Gary V. Powell, Author

I've been spending a lot of time with Chooch Bartkowski lately. He's not always the most likeable person, yet he's one of my favorite fictional characters.

Let me explain.

Last spring, I attended the Green River Writers 'Novels in Progress Workshop in Louisville. I go nearly evrey year, even if it's just for the weekend. Then I make a run up to Bloomington to see old friends. I like the Workshop, because it's just far enough away from home to make you feel like you've been somewhere. On the other hand, it's close enough to drive and hang out at places like the Moose Cafe just west of Asheville and the Cracker Barrell outside of Knoxville.

Anyway, at the workshop last spring I met the editor of a small but successfuil publishing house in Cinci. I'd had a good day pitching my first novel, Pointe of Contention,  to agents, so I arrived at the closing dinner fully lubed--I'd already drank most of a bottle of Sonoma Coutrer Chardonnay at the hotel where I was staying talking to a potter (yep, a potter) at the bar before catching a cab over to the restaurant where the dinner was held. Another writer introduced me to Rick when I was deep into my second bottle of Chardonnay (this bottle not nearly as noble as the first). He asked me to pitch my novel to him. I declined, saying we were both drunk, and while I wrote drunk, I refused to pitch drunk. He said I was just another sonofabitch prima donna author, to which I replied that he was just another asshole publisher. Then I pitched my novel, while he listened.

He liked it. He said send it to him when his house re-opened for submissions in December.

They were looking for novels 90,000-100,000 words. Pointe of Contention was over 110,000. Last week and this, I trimmed it to about 92,000. It was pretty good before, but it's better now.

Which brings me back to Chooch Bartkowski. In my novel, Mitch Fawley is a defrocked defense attorney with a half-assed chance at redemption. Bartkowski is his PI. Bartkowski used to be married to Fawley's fat sister, Janice, but she was too abusive for a guy who'd just lost his job as a homicide detective  with the Chicago police department for beating a confession out of an accused murderer, and they split. Even so, Fawley threw Bartkowski a life line from his sinking ship. Bartkowski makes ends meet by working at a tittie bar. the Kit Kat Club. Chooch is from Bridgeport on the South Side. He's more than a little rough around the edges, but he's no one's fool. He's also a bit of a romantic. In Point of Contention, Chooch falls in love with Shana Wilson, the former girlfriend of Frankie Ramirez, drug dealer etc.

Chooch is a major character in Pointe of Contention, although he plays second fiddle to Fawley. Both Fawley and Chooch are major characters in my second novel, Beyond Redemption.

Anyway, I've spent about 4-5 hours a day for the last week or so with Chooch (and Mitch). I suppose Mitch is more like me than I'd like to admit. But Chooch is surly, tough, physical and more inclined to resolve matters through physical confrontation than negotiation.

Having spent so much time with Chooch, I think I know him a little better than I'd like. Yet the more time I spend with him, the more I like the SOB.

The next few blog entries are roughly excerpted from Beyond Redemption and tell a story about Chooch's search for Shana four years after they've married and he's adopted her young son, Brick.

I hope you all like (and dislike) Chooch as much as I do.