DL Tolleson.com

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The Great American Novel Blog

JANUARY 21, 2021

• The Storm, Hollywood, Censorship and Vitamin C

2020 was a heck of a year and 2021 is already turning out to be more than capable of making life suck. To paraphrase a meme I recently saw: “I don’t need the full 30-day trial period. I am returning 2021 for a refund.” Or as I wrote on Facebook yesterday...

Not to scare the wits out of you, but I expect this year to be 2020 on steroids. It’s the “slain” movie villain on which the protagonist has turned his back. And you know how that goes; much worse than before. So buckle up and batten down the hatches. There’s a storm coming and like Sarah Connor, I know it is not a weather event. Just sayin’.

At any rate, for the past couple of years I’ve been busy with just about everything but writing the sequel to The Gray Stopgap. Oh, sure, I’ve been occasionally chipping away at it. But I don’t feel any closer to the end than the range of 75% to 90% that I think I’ve reported. And recent events have repeated the same problem that plagued The Gray stopgap. In other words I have to really work at it to avoid reality from catching-up to my plots before publishing.

Other than this, there hasn’t been any novel-related news since the movie surprise of 2016 and the website update of 2019—both described in the 2019 entry that I’ve left on this page below (even though it is now, finally, archived).

It took me quite a while to get over that news. I guess it doesn’t hurt anyone to now report the name of the production company with which I corresponded. It was Josephson Entertainment, the production company of Barry Josephson. Among titles in their list of films is, Ricochet, The Last Boy Scout, and Wild Wild West (all in the 1990s). A couple of their more “recently” recognized film productions are Enchanted (2007) and Dirty Grandpa (2016). Their list of television production credits is even longer and titles you may recognize are episodes of Fantasy Island (1990s), The Tick (2001-2002, and again 2017-2019), Turn: Washington Spies (2014-2015), and Bones (2005-2017).

I was surprised and pleased with their initial interest in my novel as a potential film project. The only thing exceeding that surprise was my having not heard back from them in spite promises to the contrary. I expected a little more professionalism from such a major Hollywood producer. If my film agent had still been living (God rest her wonderful soul) she would have given them what for!

Oh well, c’est la vie.

I have been fairly active in social media commentary at my Facebook account (linked at the top of this page). But the current atmosphere of censorship is concerning. (Read the introductory commentary about Facebook in my article entitled, Texas Doctor Announces Better Covid-19 Protocol and Cure.) I’m toying with the idea of using a new social media platform.

One thing I’m really worked-up about (still) is Vitamin C. No, really. They stuff is miraculously amazing. For years I have taken, as well as recommended it. However most people simply do not believe in the curative power of this stuff. And the public’s disbelief has been reinforced by the ignorant arrogance of many physicians. And by “ignorance,” I mean that many of them haven’t actually researched the clinical documentation regarding successful high dosage treatments. “Arrogance” of course means just that; the stereotypical hubris that seems part and parcel of the medical profession.

But the information is out there for the reading.

So I decided to make some of that information more readily available. I am collecting and indexing high dosage Vitamin C data so that it may easily be shared. After all, Vitamin C can literally save your life. That is worth knowing.

This will be an ongoing effort and an ever-enlarging collection. I am making available on this website a master list of the titles and including all sorts of related information (including links). I highly recommend it to everyone. It is called Vitamin C Index: Publications, Research and Videos. Or for short, The C-Index.

Well, that’s it for this go-around. More news later.

MAY, 2019

• A New Website and Hollywood...Again

Even though I have been absent from this blog since 2016, events have been neither uneventful nor undocumented.

So, the first and most obvious thing is the new website layout. It has been completely overhauled using Cascading Style Sheets (CSS). DLTolleson.com should now adapt to whatever device you use to visit the site (desktop, laptop, pad, phone, etc.).

CSS is amazing but the overhaul was such a massive undertaking that I’ll never have the time, energy or desire to personally do it again. Also, in the past the website was backward compatible with older browsers. But on this go-around it is unknown how far “backward” or with what older browsers the site is now compatible.

The only pages absent from the new site are the film review pages (and I may add them later).

I haven’t shifted my focus for the site, per se. But my absence from this site was the result of my using social media (Facebook) in lieu of this blog and the aforementioned overhaul, which was influenced by film industry interest.

Yes, once again Hollywood came knocking and this last time was—well, judge for yourself…

On February 23, 2016 an e-mail sent to the Mirabella account of this website arrived from a representative of Josephson Entertainment out of Hollywood. The relevant portion of that message read as follows (I’ve redacted names):

Well, that was certainly a bolt out of the blue. The August 2005 death of the wonderful girl who was my film agent (Cynthia Kramer of Lucky Star) kind of took the wind out of my sails and neither my publisher nor I had since solicited Hollywood. The 4th edition was released with no fanfare and no advanced copies for review.

But then here was this inquiry from Hollywood. Surprise. Stunned. Shell-shocked. Take your pick and the word probably describes what everyone from the publisher on down was feeling. But stupid we were not. Mirabella responded, to wit…

Sure, the response was a little chatty, but then no one on this end expected to be dealing with Hollywood.

At any rate, one hour and forty-one minutes later the representative responded! She was pleased Mirabella had enjoyed Dirty Grandpa and indicated they would love to review an electronic copy of The Gray Stopgap. In the alternative she provided their mailing address should we prefer to send a physical copy. She also reported that their Director of Development was the one to find the book and thus was unsure how the book was found. And finally, she wrote that her initial contact was to ensure the book was actually available and that they would read, discuss and get back to Mirabella “ASAP.”

Mirabella sent the electronic copy the next day (February 25, 2016) and just under an hour later the representative confirmed receipt of same. Leaving nothing to chance, I authorized the shipping of the finalize book, Certified Mail Return Receipt Requested on April 2nd, which arrived there on April 4th. Mirabella e-mailed the following morning and received an e-mail confirmation that evening.

And that, dear reader, was the very last we ever heard from Josephson Entertainment. That’s right, this relative giant in the film industry never again contacted us. Zip, zero, nada.

Oh, we tried, alright. I managed to identify the Director of Development—the same person who had taken receipt of the mailed novel—and made note of this in e-mail follow-up correspondence on October 6th and 20th.

All to no avail.

As disappointing as that producer proved to be, the affair is what influenced my decision to again start soliciting Hollywood. And as a result of that, I figured film agents and Hollywood should be able to review the website when we start soliciting them.

Of course all of this impacted the long-awaiting Karns Gray Sequel—as in, pushed it back even further. I’m still working on it and let’s just leave it at that for now.

When I have more to report, it will show up here or on the News page. I hope you enjoy the new website layout and design.