The primary aim of the "Novel Excerpts" blog category is to showcase my creative writing, specifically from the novels I've written. Hopefully, these posts will provide a glimpse into my storytelling style, themes, and narrative skills. It's an opportunity to share my artistic expressions and the worlds I've created through my novels.
The Boaz Stenographer, written in 2018, is my fourth novel. I'll post a chapter a day over the next few weeks.
Book Blurb
Walt Shepherd, a 35 year veteran of the White House’s stenographic team, is fired by President Andrew Kane for refusing to lie.
Walt returns to his hometown of Boaz, Alabama and renews his relationship with Regina Gillan, his high school sweetheart, who he had ditched right before graduation to marry the daughter of a prominent local businessman. Regina has recently moved back to Boaz after forty years in Chicago working at the Tribune. She is now editor of the Sand Mountain Reporter, a local newspaper.
Walt and Regina’s relationship transforms into a once in life love at the same time they are being immersed in a growing local and national divide between Democrats and traditional Republicans, and extremist Republicans (known as Kanites) who are becoming more dogmatic about the revolution that began during President Kanes campaign.
Walt accepts two part-time jobs. One as a stenography instructor at Snead State Community College in Boaz, and one as an itinerant stenographer with Rains & Associates out of Birmingham.
Walt later learns the owner of Rains & Associates is also one of five men who created the Constitution Foundation and is involved in a sinister plot to destroy President Kane, but is using an unorthodox method to achieve its objective. The Foundation is doing everything it can to prevent President Kane from being reelected in 2020, and is scheming to initiate a civil war that will hopefully restore allegiance to the U.S. Constitution.
While Walt is writing a book, The Coming Civil War, he is, unwittingly, gathering key information for the Constitution Foundation.
Will Walt discover a connection between the Foundation and the deaths of three U.S. Congressmen in time to save his relationship with Regina, prevent President Kane from being reelected as the defacto head of a Christian theocracy, and the eruption of a civil war that could destroy the Nation ?
Chapter 31
The first few weeks of the Boaz Stenographer column were bland at best. The Sand Mountain Reporter selection committee consisted of the senior sports reporter, the Classified-Ad saleslady, and Delton Kittle, the crime reporter. One week the committee choose an entry by Tony Sasser, “the City of Boaz is an idiot for turning down a two million dollar offer from Frank at the Bowling Alley.” Another week, the committee selected a submission by Randy Goings, “Yesterday’s double rainbow. More evidence of God’s unending love.” I was thankful Regina hadn’t asked me to write the SMR’s weekly response column before now.
This week’s selection was submitted by Dale Engles, “If you don’t like statutes of Robert E. Lee and other Confederate soldiers, then get the hell out of the south. There’s plenty of places for you to live in the North.” Finally, something to write about. I needed to conduct my pre-writing first, so I checked out Mr. Engle’s Facebook Page. No doubt he is a devout Christian. He often posts about God this or God that.
So far Engles fit the profile. First, virtually everyone in the South, certainly around Boaz, is a Christian fundamentalist. This means they believe the Bible was written by God, is without error, and is to be taken literally. Yes, these folks believe in a literal Adam and Eve, and Noah’s Ark. I assume Engles is like most all other Jesus believers, he believes God is in control. He has a plan for every follower. Even when the worst things happen, like recently, when the local and beloved football coach died at thirty-nine, God was simply revealing His endless mercy and love. This was the case, even though hundreds had taken to Facebook to shout their support and to declare their undying commitment to pray for the cancer-stricken coach. I have yet to see a single comment that even hints the question why didn’t prayer work.
I was now on a rabbit trail. It was early Sunday morning, way before daylight, and I had to have a draft to Regina by late afternoon, and I had more important things to do today. I returned to Engle’s statement: “If you don’t like statutes of Robert E. Lee and other
Confederate soldiers, then get the hell out of the south. There’s plenty of places for you to live in the North.” I easily concluded this wasn’t the statement of a rational human being. My response had to be, that was what Regina had charged me with when I accepted her offer to prepare a response to the weekly selected statement. A statement that was supposed to be something that a Boaz resident had said, written, or seen or heard locally or nationally. This requirement tied to the name, the Boaz Stenographer. The person submitting the quote had to be totally accurate, since that’s what a real stenographer does, he takes down verbal statements exactly, without change.
