Douglas Fox: Blog

I finished the first draft of the story today. The story checks in at 197,00 words and 496 pages. I am up to Chapter 13 with the editing. I expect to finish editing and do the final proofread of the early chapters in the next two weeks.

Posting will begin on July 7th. I plan to post new chapters on Tuesdays and Fridays.

I hope everyone enjoys it once I begin posting.

Doug Fox

"Will You Be My Mommy?" is the story of Andy Martin, Kyle's younger brother's long quest to find a wife and mother for this twin sons. I have been working on this story for over eight years. It has a long and troubled history.

I originally saw this as a story featuring of Andy being drafted by the Rams and developing into a top quality receiver in the the NFL with Sam Bradford and Coach Jeff Fisher. So much for my crystal ball back in 2010-11. Sam got traded for Nick Foles. I rewrote it featuring Nick instead. I had high confidence Nick would do well in St. Louis, making my story more plausible.

Strike two… and then the owner decided to move the team to LA. I rewrote it, to move Andy and the team west. Things didn't work out so well with Nick. Or for Jeff Fisher. The next surprise, after I rewrote the story with the team's training center in the general area of their new stadium. The Rams decided to train in Thousand Oaks, nearly an hour away from the new stadium.

I put the story on hold at that point in time and went to work on another story, "Coming Home." This story follows Kyle Martin and his family when he takes the head coaching job in Philly and works to resurrect the Eagles. I spent over a year working on that story. You won't see it for awhile, though I have over 550 pages written so far.

Once the Rams situation stabilized, I started my fifth rewrite, settling on a fictional coaching staff, a fictional quarterback and mostly fictional players to work with Andy. I did keep Chris Long as one of the team's leaders. About six months ago I got stuck on one scene near the end of the story. Writer's block persisted. I would occassionally write a paragraph, only to scrap it a few weeks later.

The creative process still surprises me after sixteen years of writing. Why did I wake Friday morning and fly through a scene that stumped for so long? I have no idea. But it did. I have been tearing through the final scenes in the story over the last few days. I expect to finish the story in the next week.

I will begin editing once the first draft is completed. Keep checking my blog and Storiesonline. I expect to begin posting the story later in July or August. I have 466 pages done today and expect the final version to run 480-490 pages, not a short story. I hope everyone continues read and enjoy my work. I think you will enjoy this story about Andy, Noah and Connor.

Doug Fox

I have posted updates to the Foreward, Chapter 1 and Chapter 2. The changes are cosmetic, just changing the German words and phrases to English, to match the way I am posting the rest of the story. You do not need go back and re-read these chapters. Nothing of substance is different.

I have posted Chapter 4 and also turned on voting. Please let me know what you think of the story.

Chapter 5 will be posted next Tuesday evening.

Doug Fox

I tried an experiment with this story, mixing English and German together. The verdict on my experiment is in from my readers. I should stick to English in my stories.

I am posting Chapter 3 with most of the German replaced with the English equivalent. As I get time I will correct Chapters 1 and 2 to match the rest of the story.

I am keeping the military nomenclature, month names and date format in German. Otherwise the German phrases are going.

Thank you all for your comments. I expect to continue posting the chapters on Tuesdays and Thursdays.

Doug Fox

Sigh! I worked hard on the research for this story but I missed some things. I re-posted the Glossary and Chapter 1.

Two of the corrections are minor. A German army captain is a Hauptmann. A Kapitän is a naval officer. The German translation for an American major is major.

The second correction is in the spelling of one of the towns near Leck. Hosum should be Husum.

The third correction is larger. Giselle is not a common 1930s German name for a girl. The name should be Gisela. I have corrected Chapters 1 & 2 to use the proper spelling for Dieter's love interest.

Chapter 3 will post on Tuesday, January 21st.

Doug Fox