June 16th marks the 10th anniversary of In Search of the Nobility, TX Wildman‘s publication! It’s been a long, strange road for this one. Not quite horror, the novella is more of a literary comedy about failure and existential terror. Maverick Casey’s search for Bigfoot can be a metaphor for every goal you’ve put everything into, but still come up short. This started as a short film script. Later, when staying at a playwriting retreat in Virginia, I made it into a full-length play. Called In Search of the Amherst County Wildman, it managed a couple of readings (one of which is currently still on YouTube somewhere). 2016 I made it into a novel.
I think it works great as a novel, and might be the best thing I’ve written. While it’s not a horror, it’s about the thing that scares me most: failure. Funny story, I was pursing representation and traditional publication with it, when I read about a movie being made with a similar plot and a stacked cast. I panicked, assuming this would be popular and I would always be accused of ripping it off. I self-published the novel, starting my journey with prose that continued with Apartment 239, my short story collections and kids books, and my weird fiction novellas. The movie? Dropped unceremoniously on Hallmark years later after a dramatic re-edit. Apparently, nothing to write home about.
More Wildman lives on! This is a new edit, new cover, and for the next five days, it’s free on Amazon. Enjoy!
