Train of Thought

crossings: a metaphor

In the French countryside, at railroad crossings, you may encounter this sign:

UN TRAIN PEUT EN CACHER UN AUTRE

Literally “One train might be hiding another”.

A warning to drivers and pedestrians not to rush through as soon as a train has cleared the crossing, because another one might be barreling in.

These signs started appearing in the late 1950s. France had over 30,000 railroad crossings at the time, half of them were manned, and only a few hundreds were automatic. Railroad engineers were required to blow the whistle as they approached the crossing. Needless to say, accidents happened. With half the number of crossings remaining in place today, and most of them being automatic, accidents still happen.

And the warning signs are still there.

As a kid, sitting in the back of the car, taking in the landscape, being bored by the long trip, I read every sign in sight. This one, with its suggestion of a train in hiding, skulking, intrigued me. It was strange, tickling scary, and darkly poetic.

(the picture below is not from France, that’s near Marfa, Texas, in case you wonder about the vegetation)

An invisible mechanical monster, a ghost train, steaming with hunger, laying in wait, idling, ready to pounce on the unsuspecting prey that would set foot, or tire, on the rails. It sure didn’t look like The Little Engine That Could or Thomas the Tank Engine®.

I already had a strong affinity for “le fantastique”. The foggy northern latitudes of my birth are conducive to these kinds of mental meanderings as a rich crop of writers and artists (symbolists, surrealists) amply demonstrates. You may know some of them—Jean Ray (Malpertuis), Michel de Ghelderode (La Ballade du Grand Macabre), James Ensor, Paul Delvaux (who put lots of trains and train stations in his paintings), Maurice Maeterlinck, the Art Nouveau phantasmagories of architect Victor Horta … The list is long, these are the names that spring to mind.

There’s something in the air over there that makes nightscapes shiver, a place, as I wrote in a query letter once:

… where disquiet simmers beneath respectability, and stubborn rain blots out the narrow horizon.

That query for one of my PI books didn’t land me an agent, by the way. (The story was deemed too violent. That was after, in another attempt at representation, I was advised to raise the stakes. I guess I overcompensated and raised them a tad too much 🤪.)

These days, when that railroad sign comes to mind, I no longer picture a homicidal ghost train. The meaning of the warning has broadened. It has morphed into a metaphor for being blindsided.

Focusing so much on a project, being so absorbed by it, that you don’t see the problems at the periphery, the signs of trouble. Anybody who’s ever been fully invested in making something work will understand what I mean. It’s full speed ahead, hope and adrenaline pulsing, feeling good and confident.

Right …

Until you catch a glimpse out of the corner of your eye. You have a hunch all is not well in Wonderland. You may have been blindsided. Luckily it’s rarely as terminal as being flattened by an incoming train. But it can be painful.

My 2023 year-in-review is practically a case story. Let me explain.

I signed a contract with a publisher for a book series over two years ago. Big exciting project. All ready to go. Then nothing. The book did not materialize. The contract expired. There were warning signs (that corner of the eye thing), but publishing is so freaking slow I didn’t worry right away. Crushed hopes, ouch. When I was done biting my nails (it took a while, nobody wants to mothball a dream), I made a lateral move. I switched tracks.

I’d been playing with the idea of doing a short story collection for a while. Wordwooze Publishing was interested. Family and Other Ailments (Crime stories close to home) came out in August. It’s available in paperback, eBook, and Audio book. Reviews are coming in. They make me smile. The book that never was (the train that didn’t reach the station) receded in the distance.

And then—because once you shrug off the mishaps, things tend to happen—I signed a contract with Shotgun Honey for the publication of the first Declan Shaw book, a Houston crime story. Publication is scheduled for August. The folks at Shotgun Honey are fantastic and I’m stoked to join a roster of wildly talented writers. Have a look at their list.

So in fine, 2023 was not a train wreck. It was a rollercoaster. I guess that was the thing on wheels hiding in the background. Last January, I wasn’t expecting any of that stuff. Talk about being blindsided …

A new short story

This story was published last week by The Yard: Crime Blog. It’s a retro-noir featuring my San Francisco cop, Tom Keegan: The Sunny Side of the Street (free to read). People are asking me why Tom doesn’t get a book of his own. Maybe … maybe … something to think about.

What I’ve been reading

I burned through Blacktop Wasteland, by S.A. Cosby. If you like propulsive noir and rich characters, you’re in for a treat.

I changed pace and genre with The Hunger, by Alma Katsu. A re-imagining of the Donner Party. Horror, and a lot more. It’s a smart and brilliant book.

I finished my current reading splurge with Brett Lovell’s A Bad and Dangerous Man. Based on a real life event, a shooting in a courtroom in 1911 in Appalachia. Tradition and the modern world on a collision course. A great read.