commentaries

It’s Wednesday, and that means it’s time for another chapter commentary on THE MEMORY THIEF. This week, I’m doing two chapters at once, mainly because in the original draft, chapters three and four were just one long chapter. They featured the introduction of Chris, Benji’s best friend (who ultimately became his twin sister. Talk about a convoluted past.) In the original, there’s no talk of divorce. No scene with the parents shouting at home that night. Instead, we have Benji telling Chris about Louis, and then the two of them walking home after school, followed by walking over to the […]

Welcome back to another chapter annotation, where I talk about the work that went into the writing of THE MEMORY THIEF. Up this week? Chapter two, the first introduction to Memory Thieving. It’s interesting to me (and maybe others, though no one’s noted it yet) that there’s some overlap here between VODNIK. After all, the extended sequences with Lesana showing Tomas what happened to her in the past are essentially the same thing as what Louis shows Benji in this first chapter. I even use similar ways to describe the experience, with both Benji and Tomas feeling strange as they’re

Welcome to the first chapter commentary for THE MEMORY THIEF. I’m going to be doing these periodically over the next while as we gear up for the sequel (coming summer 2018!). I’ve done these for my books in the past (VODNIK has a series of them, as does CAVERN OF BABEL). Basically, I take a look at each book chapter by chapter, talking about changes I made to the novel or how characters came to be. Sometimes there will be some deleted scenes. Sometimes I’ll use a point to talk about writing in general. Whatever takes my fancy. Why? Because