Fiction

After the Storm

Hank Garfield

Welcome to the new and improved Slower Traffic, 2021 edition. I hope you like the changes. If you’re here for the first time, thanks for taking a look. Please allow me to briefly re-introduce myself, and the blog.

Two questions I get fairly often. Yes, I am the Henry Garfield who writes the Moondog novels; and yes, I am a descendent of the 20th U.S. president.  I use Henry for the books and Hank for the blog, but most of my friends call me Hank.

I’m also the guy who lives in Maine without a car. The last year my name appeared on a valid car registration was 2006. In my home community this is still sometimes met with incredulity. “How do you do it?” people ask. Slower Traffic was born from that question.

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A Writer Writes about Writers Writing

Hank Garfield

No politics. No cars, trains, buses or bicycles. I’m too tired for any of that. November provided many challenges and anxieties, but I haven’t missed a calendar month since starting this blog in March 2015, and none of my excuses for skipping this one seem compelling.

One could say that teaching three writing classes on-line and trying to write a new novel in 30 days might get in the way of writing a blog post. But other people seem to manage more than one project at a time. I try to keep playing my guitar while there’s no one to listen, and I look at marine catalogues and on-line stores while my boat sits on stands, covered for the winter. 

There’s a thing in November, a challenge for writers to produce 1,666 words each day until the end of the month. It’s even got a name, National Novel Writing Month, and an acronym so unwieldy that I have to keep looking it up: NaNoWriMo. One would think an organization of and for writers might come up with something catchier. It’s like a good book with a lousy title. 

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QUEST for BEER: chapter 1

Hank Garfield

Somewhere in Mespotamia

Something like 12,000 years ago

Traffic was slow twelve thousand years ago. Most humans were hunter-gatherers, roaming the land on foot. But a hardy band of pioneers decided to try something new. They called it “agriculture.” They called it “civilization.”

But life was hard for the villagers. They had to contend with the vagaries of climate, their lack of knowledge, and the implacable opposition of their traditionalist peers. They were on the verge of giving up, until one of them made a discovery that might change the world…

QUEST FOR BEER

chapter 1

Rain came to the first agricultural settlement on Earth.

Thunder woke Sera in the predawn darkness. As thick raindrops fell on the thatch-and-mud roof of her dwelling, a flash of lightning illuminated the open doorway, from which the skin had been pulled back to admit the night air. On the mat beside her, Fredd snored gently, oblivious to the storm.

Sera sat up and drew the sheepskin blanket around her shoulders as the thunder boomed, louder and closer, echoing up and down the valley. The rain intensified. How could Fredd sleep through this? From a far corner, Sera’s ears picked up a new sound: the steady drip of rainwater working its way through the roof and falling on the dirt floor.

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