Joe College, Part 2 (2021 revision)

When I started this project, it was intentionally casual, intended to be a slight personal distraction, built on the premise of writing a raunchy campus comedy (Van Wilder, Animal House, etc.) with a gay protagonist.  That changed when I figured out Matt Canetti and Chris Riis.  They felt too big and too human, the characters' interactions were too genuine, and the whole project sprawled.  Here we are, thirteen bittersweet years later.

I've been re-reading parts of the story over the summer, both with an eye toward what I'll need to do when I eventually revise it, but also to reconnect with the early chapters as I bring this to a close.  The last couple of years have been rough for everyone.  It's brought too much cynicism into my outline for the end.  I needed to get back in touch with my guys.

Some of it holds up pretty well!  The second part does not.  Because it was written with an eye to raunch and mild amusement, the voice was a mess, Joe faced no consequence for his misdeeds toward Andy, and important details were glanced over.  The sex passages felt mechanical, joyless.  Some of the dialogue was atrocious.  And it wasn't even funny.  Joe didn't display the idiosyncrasies I later discovered.  Andy Trafford seemed empty.

About a month ago, I started playing around and overhauled the second part in a few days.  I've been rereading and tweaking ever since, not just because I'm being neurotic, but because it felt nice to spend time with these guys.  Like exiting a time machine and having new adventures with old friends.  

The original chapter two embarrasses me.  The new one does not.  Hope you enjoy.

Joe College during Covid lockdown

During the lockdown, I sometimes thought about my characters -- where they'd be, what they talked about, how they organized their lives during that time.  It was a gentle distraction.  Sometimes it helped me sort out their story trajectories.

Does it make sense to post installments that jump ten years into the future from my most recent chapter?  Is it a productive use of my writing energy, when I could be pushing the story toward the finish line instead?  Who knows.  Probably not!  But I'm not beholden to a publisher, editor, agent, or schedule, and my only remuneration is e-mails and comments.

I don't think of my story as capable of having spoilers in the traditional sense.  If you want to be surprised in real time by how it unfolds, you can wait and read this later, in the normal order.  At most, you could infer my general intentions of who will be in the picture and what they'll be up to later in the story.  I'm not filling in background or providing exposition, beyond what people experience this spring.

I'll keep adding to this post.  My thinking is that this section will run from New York's shutdown order of March 20 through the end of the curfew imposed on the City's protestors a few weeks ago.  I'd like to claim that I'm writing this solely for myself, as a way of making sense of what just happened, through the idealized and somewhat more comfortable world I've created for the characters.  Writing it feels cathartic.  But if I were doing it solely for my mental health, I wouldn't feel compelled to share it as a work in progress.

Second installment; June 30, 2020

Third installment: July 13, 2020

Chapter 34 is posted.

Available here.

Chapter 33 is posted.

Here's the link.

Chapter 32 is posted.

Here's the link.

What's up, everybody?  Is anyone still here?  It's been 33 short months since the last installment.  Given that wait, I feel like whatever I cooked up was bound to be underwhelming -- short of Daenerys sitting on the Iron Throne and Jon Snow hooking up with Gendry, which definitely happens.

I've also been avoiding e-mails and comments recently, in order to make sure that any feedback didn't distract from my efforts to hammer this out.  I skimmed through them today, and thankfully no one was too threatening or frustrated.  Sorry if I've left you hanging, but, you know.

The next chapter will be graduation, so I expect a lot to happen.  How much actually gets resolved is harder to say.  I expect three or four more installments altogether.  Thanks as always.

Chapter 31 is posted.

Here's the link.

Chapter 30 will post soon.

It's done and e-mailed in for posting.  I may not be on my laptop for awhile, so can't update with a definite link, but I assume it will be posted at this link within 48 hours.  If not that link, you should be able to find it.

Apparently it's been seven months since my last chapter, and this one will probably seem anti-climactic!  Sorry about that.  It was supposed to be the first half of a longer chapter, but it developed its own story arc that stands alone.

The next chapter is one I've been waiting for years to write, like Chapter 16, Chapter 25 and Chapter 28.  Those chapters almost wrote themselves.  I'm hoping the same will be true here, but I never really know.

Thanks for your patience.  I think that there are only (?) nine chapters left.  If you're digging the story, the waits are probably frustrating, but we're all going to miss this when it's over.

Chapter 29 is posted.

Here it is.

Chapter 28 is posted.

It's available here.

Opposing views on Chris Riis

A couple of different takes on Chris popped up in the comments to my last post.

Opinion A:

Also if Joe and Chris don't end up entwined, you're going to have to write an alternative ending just so I can cope emotionally and continue with my day.

***

I hope, I pray that Chris sees that he loves Joe so much. And I know it's not going to end with Joe and Chris happily ever after- but god I wish I could change it so they could.

Opinion B:

Why anyone would want Joe to end up with a guano-head like Chris is beyond me. The story is about Joe's growth, and it's obviously bringing him to a point at which he's worthy of Andy. Chris - despite the fact that he's a fucked-up child and therefore deserving of sympathy, like the rest of us - is a means to an end.

Judging from the e-mails and comments, Chris and Andy are the two characters that people seem to really, really like -- although Chris also has a lot of detractors.  For me, it's just cool that people have a strong feeling one way or another.  Anybody else feel like giving their opinion?

Myself, I fucking love all of these characters, including Joe's asshole brother Rob.

I also want to mention that Chapter 28 should be done and posted soon-ish.  Not necessarily this weekend, or even the weekend after, but it's around 80% complete and the rest is falling into place.