In the business of busy

Life would be so much easier if I were, in fact, Hank Moody. No cares, a bunch of worries, but money in the bank. Sadly, well, not really sadly, Hank Moody I am not. I get to work all day, write articles when I get home for the meager paying portion of my writing and then still try to make a novel sell somehow.

But this is the price we pay to pursue our art, right. In a city full of hipsters, I am the quirk, a staggeringly normal man with a normal job and a deviant mind that creates a form of art that may or may not sell, but I keep on keeping on because I am a remnant of a generation long since forgotten in the world of art. In between. Not quite a boomer and not quite a Gen-X.

The Baby boom generation ended in 1964; Gen-X is supposed to define me, but somehow I think I got lost in the mix or the definitions were simply too confining. Do you know what Millenials call Gen-X'ers? Old.

So today was filled with an article. But it also brought the first review for Fragments of Humanity. It was chilling to read someone whom I had never met in person so eloquently describe what I had attempted to convey. You hope as you are writing that the message will shine through and that the words will be appreciated. Anyone who says they do it solely for the artistic merit is full of shit. We do it because we have things we want to be heard; this is our voice. I cannot paint and I cannot sing, but there is a tortured wordsmith inside begging to be heard. So I write.

Rather than wallow too long in the pit of despair that is the life of a writer who aspires to becoming a successful writer, I instead choose to bask in the faded glow of my first review for the second novel.

“We are the sum of all the lies before us, timeless in our dissatisfaction we are wandering souls, lost in a world of emptiness “ – Scott Reed.

Fragments of Humanity, is a story of four young lives converging upon each other with such ferocity and chaos that any reasonable hope and sanity is ripped to shreds. 

Gritty, and raw, yet elegantly told from each one of the main characters point-of-view, it is a story about the tragedy and consequences of four young lives that run aground.  Their fates it seems, are sealed the moment the four step onto a bus and pull away from a Riverside bus stop bound for Las Vegas with nothing more than suspect dreams and desires for a better life. 

Fragments of Humanity, is a gripping, and honest story told by the gifted mind of Scott Reed.  It’s like witnessing a bloody, gory scene from a movie while swearing that you can’t stand to look any longer yet, you are unable to turn away.  From the first page you are sucked in, and held firmly within the grips of each paragraph.  It’s captivating, breathtaking, and vivid in its darkness; and as the reader you become the witness to the lives of these four unfortunate people.

You want to scream and yell and tell them to run, but they can’t hear you and more importantly, you can’t turn away.