War and Peace in Dodge is my first published novel. It was never meant to be first. However, all the Great American Novels I had planned over the previous years I couldn’t bring to completion. When the time came to launch New Brevet Publications, a draft of this book sat ready to hand. I launched it originally at the end of April 2018 and it was an instant success . . . with the nearly two dozen people who favored me with a purchase and thus secured their place in heaven (theologically speaking I am unable to confirm this at the present time, but I am grateful to those who gave me a chance).

The terrible thing about War and Peace in Dodge (henceforth WPD) is that I rushed it. The day after I pushed the “publish” button I figured out something I hadn’t added to the text. I was crushed. I felt sure the many readers I would get (the two dozen limitation was as yet unknown to me) would notice that something was amiss, wrong, missing, and throw down their formerly cherished treasures in disgust.

This vision of mine was not helped by the fact that within a month I had thought of no less than six things I should have written and included. I started keeping a list. Eventually I started a new copy of my Word document (tracking my changes) that was the more completed version that would be mine. It had to be just for me, because the chances of updating the text officially were slim. In the future, I counseled myself, perhaps it will happen.

A year later, in the spring of 2019, I was on an airplane from the Twin Cities to Nashville. I sat next to a fellow Minnesotan, a nice older lady with whom I struck up a conversation. We compared books. Soon we discovered we both liked reading about the Second World War.

“Oh,” I said, “I wrote a novel about a family feud in a parody of World War 2. The family has all these aunts and uncles representing people in the war. Uncle Frank is FDR, Aunt Winnie is Churchill, etc.”

She seemed interested. Her eyes were bright and wide, her smile too. She said, “Really? How interesting! Does it have Eisenhower? I like Eisenhower!”

Who doesn’t, am I right?

Well, except me, I guess, because it hit me hard in between my eyes (or maybe it was a gut-punch) that I hadn’t put Eisenhower in my book at all. I tried desperately to explain that I had to limit the number of characters, but the light went out in her eyes. I wrote down the name of the book for her, but my sales stayed at the same level.

When I was back home, I went back to my expanding revised text and figured out how the story actually called for a Cousin Isaac (the family called him “Ike” of course) and how well he fit into the book. I became disenchanted with not just my published book—feeling embarrassed and wanting to apologize to the two dozen—but my ability to write at all.

The time came this spring to refresh the whole text and go ahead and republish(1). Why I had rushed the first WPD and why this spring was the right time to put forth a revised WPD is another part of the story, one which I will save for another post.

(1) Note: If you are among the cherished original two dozen, you needn’t feel misused over this. You could probably read the new version and not notice much difference; it is more for the author’s eyes. However, if you feel strongly about this (bless you), please contact me and I will be happy to exchange your old book for a new one.