I knew Engle’s statement screamed for me to address Robert E. Lee himself. No doubt, he had a great reputation in the South. I assume the general opinion throughout the South, especially among the less educated, is that secession was totally justified. Who were the damn Yankees to tell us Southern plantation owners that we could no longer own slaves? Hell, the Bible supports slavery. No matter what wonderful things that could be said about Mr. Lee, there are a few things that cannot be argued. Unlike George Washington and Thomas Jefferson, both slave-owners themselves, Lee was the only one of these who choose to fight against his country and kill hundreds of thousands of his fellow Americans to preserve his right to own and sell slaves. It was Lee who chose to fight for his fellow Southerners right to sell a black mother to one buyer, and her child to another buyer. Lee was a Virginian and a U.S. army officer before the Civil War started. Both he and Grant were graduates of West Point. Lee could have remained in the federal army and fought to protect the United States of America. Over forty percent of Virginian’s did just that. There is no doubt Robert E. Lee was guilty of treason. Even though he was indicted, he was never prosecuted because General Grant persuaded President Johnson otherwise. Lee’s troops killed at least 360,000 Union soldiers, and Lee led approximately 260,000 Confederate soldiers to their death. Lee’s legacy lives on to this day.
During my research, I found a letter allegedly written in 1856 by Robert E. Lee to then President Pierce. “The blacks are immeasurably better off here than in Africa, morally, physically, and socially. The painful discipline they are undergoing is necessary for their further instruction as a race, and will prepare them, I hope, for better things. How long their servitude may be necessary is known and ordered by a merciful Providence.”
Why did Lee choose to lead the Southern army; was it because of his allegiance to state’s rights? Maybe. If so, he allowed that allegiance to lessen his sympathy toward the suffering slave (which appears to reconcile with what he wrote above). All I could think about was the overwhelming pain and suffering multitudes of blacks endured at the hands of Southern whites/slave-owners–probably, including my own ancestors. Seems to me, I have a lot to be ashamed of and therefore, I should do my best to be slow to speak and quick to learn. Finally, I suspect Robert E. Lee was like most of us, a mix of good and bad, most likely an honorable man. Of course, we all know honorable men are men; they can be wrong. If I had to vote right now whether to leave the Civil War statutes, I would vote yes, leave them. But, that vote wouldn’t represent the result of my careful research and analysis.
The sad thing is that Mr. Engles probably doesn’t care about these facts at all. He has this warped opinion, generated by years of brainwashing, indoctrination, poor education, all included within Christian fundamentalism, that facts and truth don’t really matter. Of course, he would argue differently. He would likely argue, as Lee himself did, that the black man was far better off on a Southern plantation than he was when he was in Africa.
No doubt, Robert E. Lee and Dale Engles, grounded their worldview in scripture. As Lee stated, God was in control, and, if he chose, would free the black slaves in good time. Engles, likewise, would argue for the wisdom of a providential God. Engles didn’t say it but it appeared certain he would argue that if a person is against the Robert E. Lee statute then he is against God. And, Engles wasn’t the only one who likely thought this. I counted over forty comments from others in the Boaz community who felt the same way. Sissy Peterson said, “God works in mysterious ways. Sometimes it is God’s will that thousands are killed. Just look at His commands to the Israelites to wipe out every man, woman, and child in Canaan. But, no matter, God is good, He is Holy good.”
I felt like my little brainstorming adventure had given me enough ideas that I could develop an outline. Writing my article would be the easy part. But, I could do that later. Now, I was sleepy. I walked back upstairs from my study and lay back across the bed. The first rays of the sun were just appearing through a small crack in the blinds. As I tried to doze back off, I couldn’t help but associate Dale Engles with President Kane. No doubt, Engles would be a huge fan. When facts, truth, and reason are relegated to the waste bin, one cockamamie opinion is as good as another.
The Pencil-Driven Life 