Exciting news. My review of Richard Cox’s new novel The Boys of Summer (it’s awesome, buy it here) and my interview with him has been published on The Weeklings literary website. Go here to read it.
Past writers who have appeared on The Weeklings include Owen King (son of Stephen—you may have heard of him), Diana Spechler, and Elissa Schappell et al. I’m privileged to be in such fine company.
Excerpt from the book review:
Richard Cox spins a cyclonic yarn of a tale in The Boys of Summer, which releases September 6, 2016, from Night Shade. As equally driven by plot as it is character, Richard Cox’s latest allegorical science fiction novel registers an EF-5 in excitement and non-stop action that will suck you in from page one and leave you shaken and never looking at the world the same by storm’s calm, earning itself a spot on a shelf-end display alongside masters of the genre Stephen King and Philip K. Dick.
A supernatural thriller set against the historical backdrop of Terrible Tuesday, the April 10, 1979 Red River Valley tornado outbreak in Wichita Falls, Texas, The Boys of Summer tells the coming-of-age story of a band of boys, “survivors” if you will, four years later in 1983 as 13-year-old Todd Willis awakens from a trancelike comatose state endowed with remarkable abilities that, at first, seem only weird and more mature for his age to his newfound adolescent friends in his neighborhood…
Excerpt from the interview:
You grew up in Texas, but now live in Oklahoma. Were you familiar with the events of 1979 in Wichita Falls, Texas? Was there any connection? The historical backdrop of Terrible Tuesday plays such a critical role at the onset of the novel.
My family is from the area, and lived in Wichita Falls during high school, but we didn’t live there when the tornado hit. However, we visited just a couple of days after Terrible Tuesday. The town was still off limits to non-residents, and in order for us to see the damage, my uncle had to drive to the city limits and pick us up. What I saw as we drove through a town that had nearly been wiped off the map—20,000 of the 100,000 residents were homeless after the storm—has stuck with me ever since.
That must have been pretty devastating to witness, even the aftermath.
It was the most damaging tornado in American history at the time, and wasn’t surpassed for more than twenty years.
How old were you?
I was eight. It’s part of the reason I became fascinated by the weather and eventually became a storm chaser.