The Comfort of Old Friends

Taking a break from writing the other night, I looked over to my bookshelf and a book called out to me. Wondering what it had to say, I went over, picked it up, and ten minutes later I found myself deep in an adventure whose outcome I knew very well.

I had read “Plan B”, by Sharon Lee and Steve Miller, many times previously, so why did I pick it up? Why read it again? Back in the late 1980s-early 1990s, I worked on the DEWLine (Distant Early Warning Line), a chain of radar stations across the north of Alaska, Canada, and across Greenland, built to give warning of Soviet bombers coming over the pole to attack North America. A friend and co-worker, Keith, mentioned that he didn’t re-read books or re-watch movies. He didn’t seem to understand why I did, and I didn’t understand why he didn’t.

Each Canadian DEWLine Station had a library of sorts. Each month, each station would get ten new books. They’d usually consist of a non-fiction, a couple of best sellers, a couple of genre fiction books, and a few Romance books.

Why we ended up with so many Romance books, I don’t know. At any given time there were approximately 400 people on the 21 Canadaian DEWLine stations, and maybe seven or eight were women, and those mostly at one of the four Main Sites, not at the 17 Auxiliary Sites (10-14 man stations). One day I opened the box and found a copy of “How to Meet and Marry the Man of Your Choice”. I later discovered it at another station as well, so I had visions of that same book arriving at all 21 stations, and the guys standing around wondering why HQ would think this was a good idea. Being a voracious reader at the time, and deciding that knowing how ‘the other side’ thought, what tactics they might use, could bring me advantage, I read the damn thing, anyway. But I digress.

At one station, I picked up a copy of “Carpe Diem” by the above mentioned Sharon Lee and Steve Miller, and I fell in love with the characters, their tribulations, and their Universe. The next time I went South (going South meant holidays or ‘leave’ to Dewliners), I searched for and found “Agent of Change” the book that came before “Carpe Diem”, and I continued looking for several years before I found their 3rd book. I re-read those two books several times – as I tend to do – while working in the north.

If an author does it well, characters become like old friends, which makes the books old friends, too. And old friends tell each other stories – often over and over again through the years. Those on the receiving end usually listen politely, as if they had not heard of that particular incident a dozen or more times previously. That’s one of the duties of friendship. It’s all well and good if the storyteller has talent, and can draw you in, make you feel you were actually there; it’s something quite different if this is not the case. Then, you can tell the depth of that friendship. Lee & Miller have talent. As I mentioned in a previous post, stories give our lives meaning, give us a sense of progression, not just a feeling of random reactions to a series of random events. I could relate to the meaning in the lives of Val Con and Miri. They became my friends.

Someone, whose name escapes me at present, when asked why he was friends with another person, replied, “He listens to my stories.” Paraphrased, one could say, “He acknowledges that my life has meaning,” and that's a rare and wondrous gift.

Reading a new book, a new story, brings excitement, the wonder of a new world, the thrill of the unknown unfolding before one. Re-reading a book brings the comfort of the familiar, the satisfaction of living once more in a world you know well. It also allows more time for thought, and one sometimes peels away another layer of the onion that the author has presented. And then the jewel shines once more. And now, I think I understand Keith better. He desired the thrill of the unknown. I’ve not heard of or from him in over twenty years. I wonder if he has changed in this regard. I wonder if he now likes comfort as well as thrill.

So, I picked up “Plan B” for comfort, and perhaps to see if my life experience since the last time I picked it up would bring new meaning to some of the nuances of the story. And I wished to see if the jewel would shine again.

I have found that the same thing occurs with the books that I write. I reread them, too, upon occasion – not to compare my craftsmanship then with my more developed skills now, not to look for errors or places that I might have done better, but for the story. As I’m now writing another book in the ‘Courtesan – Pelgraff’ universe, I occasionally need to reference something that happened, and thus turn to the original documents. I have to take care, otherwise I get caught up in that story once again and an hour or more will pass before I get back to the job at hand.

Sometimes I get surprises. “Wow! I wrote that?” But it shouldn’t surprise me; I write the stories that I want to read. They should, therefore, attract me, draw me in, make me want to live again with ‘Mad Dog’ McLean, Mart Britlot, or Karsten and Arialla. They are old friends, comfortable friends. And they still speak to me.

I hope they still speak to others, too. And I hope that people new to my works will begin with the thrill of the unknown, and then progress to the comfort of the familiar for times they wish to once again live with old friends.

Whatever book you read, I wish for you the joy of discovery, and the making of new friends.

D.A. Boulter

For an update on my progress, check the ‘news’ section of this blog.