It’s ironic really. As mentioned in a prior column, November has been  National Novel Writing Month and this particular writer had decided to go at it full tilt. And as we came to the final day of that marathon of prose, and this particular  specimen of bloggery was due, what was he doing?  Well, since it’s now late Monday night, and all those folks who tuned in Monday morning to read Action Sherlock are gone, I can tell you the truth . . .

Having finished the required 50,000 word (and even an additional 104 for good measure) at 11:30 on Saturday night,  I awoke to find Peoria covered in white, our first snow of the year – and a good one at that! Taking the snow day as a sign that I was to goof off as much as possible in celebration of crossing the finish line, I did no writing whatsoever.  Not even to get this little bit done.

The odd thing was, I had come to enjoy the writing so very much in the previous month.  I was looking forward to the novel part getting over, so I could get back to some of that good old Sherlockian writing that I used to do outside of this massive  mob-driven medium we call the web.  But everybody needs a breather, so I can forgive Sunday . . .

Then came tonight.  Where to start with good old Sherlock Holmes? 

What’s the hot publication to write for in Sherlockian circles these days? Who are the writers setting the pace?  What publications am I even getting?  Do those things even matter?

Getting back to writing about Holmes and company requires a starting point. So I turned my mind back to days long past, and considered where I started then. The answer was pretty obvious . . . back to the shack.

A lot of people call the sixty tales of Sherlock Holmes “the Canon,” but I suspect I’m the only one that ever refers to it as “the shack.”

“The shack?” you ask,  “Could that possibly be a reference to an actual outbuilding, like Christopher Morley’s “Knothole” where he did so much of his writing?  A refuge where the words can flow freely?  Unfortunately, it’s nothing that architectural-literary.  The true origin of my mental shack is that I’ve always  held the odd delusion that  Kenny Loggins’s song, “Nobody’s Fool” was about Sherlockiana.

“Back to the shack,” the song goes. “Nothing suits me better than that.”

So it’s back to that shack built out of Watson’s words, to stare at the wallpaper and see what comes.  After 50,000 words pulled out of nothing at all,  it should be a piece of cake.

Your humble correspondent,
Brad Keefauver