John Finn, Work-In-ProgressComments
John Finn 14: Under my hat
December 24, 2009
I have a couple of things on my mind. Detective Wise said ‘Keep it in your hat.’ My father always said ‘Keep it under your hat.’ Same thing I suppose. But I have something in my head that I don’t want there. I was happier before I knew it, and I wasn’t very happy then. It’s a nice little cap. It’s a Donegal tweed my daughters gave me a while back. Des took it off my head more than once and wore it when we were out in the cold. It was too big for her and gave her the look of an old-time newsboy. She looked damn good in it. I was going to buy her one for Christmas. The thing for me to do now was to get all this out of my head. I went down to the Historical Society for that. I hadn’t been there since I’d gone to work for Connie because it…
Posted in: Fiction, John Finn, Work-In-ProgressComments
John Finn 13: Private practice
December 16, 2009
The thought process went something like this: I ought to start looking for reasons why Desiree had disappeared by looking at the present. Her past in California, or in Texas, might have something to do with it, but she had disappeared little more than two weeks ago. What had happened to her in the last few weeks to make this happen now? The most obvious thing was moi. Perhaps this whole thing was in fact my fault after all. But then, perhaps I was just putting myself at the middle of the story out of the usual narcissism. The next link to the present I knew anything about was her job. The problem there was that she had told me next to nothing about her work and I had no easy access to the world of big-time law firms. I called Connie to find out if his lawyer had any contacts with Carey, Frost, and Theil. Connie’s lawyer,…
Posted in: Fiction, John Finn, Work-In-ProgressComments
John Finn 12: Stupid man
December 14, 2009
I see here that I have written very little of Desiree. Almost nothing. The catalogue of small habits and qualities that I have taken note of in my thoughts are not here at all. What was I thinking? Haven’t I proved this matter over and again? If it’s not written, it’ll be forgotten. Did I think that my love for her was enough? Stupid man. What was the first thing, then? After we met, I had given her my phone number. I wrote it on a beer coaster at the bar when she had abruptly gotten up to leave. I had no reason to expect that she might call me. What did she need with a lout? Still, I thought about her many times over the weeks afterward. Her face came easily to mind then. Unbidden. Unexpectedly. When Desiree did call me at last, I think the shock must have shown on my face. I was with Becky,…
Posted in: Fiction, John Finn, Work-In-ProgressComments
John Finn 11: The last time I saw Desiree
December 11, 2009
The last time I saw Desiree she was just an edge of coat and one gloved hand holding tight to a metal bar in a subway car as it began to move away. A shard through the glass. Her face will not come to mind now without a forced thought and then only obscurely. This disturbs me. I have already wondered if, in some recess of my brain, I have concluded that she’s dead. Is this mental obfuscation of her face, a picture so clear in every moment of the day and night for weeks, and now hidden from me, a subconscious attempt at self-protection? Some psychological trick to lessen the blow? I called the police on Thursday and reported her missing. This was a stretch for them. I had seen her on Sunday evening as the subway car pulled away. Only four days. I suppose the number of unhappily rejected boyfriends making such calls is routine. Resorting…
Posted in: Fiction, John Finn, Work-In-ProgressComments
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