The Great Novel That Almost Wasn’t

Allen Levi

I wanted to prove to myself that I could finish a piece of long fiction, whether it was for public consumption or not, that that goal has been reached, and by that metric, it has been a success. And in my mind’s eye, I imagine whether anyone ever reads this book or not. When I die, I will stand before the Lord, and I will say, Lord, this is something I need for you.

Collin Hansen

Now I can’t be sure that if I recommend the book Theo of golden that you’ll love it, but so far, that’s been true in every case, sometimes even to the point of joyful tears. And now I know at least you’ll love it, if this is true of you. Quote, a man who takes long walks by the river and reads books always has something to think about. End quote, I just I just love that. Well, for months, I’ve been encouraging friends and family to pick up this book by Alan Levi. When you finish this novel, you’ll feel like Alan is a friend. I’m blessed to have more than a few mutual friends with Alan, and he has exceptional taste in those friends. I must say, that quality shines in his in this debut novel featuring the mysterious traveler Theo, who drops in on the small southern city of golden Theo is described as a man who, quote, lived with such a winsome commitment to the seen and the unseen, the ultimate and the proximate, the wide grace and the narrow way. It is a story that is so beautiful you can’t help but long for it to be real. And I think that’s what makes me want to hand it out to non Christian friends who search for goodness and beauty and haven’t yet found it and seen it in Christ, as Theo says in the book, quote, seek truth, make beauty, live well and elsewhere. It said of Theo, quote, his decision to live small made him larger than life. Everybody knowing, watching and listening this podcast knows how often I encourage Christians to do likewise. So let’s turn and talk to the author himself. Alan Levi has been an attorney and judge, singer and songwriter and author, and joins me now on gospel bound. Alan, welcome my friend. It

Allen Levi

is a pleasure to be here. Hey, Colin. Before we take another step, I am going to seize this opportunity to tell you how grateful I am for your work. I know that you you spend lots of time in isolation, reading, thinking deep thoughts, trying to make very complex ideas accessible to the rest of us. And I have binged on your your podcast in the last few weeks, much to my delight and and I’m sure I speak from anyone I say, Thank you for the work that you do. We are grateful, and the life of the world is richer because of it. So thank

Collin Hansen

you. Oh, thanks, Alan, that’s a great encouragement, and I appreciate it more than you can know. Well, this is your first novel, and it is self published. Tell us the story. How did this come about? So

Allen Levi

I have, have long been a lover of words. Vocationally, words have been kind of the centerpiece of everything that I’ve done, lawyer, judge, singer songwriter who really wanted to emphasize the lyrical content of songs more than anything else. And years ago, I went to the University of Edinburgh, got a master’s in Scottish fiction, and spent lots and lots of time reading there in the back of my mind. For years, I’ve had a story that I wanted to write, still want to write it, and about the time that COVID struck us all down, I realized I had time to luxuriate in writing. And so I said, let me see if I can finish a piece of long fiction. I had no intentions of writing a story that I would publish. I just wanted to see if I had the discipline to do such a thing. And one day, I was at a coffee shop down in Columbus, Georgia, my hometown. And there are 90 some odd portraits, pencil portraits, on the wall of the coffee shop, all done by a dear friend of mine, Gary pound, and while I was waiting for my coffee to be prepared, the thought crossed my mind, wouldn’t it be fun to buy all of these portraits and give them to their rightful owners? And that became the seed corn of the story. I bought five of the portraits that day, and while I was writing this story that was not intended to be published. I had those portraits on the wall there, Ellen manette, Kendrick and a couple of others. But anyway, I wrote in fits and starts. I was very frustrated through the process, but when I had finished a pretty substantial draft, some of the mutual friends that you and I have in common from the Birmingham area, and a couple of others read the manuscript, and they said, We think you should do something with it. I trust their judgment more than my own. And so I said, Okay, I’ll, I’ll see if I can knock off some of the rough edges. And it became what, what it is

