Three pears

This is one of my favorite photographs - taken in a house I once owned in Kalamazoo with my beloved Canon Rebel film camera.

The Amazing Force of Gravity

I've decided to call this blog "The Amazing Force of Gravity" because that's the name of the first (unpublished) book I wrote. It turns out the book wasn't very good, but I still like the title.

I took the title from a billboard for a place called "Mystery Hill" - one of those roadside attractions that are built with everything off-kilter. Mystery Hill is located in an area of southern Michigan known as the Irish Hills. I remember going to a similar place called "Mystery Spot" in Northern Michigan when I was a kid.

I'd listen attentively to the tour guides as they led us along and demonstrated astonishing things. Balls rolled uphill! People stood at imposible angles, and their height seemed to change. You could walk up the wall or sit on a chair balanced on its back legs, your feet dangling in mid air.

I knew it was a trick, but half-believed the "theories" about magnetized mineral deposits, fallen meteorites, and the deflection of gravational forces.

In my book I had the main character fall in love with a guy who's family owned and operated Mystery Hill. (Though in the book I called it "Mystery Ridge") It was fun to write a sex scene that took place inside Mystery Hill, and I also intended the place to represent the character's life: not quite what it seems. The Amazing Force of Gravity was about a character who is drawn toward her true self, as if by an unavoidable force.

I thought it was pretty clever, but it wasn't clever enough. I worked on it for two years, collected a big stack of rejections from agents, and then finally gave up and moved on. Though I'm still fond of that book for what it taught me about writing and the writing life.