As I started the process of writing my novel, I only knew it would involve a road trip and a prize winning chili.

The first sentence came to mind immediately as a way of expressing the undertaking and seemed true not only of my character’s journey, but that of nearly everyone. I loved the cadence of it, which suggested the feeling of rolling wheels and reminded me of Coleridge’s Kubla Khan. I decided all the narrative passages taking place in the car ought to have the same rhythm to them, though I found I had to sound out every sentence until it just came naturally. I let each line suggest the next, until I had drawn my main character; his comportment, background, situation, attire, and finally, his various voices.

The first two paragraphs establish the pattern of the humor in the novel. It deals with Eddie’s grandiosity, and how his self-image is undermined by subsequent revelations and events. He isn’t meant to be likable, at first; only to be recognizable as the sort of self-entitled prick normal people aspire to take down a notch or two.

Moonbeam Highway