Who Is Stuart Page? /  by Tim Lane

I’m going to post tiny introductions this week to some of the characters from Your Silent Face (which is also now available at the Apple Book Store).

Obviously, gotta start with the narrator, since it’s his “cassette.”

“I found it interesting how select shit like sending a wet bathing suit down the clothes chute or picking the stewed tomatoes out of the spaghetti sauce was unthinkable in this house but allowing the neighborhood kids to press their gross noses against the screen while we tried to eat dinner in peace was acceptable.”
— Stuart Page, YSF

Stuart Page is a first gen college student who grew up in the 70s and 80s on the East Side of Flint, Michigan. Generally speaking, Flint’s reputation of being a tough, hard-drinking, blue-collar General Motors town precedes any discussion of its history and contributions to American cultural.

Stuart is perhaps first and foremost a New Wave music geek, but he’s been influenced by others and has other areas of interest, as well. Like chess.

He’s a product of working class people and a Catholic school education.

He obsesses upon the artistry and suicide of Ian Curtis, the leader singer of defunct British post punk band, Joy Division.

Stuart is the cassette upon which the story of Your Silent Face has been recorded. He’s home, back on the East Side, after his freshman year of college. The whole story unspools from his head. The ghosts of his memories compete for just as much air time as his current observations.

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Hey, man! I Read Your Novel! It totally _____! /  by Tim Lane

Love my debut novel, hate it, couldn’t finish it, need to give me a high five, need to drive by and scream at me as I’m walking down Michigan Avenue—leave a review at my Amazon page! Or email me; I’ll feature it in a blog post.

email: [email protected]

Grab the novel at Amazon, the Apple Book Store, or here at the website.

And be sure to check out and follow the companion playlist (it’s free)!

#YourSilentFace, #80smusic, #GenX, #ComingOfAge, #NativeAmerican, #RustBelt, #FlintMichigan

author pic, #YourSilentFace, #80smusic, #GenX, #ComingOfAge, #NativeAmerican, #RustBelt, #FlintMichigan

author pic, #YourSilentFace, #80smusic, #GenX, #ComingOfAge, #NativeAmerican, #RustBelt, #FlintMichigan

Empty Intersection /  by Tim Lane

Fall is here, in Michigan, and it’s amazing. My heart goes out to everyone who is dealing with the fires. I can’t imagine it. But I am paying attention.

It feels weird to be done with YSF. I spent six years working on it (seriously hope my next novel does not take that long haha). It was an everyday part of my life. I would write in the mornings before going to my day job, and then tinker in the evenings. I would give myself the weekends off, but would ultimately wind up putting in some hours.

If I wasn’t at the keyboard, the process was always spinning away in my mind.

Part of me feels a sense of freedom to relax for a minute. Part of me feels like I just witnessed a head-on-collision at an empty intersection, and both vehicles quickly limped away.

Leaving behind the sounds of cars on a nearby expressway, birds, the moment.

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Every Novel Opens Somewhere... /  by Tim Lane

Your Silent Face, coming soon on Amazon Kindle, iBooks and here.

“Your Silent Face


Earlier we had argued whether The Smith’s lyrics were over-indulgent.

“Seriously, though,” Karen whined hours later, and drunker, at El Oasis. “What the hell is Morrissey whining about?”

From the bus station, we had driven around the city, hunting for Nigel to buy some beer. Now, as it neared last call, I still had not been home.

In the mirrored alcove behind the dance floor, I leaned into Karen and sang the opening lines of The Smith’s haunting song, ‘How Soon Is Now.’

Karen wasn’t loving it. “Spare me, goon boy.”

She was totally rude. I singled out The Beautiful Ones, noticing how absorbed in the music they seemed.

Nobody danced together anymore.

On my first night here at El Oasis, during the twilight of high school, I had asked a particular girl to dance. It was my last brave act before I had gone away to college. For two whole years, this girl had been my library scope.

My friend, J Dog, in the library, while we worked on AP Physics: “Look, dude, there she is, The Italian Goddess.”

I never really understood why she had danced with me. “Would you like to dance? My friend and I have a bet that you’re Italian.”

Lame.

Her name was Farrah; Italian, not.

We had danced for two whole songs: ‘Tainted Love’ and ‘Video Killed the Radio Star.’

(I hadn’t seen her since. Not at El Oasis, the library, anywhere. It was like she hadn’t been real.)

I leaned back into Karen and tried to croon a few more lyrics of ‘How Soon Is Now,’ picking up where I’d left off.

“Not bad, hunh?”

“Barf.”

I wound my way to the center of the dance floor, drawn out of the alcove by a song by New Order which was replaced by Fine Young Cannibals which faded into The Cure’s ‘Close to Me.’ I allowed my arms to swing and my neck to bend like Ian Curtis, began to sweat, became more absorbed in the music.

“Last call, my beautiful people,” the DJ breathed, interrupting my groove.

Did I want another beer? Damn straight.

Karen was beside me. “What’s going on?” She raised her voice above the thumping bass.

A crowd was gathering near the entrance to the club.
Out of sync now, I gave up and relayed everything I could see.

“Wow, it’s Nigel,” I shouted. “He’s out front. It looks like they won’t let him back in.”

“What?”

“Oh, my, is he pissed.”

Nigel, who was one of the most passive dudes I had ever met, was giving the bouncers the most dramatic middle fingers he could summon.

It struck me as comical.

In my head, Morrissey’s plaintive voice came back around like a boomerang.”
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