The Return Trip

To create the flawed character of Ray James, the protagonist in The Return Trip, I drew on the advice of substance-abuse counselors, psychological and behavioral studies, internal energy arts training, holistic health gurus, and my own experiences dealing with alcohol and other drugs. For all its sexual adventurism and political intrigue, The Return Trip at its heart is about overcoming addiction.

When he learned alcohol already had damaged his liver, and was told he must quit drinking or start writing his obituary, Ray went into denial immediately. He resisted efforts by friends and his devoted daughter to persuade him to change his ways. Like any addict, Ray dismissed warning signs and embraced whatever behavior gave him pleasure.

In literature, Ray James is an unreliable narrator whose first-person, present-tense story is propelled by his addictions, and the narcissistic and self-absorbed impulses they feed, and is filtered through his altered states of consciousness. I balanced Ray’s skewed personal narrative by adding seven objective accounts from other characters, people who were trying to help him.

It didn’t escape me that, while I was plotting Ray’s passage from doomed substance misuser to survivor, I was conjuring my own destructive spirits, and studying what I should do to drive them away for good. Ray’s story is over (maybe), but mine is very much a work in progress.

With this blog, Off the Road, I’ve committed to stop, look and listen as I begin to plow into a new novel. The first stop has been disposing of alcohol two months earlier than the usual New Year’s resolution, and this time for good, I’ve resolved. I frankly don’t have a good record with this resolution, which I make every year at least once. I went an entire year one time, and have sustained it for months at a time. This year I logged only a Dry January.

But I’m fully committed this year, thanks in large measure to the devotion of my daughter, who stopped drinking months ago after reading The Return Trip. We’ve inspired each other. I plan to return to the diet and exercise regimen that in 2019 helped me lose 30 pounds and regenerate my gut microbiome, before the pandemic blew away most such good intentions. Key to that result was avoiding alcohol, other sugars and salt. Whole foods are good, organic is best and processed food is the worst.

A principal lesson that Ray James took away from his Chinese healing guru in The Return Trip was the importance of choosing beneficial food, and I believe that’s a universal truth, even as we may instinctively gravitate to the mouth-watering stuff. Personally, I’m also adjusting to an evolving vegetarian lifestyle, as the chef in a household that otherwise shuns meat eating. Thankfully, fish is on the menu. Men may have evolved from hunters to gatherers, but we still must go fishing.

With Off the Road, I hope to establish a dialog with readers, and an understanding that I am a reliable narrator, even if my characters are off the rails. Please let me know what’s on your mind. Got any good recipes? Meditations?

Beginning in January, I will be serializing my new novel on this blog, and will ask readers for their comments and suggestions. Rather than wasting time with literary agents, most of whom I’ve discovered are only looking for formulaic fiction, I will crowd-source the publishing process as my novel comes together, playing show-and-tell with readers. I hope you will enjoy the blog, and pass it along to others who also may be interested in our discussion.

My new novel, as I’ve described before, is nearly 50 years in the making. It was conceived as a “Coming Home” story and became one of many Vietnam novels that didn’t get written, in my case, or didn’t get published, for other veterans trying to unravel what happened in the war. Some great ones were written, too. My novel focuses on the home front, in a small town on the Ohio River where people were celebrating the nation’s bicentennial, on July 4, 1976. But they had little cause to celebrate.

An Arab oil embargo created an energy crisis affecting communities across the United States. Nixon resigned in disgrace, Saigon fell and created a wave of boat people seeking asylum. Gerald Ford became a caretaker president and 17 Democrats vowed to replace him. Jimmy Carter came to town, riding down Main Street in a convertible waving to the crowd that lined the avenue.

But the headline was the word on the street: People were struggling. Not only veterans returning from war, but also young people who graduated high school and hit the road in search of work. Inflation was soaring with energy costs leading the way, and then the economy cratered in 1975. The Unemployment Office was a regular hangout for a group of young friends. A couple of local brothers wrote this song: