For the love of Pete. Seriously. I guess it just goes to illustrate the idiom of “… the best laid plans.”

As I’ve been whining about for months now, I have a deadline. A firm deadline. Well, mostly firm. The firmer date that sources the deadline is the release date of the forthcoming true crime book I’m supposedly writing. That is firm. Set in stone.

So, because this writer is just oh-so organized and disciplined, I set the deadline of finishing my first draft according to the estimated time it should take to actually write it, have it edited, commission the cover, get some marketing materials (including teasers) ready, etc. My fellow writers know the drill all too well. And when all was said and done, I concluded that I needed to start writing on April 1^st to reach an easy finish date of around the end of September.

What. Ever.

I won’t bore everyone by replaying the February – April mess that is my personal life. Frankly, I almost never even have a personal life. I don’t “hang out” with friends. I don’t talk on the phone much except to my manager. My husband and I only rarely have nights out (he’s gone a lot – I’m a railroader widow). Basically, if I interact with anyone, it’s other writers in the course of writing or planning the next book. I mean, I have a dog I spoil, but that’s really the gist of it. But man oh man. This year – a beloved “odd year” for those who follow this blog – has really done a number on me.

So okay, fine. I’m finding my feet again and am sort of back in the proverbial groove. Yes, there are a couple of family issues I’m still having to handle but that’s about it. For some reason, though, I’ve had a tough time sitting down to do the actual work.

To bring you up to date regarding the nail-biter interview I’d anticipated when I wrote last month’s post, YES. The interview took place. In fact, it might be the most consequential interview I’ve conducted to date. I’d really only needed to speak to this person because there were a couple of things I needed him to say to me. Things I’d already heard, but weren’t mine to share. Confidential unless he told me himself. But I needed those things. Until the actual information spilled from his lips, I doubted I’d get them. I did, though.

What I didn’t count on during that interview, however, was the additional information he gave me. I’ve been working on a theory about the case. A theory I most desperately don’t want to be true. Unfortunately, at every turn, it seems to be more and more likely. If it’s true, well … let’s not get ahead of ourselves.

Because of these revelations, I’ve had to conduct even more interviews and do more traveling. I find myself on regular hours-long calls with someone who is assisting me with information. I also have to re-interview someone who could be key in confirming the worst. I won’t lie. If it’s true, and if that person has to say so, things could get very uncomfortable pretty quick.

The point of all this is that everything I’m researching is pushing out the actual writing. My big victory, I suppose, is that I finally finished Chapter 1. Woo-hoo, right? One whole chapter. It won’t be the most popular chapter in the book. In fact, it’ll likely be a head-scratcher. Why? Because even though this is “true crime,” I’m starting with history and geography. I am fully persuaded that folks who are curious about these murders and why they haven’t been solved in nearly a half-century need to understand who and where they’re dealing with.

It’s a cluster. I’ve said it before. The deeper one gets into this case, the more convoluted it becomes. Had I not had an epiphany one night many months ago that prompted me to outline the book, I don’t know if I could get this organized in my head. That’s the biggest victory in this project, to be honest. It demands organization.

The irony is, as a novelist, I may be uniquely qualified to get this done. I’ve become convinced that laying out the facts (and face it – many already have) is insufficient. This case must be written as a story. I’m not talking about trying to Truman Capote it. That’s not what I’m doing. But I do need to start at the beginning and tell the tale and how things evolved. The people involved need to be fully seen – the cops, the victims, the families, those making witness statements, everyone. Now, I won’t have complete family histories and backstories on everyone, but I will be able to demonstrate enough about who they are to explain why they matter.

This is one reason I’ve been trying to track down folks to interview them. There’s a ton of information out there. I don’t need to ask about established facts. We have enough of that. I need to find out who these folks are and, in some cases, I need them to explain why they’ve given conflicting information over time.

Most folks I’ve tried to interview have been great. Very helpful. There are two people, however, who have dangled a carrot in my face for many months: one, for about twenty-one months; the other, for about three months. Both, pivotal. And both, I’m giving up on.

It seems there are evolving two camps of people in this case. On one side, there are those who sincerely want to help the victims’ families find answers and heal. On the other side are people who have, or have accumulated, a lot of good information but refuse to share it. The whole, “I know something that you don’t know” game. They hoard their discoveries like doomsday preppers. Why? What do they gain? I don’t know. And frankly, I’m at a place where I no longer care. I have the documentation that I’ve tried to get them to speak to me. And I have the proof they’ve initially agreed before ghosting me (or, in one case, having their wife call to try to bully me).

Fair enough. Ghost me. I’ll be calling you out. By name. If you don’t like it, sue me. I’ll meet you in the discovery phase. I’ll bring snacks.

For a long time, I had to figure out my role in this whole thing. I finally realized that I don’t have to solve this case. I’m not a detective. To be perfectly honest, I believe it’s already been solved (other than the aforementioned person who fuels my theory). There are a lot of reasons it hasn’t been official, and I’ll get into that in the book. One reason, though, is “the game.” It’s as if those involved have forgotten that real people, with real lives, were murdered – three in a cabin in the woods, and the other dumped near a campsite one county over. Families were fractured over this. Hell, an entire county was fractured.

Why would I not call out those who thrill at the “gotcha!” of withholding information just to try to make themselves look and feel superior?

All I know is that my position in this is getting clearer. And stronger. I don’t have to have all the answers, and I don’t have to have all the facts. I just need to report out how the whole thing started, what happened, and who might have the answers that are derailing a resolution. It’s going to be compelling reading. It’s also going to earn me a fair amount of criticism. So be it. One of my all-time favorite quotes is, “… let justice be done though the heavens fall.”

Anyway, I’m one chapter in and ready to move forward. Nothing’s going to break my stride.

More to come next month.