HANK AND MUDDY AND
FAVORITE CHILDREN
Writers often get asked, which
one of your books is your favorite? The safe answer is to claim your books
are like your children—you love them all equally. However, when applied to
either children or books, this is a lie. Every child you raise has a different
personality, as does every book you write—they all need love, but in varying
degrees and varying ways. Those children who are the most difficult need our
love the most. It is the same with books. You always love your child, but depending
on their phase of maturity, you might not like them very much. Books are no
different…
I always say my favorite book is the one I’m writing next
because it has all the promise of a child about to be born, hasn’t yet thrown a
tantrum on the page, nor gone through the terrible twos, which is when you hit
the difficult part of a manuscript—usually between page ten and ten pages
before you can type The End.
Still, of the books I have written, I do have favorites.
Some of my books are more personal, some perhaps carry more of my soul than others.
I love them all, even those I’ve had to beat into submission, but one or two
are special…
Recently, my writing pal Stephen Mertz stated, among his
extensive output of novels, his favorite
was Hank And Muddy—a novel in which
he was able to use his writing skills to express many of his feelings about
also being a musician, performing on the road, and a life he might have lived.
Seeing an opportunity, I asked his permission to publish his thoughts on why Hank And Muddy is his favorite child…
Stephen Mertz
I knew I wanted to be either a writer or a musician.
I was a working musician, blowing harp (as in harmonica) in
Eagle Park Slim’s Mile High Blues Band—the house band at a black after hours
club in Denver’s Five Points. From the 1930s to the 1950s, Five Points was
considered the Harlem of the West,
with bars and clubs where people like Duke Ellington and Billie Holiday played.
However, by the 1960s, it had suffered the same demise as inner cities across
the U.S.
When I played there, Five Points was a rough part of town.
Slim is a real deal St. Louis bluesman (who currently resides and works in
Eugene, Oregon), and the Mile High Band was hot. I’ve got the tapes to prove
it. The band’s gig was Thursdays through Saturdays, 11pm to 3am. The drummer
and I were the only white boys in the place. I was living the life.
Trouble was, I was beginning to gradually sell more of my
writing to the smaller markets of the day. No bread to speak of, but I was
establishing a presence. I’d wanted to be a writer since I was a kid. I could
taste the dream of being a published novelist becoming a reality, that’s how
close it was even though the rejections continued to outnumber the sales.
I was in a band called Blue Tale Fly at the time, a bar band
playing Allman Brothers and J. Geils covers and a few originals. We’d landed a
four night gig as the opening act for Cotton at the old Rio Grande down by
Denver’s rail yards. Cotton was a party animal. Plenty of drink and smoke and
passing the time with small talk between sets. He’d just signed with Albert
Grossman—Dylan’s manager—who had landed him a contract with Capitol. Star time!
Except, Cotton added, for the last two years, he’d been on the road 50 weeks
out of the year.
That sunk into me and stayed. I’d only been living the life with Eagle Park Slim for
18 months and I was already starting to burn out. I like to entertain and
socialize well enough, but like most writers, I am by nature a solitary soul.
Then Don Pendleton stepped in to nudge me into my future
with an offer to assist him in the writing of Mack Bolan novels (this was years
before Don sold the Bolan franchise to Harlequin, where it flourished, scripted
by a cadre of contract writers). For me, Don’s offer was the writing dream come
true. No more smoky bars, bad food and crazy hours. I could sit at a keyboard
and make a decent living. An apprenticeship! I could not say no, and so I said
goodbye to Slim and the guys and to the musician’s life. I resettled on a
country road near Don’s spread in Brown County, Indiana.
Well, the Mack Bolan gig lasted for six months (not Don’s
fault; we remained close friends until his passing), but in the process, I had
acquired a lifelong taste for what is called the writing life. I’ve lived on
back roads ever since, writing short fiction and novels which, I’m happy to
say, have been published for the most part to favorable reviews and reader
acceptance. And guess what? Turns out being a writer is not so different from
being a musician. Sure, the work conditions are more comfortable, but it’s
still all about hustling up the next gig, about finding an audience by striving
to provide something worth their while.
These days I perform around Tucson now and then, and finally,
I’ve written a novel about the music I love. Who says you can’t have it all?
Just wish I’d figured that out a long time ago...
HANK AND MUDDY
In steamy Shreveport,
Louisiana, two musical legends-in-the-making come together: a whiskey-soaked
country singer named Hank Williams and blues artist Muddy Waters. What they've
got in common over several hectic days of drinking, singing and whoring is an
interest in staying alive despite local mobsters, bent cops, and a truckload of
Ku Klux Klansmen. Then there's the bank robber's daughter...
FOR MORE ON HANK
AND MUDDY CLICK
HERE
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