"Bob's Book"

 

Having by some inexplicable fluke of fortune gotten my little volume A Grave on Deacon’s Peak published with suspicious ease, I began writing, in October 2019, a proposed sequel, which would follow the further adventures of Bob Bellamy as he went to follow in his father’s footsteps and join the Department of Extranatural Affairs, or, as it is more informally known, the Bureau of Shadows. I had already produced a whole book’s worth of Bureau stories (many of them dealing with the Bellamy family) and spanning the centuries of the Bureau’s operations, and now I wanted to see if I could write a more direct, novel-length sequel to the first book. Unfortunately, I bogged down around Chapter Four nearly a year later. It had been coming along slowly, and I gave up in frustration, and let it go on hiatus.

Now, feeling antsy and thinking of taking up a summer project, I turn back to the provisionally title “Bob’s Book” and look at it once more. As I had it planned out, it would cover the first year of Bob’s apprenticeship at the Bureau, and involve his fellow apprentices and teachers, at first in a series of short adventures, but with an underlying plot below the surface that sneaks up and takes over the last few chapters.

I took out Chapter One, polished it up a bit, and present it here. Whether I do indeed take up the book again is at the moment a moot point; it depends partly on what (if any) reaction I get.