HOMEPAGE CENTERVILLE BOOKS
Hugh Centerville is retired and lives in New York State's Hudson Valley. He likes, in no particular order, baseball, cats, tall spreading sycamores and old Indian stuff. His favorite all time book is The Last of the Mohicans.
Hugh Centerville is retired and lives in New York State's Hudson Valley. He likes, in no particular order, baseball, cats, tall spreading sycamores and old Indian stuff. His favorite all time book is The Last of the Mohicans.
Hi and welcome to Centervillebooks.com, an online bookstore featuring (exhaustively-edited,) indie books. What we are doing here is creating our own genres. (Or at least going where not so many have gone before.)
Our first attempt, our initial offering, The Denouement, is Christian theology/ mythology told as Epic Fantasy and judging from the reception we've received from fans of those 2 genres, we don't fit either, which is kind of both good and bad. Good because we've succeeded at our mission and bad because we haven't had much luck convincing fans of either genre to have a look at us.
Their loss, not ours.
We asked a friend of ours, a sword and sorcery nut, to read The Denouement and after we explained to him what it was about, he agreed to read it but said, before he started, that it'd be boring and we were like, how can you say it's boring, based on what it's about? Come on, man, say you don't have any interest in reading it, say it's a foolish idea, say it's not real sword and sorcery (or Christian fiction, either,) but don't say it's boring, at least not until you've read it.
I mean, nothing is inherently boring, right? Put a great idea into the hands of a lousy writer and you'll get a lousy book. Put a lousy idea into the hands of a great writer (and we're not calling ourselves great, or lousy,) and you'll get a great book. Or at least something readable.
But enough with the grousing. We asked for it.
Our second offering is Bobby Slater's World. It's the summer of 64 and Bobby Slater is a 13 year old boy whose crush, an Indian girl, is afflicted by a deadly curse. Bobby will fight to save his girl. Sounds like basic YA paranormal, eh? Uh, not quite. It's not written for kids, although they have responded positively. We call it paranormal boomer fiction, written for boomers like ourselves, the nearing/gone beyond 60 crowd. We don't think paranormal boomer fiction is its own genre, yet. We don't see it mentioned anywhere, but with 90 million boomers out there, don't you think we should have our own fiction genre?
Our third offering, Lottie Barrett Lives Again, (available mid to late spring, 2012,) is more paranormal boomer fiction, another 13 year old 1960s Bobby falling for a girl who's afflicted by a curse. She's been dead a 100 years and come back to life. She's a zombie, but what a zombie! She's no Eye-gor. She's cute and sweet and funny and Bobby is smitten, or is there a spell on him too? He's determined to accompany his girl when it's time for her to go back into the ground and it's on Bobby's big sister and his mom to save him, if they can just figure it all out.
Just as Bobby Slater's World is about long ago summers, Lottie Barrett Lives Again is about old time Halloweens and Thanksgivings and Christmases. And what both books are really about is small town, 1960s America.
And you know, with 2 1960s Bobbys, we've decided to go for yet a third 60s Bobby book, you know, make it a series, if not exactly a trilogy, and with only the vaguest idea what the final book will look like -- 1960s, a couple of 13 year old boys, 1 named Bobby, 1 named, oh, Dan, or Mike or something. The boys are best friends and Little League teammates chasing the local league's home run record, kind of an M and M boys thing. Bobby falls for a 13 year old maiden (that's what they called them, back when the girl lived the first time; yes, we're in the presence of yet another cute/sweet/funny zombie.) The maiden was sent to a sacrificial death over the waterfall behind the Little League park. She's back now, the boys see her, watching their ballgames from the decrepit wooden bleachers behind right field.
And after that? Well, after that we expect we'll be inventing yet another genre. We just don't know yet what it will be.
Anyway, there's plenty here about our books, so take a look, we'll appreciate it.
Our first attempt, our initial offering, The Denouement, is Christian theology/ mythology told as Epic Fantasy and judging from the reception we've received from fans of those 2 genres, we don't fit either, which is kind of both good and bad. Good because we've succeeded at our mission and bad because we haven't had much luck convincing fans of either genre to have a look at us.
Their loss, not ours.
We asked a friend of ours, a sword and sorcery nut, to read The Denouement and after we explained to him what it was about, he agreed to read it but said, before he started, that it'd be boring and we were like, how can you say it's boring, based on what it's about? Come on, man, say you don't have any interest in reading it, say it's a foolish idea, say it's not real sword and sorcery (or Christian fiction, either,) but don't say it's boring, at least not until you've read it.
I mean, nothing is inherently boring, right? Put a great idea into the hands of a lousy writer and you'll get a lousy book. Put a lousy idea into the hands of a great writer (and we're not calling ourselves great, or lousy,) and you'll get a great book. Or at least something readable.
But enough with the grousing. We asked for it.
Our second offering is Bobby Slater's World. It's the summer of 64 and Bobby Slater is a 13 year old boy whose crush, an Indian girl, is afflicted by a deadly curse. Bobby will fight to save his girl. Sounds like basic YA paranormal, eh? Uh, not quite. It's not written for kids, although they have responded positively. We call it paranormal boomer fiction, written for boomers like ourselves, the nearing/gone beyond 60 crowd. We don't think paranormal boomer fiction is its own genre, yet. We don't see it mentioned anywhere, but with 90 million boomers out there, don't you think we should have our own fiction genre?
Our third offering, Lottie Barrett Lives Again, (available mid to late spring, 2012,) is more paranormal boomer fiction, another 13 year old 1960s Bobby falling for a girl who's afflicted by a curse. She's been dead a 100 years and come back to life. She's a zombie, but what a zombie! She's no Eye-gor. She's cute and sweet and funny and Bobby is smitten, or is there a spell on him too? He's determined to accompany his girl when it's time for her to go back into the ground and it's on Bobby's big sister and his mom to save him, if they can just figure it all out.
Just as Bobby Slater's World is about long ago summers, Lottie Barrett Lives Again is about old time Halloweens and Thanksgivings and Christmases. And what both books are really about is small town, 1960s America.
And you know, with 2 1960s Bobbys, we've decided to go for yet a third 60s Bobby book, you know, make it a series, if not exactly a trilogy, and with only the vaguest idea what the final book will look like -- 1960s, a couple of 13 year old boys, 1 named Bobby, 1 named, oh, Dan, or Mike or something. The boys are best friends and Little League teammates chasing the local league's home run record, kind of an M and M boys thing. Bobby falls for a 13 year old maiden (that's what they called them, back when the girl lived the first time; yes, we're in the presence of yet another cute/sweet/funny zombie.) The maiden was sent to a sacrificial death over the waterfall behind the Little League park. She's back now, the boys see her, watching their ballgames from the decrepit wooden bleachers behind right field.
And after that? Well, after that we expect we'll be inventing yet another genre. We just don't know yet what it will be.
Anyway, there's plenty here about our books, so take a look, we'll appreciate it.
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