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The Mountain Between Us
My 7th book, The Mountain Between Us, releases June 1st.
It’s set in the mountains between Salt Lake and Denver but that’s not really the mountain I’m talking about. Most, if not all, of my stories, follow the arc of a character from a real bad place of being broken to a place of not broken. If you ask me ‘what fires me up as a writer,’ it’s that. That arc. From messed up to maybe not so messed up. Why? Because at the other end is hope.
Most of my stories first appear as flashes somewhere just outside of view. Mountain is no different. The first I ‘saw’ of this story was a guy lying on his back staring up through what was once the windshield of a two-seater plane with snow covering his face. Naturally, I –like you—wanted to know what happened. How’d he get there? Who is he? Why’s he in the plane? Is he hurt? Who’s with him? Stuff like that. That line of questions bled into a story where an orthopedic surgeon from Jacksonville is attempting to fly out of Salt Lake late on a Sunday evening after attending a medical conference in Salt Lake. The television screen above is tuned to the weather channel and, currently, a huge green blob is about an hour from shutting down the airport. When it does, he hires a charter to hop him to Denver so he can catch the red eye home where several surgeries and his wife are waiting. Seeing that the two-seater plane will seat one more, he returns to the airport to find the girl he met in the terminal who was trying to get home to her fiancé and wedding in forty-eight hours. You see where this is going? Continue Reading…
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The Latest Rives’ism
My dad’s from Texas, I’ve spent a good bit of time out there, I’d like to think part of me is from there and I am one of those folks who believes The Alamo is hallowed ground. A few months ago, I returned from a research trip out there where I bought a coffee mug at the Texas Ranger Museum in Waco, TX. It’s now my favorite mug. It says ‘Texas Rangers’ on one side and on the other is a rather famous quote from Davy Crockett. The quote is drawn from a speech Crockett made in his re-election campaign for Congress. He lost and was killed year later at the Alamo. Around my house, Davy Crockett is held up on a pedastal, as is any man who died at the Alamo. One problem: on more than one occasion guys like Travis, Bowie, Houston and Crockett said things I might not want my first grader reading—or repeating. Yet. To be honest, I didn’t know Rives was paying attention to the fine print on the side of my coffee mug.
You see where this is going?
‘Ask Charles’ No. 2
Q: Which of my books is my favorite?
A: I get asked this question alot. The short answer is, I don’t have a favorite. You might as well line up our three sons and ask me who I love the most. I love them all the same, equally and for different reasons. There are scenes in various books that I’m proud of, specific moments, I look at and think, ‘that’s some good stuff,’ but not one book. I’ve said this alot but it remains true: when I’ve finished every book, I’ve been able to lay it down and honestly say, ‘that’s the best I can do.’ It’s not like I held back somewhere. Each has required all of me to write it. Books do that by default. (At least mine do.) I am either all in or I’m not. Can’t be half in the computer screen and half out. Can’t be half pregnant. That said, this latest one is pretty good. Course, I’ve said that same thing everytime a book has released.
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