I’ve written what might be the beginning of the Western. If not the beginning, a starting point (and it’s true, you do have to start somewhere). I have a long way to go with the research, and I’d rather be farther along with research before starting. Details are coalescing, year, setting, character…Texas Gulf Coast, 1888..but a lot to be determined. Like, most of it.
No title yet. Sometimes I have a title before I start, sometimes I can’t think of one at all. I might give this a one word, character’s last name title, like a Louis L’Amour Western. I just read his novel Matagorda, which was a lot like a lot of his books: Good Honest Man Gets The Job Done, with lots of repetition about how he came to Texas to be a partner on a cattle drive, not get involved in a feud, but, would you believe it—he got involved in the feud, and his fiancé came from Virginia to Indianola right before the hurricane destroyed the town, and somehow, she knew about the feud before she got there, but he hadn’t. Still, I’d love to be able to write about landscape the way he did.
First person or third? I started with third person, but I’ve been reading Dashiell Hammett’s Continental Op stories and like the style of having anonymous first person narrator (though that would interfere with the idea of a last-name title—or would it?).
Laconic Writer 
“Good Honest Man Gets The Job Done” sounds like someone I know. I can’t wait to read it!
Neither detective stories or westerns are my usual reading fare, so I cannot add much to that discussion. I would, however, like to talk about first person and third person narratives. Why is it many publishers will not accept first person manuscripts? For me, it seems easiest to write in first person because the point of view is clear-cut. A third person has to know “more,” right? Must that point of view be always omnipresent? This is confusing to me in many aspects.
Hi Marilu, thanks for commenting. I’m not sure I understand what you’re asking. Why do you think that many publishers won’t accept something in first person? I really doubt anyone bases a decision on that.
First person, you’re clearly in someone’s head. Third person has more variation. You can be inside or outside someone’s head. I’m not prepared to explain it all, but it’s likely that there are a lot of good websites that do.
I just happened to notice that publishers wouldn’t accept first person and wonderd why. This was a few years ago…I noticed I tended to always write in the first person because it seemed easier. I made a conscious effort to write in third person and found it wasn’t as difficult as I imagined.
I just finished Circus and really liked the ending!