Collin Hansen

you. Our friend Dickie Barlow says that you were not planning to publish this, just sort of scratching on some paper. And Dickie and your friends, he was actually just on his way to see you after he’d been sitting down with me, and he said, and we always told him, he’s got to publish this. Did you consider taking the book to publishers? I mean, it is. It’s hard to break through at any age or any stage as a Christian fiction writer especially, yeah,

Allen Levi

yeah. So the short answer to the question is not really. You’ll notice that I didn’t give any credits in the book because I wasn’t sure that anyone would want their name associated. There are many people to whom I owe a debt of gratitude, but I did publish a book some years ago. It was a memoir about a year that I lived with my brother before he passed away. The rabbit room was very gracious to hit on as one of their titles. But on this one, I honestly had a lot of reservation just about the quality of the work. I didn’t know if there would be an audience for it at all, and I, as much as I love the friends of mine who said, publish it, I still voted whether their, you know, their encouragement was more sentiment or solid criticism. But about the time that was going to release the book, a niece of mine who had a job that she enjoyed, but was very demanding on her as a mother of three small children. And I started talking, and I said, Why don’t we see if we can just publish this on our own? You’re going to have to do everything but the writing. I’m going to do the writing. You’ve got to figure out the social media, the marketing, the Amazon, the Ingram press, all of those sorts of things. But let’s see what we can do as the owner of one book, one title that we’re trying to sell and and so it has kind of turned into this wonderful friendship, a deepening friendship with my niece, who I have adored since she was born, and we have had a really, really good time. Colin, I will tell you this, that when, when she and I kind of put our heads together, she wanted some metrics by which to measure the performance of the book and maybe her, her performance as my my partner and I said, So let’s define success. I wanted to prove to myself that I could finish a piece of long fiction, whether it was for public consumption or not, that that goal has been reached, and by that metric, it has been a success. And in my mind’s eye, I imagine whether anyone ever reads this book or not. When I die, I will stand before the Lord and I will say, Lord, this is something I made for you. And I said, so we have already succeeded. All the pressure is off. If we sell some of them, great. If we don’t, it’s no problem. And you know, thankfully, people have read it, and a number of people have enjoyed it, and good souls like you have been kind to, you know, to help the cause. But at least, you know, at least for now, it, what began as an experiment has proved to be very much a good working model for us. I think we’ll stay in this space for a while.

Collin Hansen

Yeah, the Kevin was telling me about a bunch of your friends had bought cases of the book and handing them out and things like that. I think I ended up with one of Ben’s and two of Kevin’s, at least, and one of them you kindly wrote in. And I treasure that. It’s a it’s, it’s really special. But in terms of commercial success, it is, I mean, I can say, as somebody who works as a publisher and as an author and everything like that, has been a tremendous success, which is a huge encouragement, not only just for you, but I think it’s an encouragement because of the market, but there are so many people who have an appetite for for a book that is, it’s not a short book. I mean, it’s a substantial book. It doesn’t take a long time necessarily to read because the story moves so well. But I was explaining to Kevin the other day over lunch that it’s rare that I come across a piece of Christian fiction that allows me to to range so high up in terms of the intellectual and artistic illusions in the book, but all the way down to being accessible. I can hand it to anybody, even if they don’t read many novels or read much at all, I’d feel confident in giving them this book, and Christian and non Christian, none of that is a none of that is a common phenomenon in my experience as a publisher. And Alan, what is it? What does it mean for you to write Christian fiction, and what are you hoping to stir up in your readers? Yeah, thank you for that.

Allen Levi

First of all, I would push back a little bit on the characterization of the book as Christian fiction. Sure, it used to really bother me when people would refer to me as a Christian lawyer, right? I was a lawyer. I am a Christian, but I honestly don’t fully understand what those terms mean. At the lowest, the basest, maybe the most low. Least appealing definition of those terms, it means that you use certain buzz words right, or a certain predictable plot line with a predictable demo, you know exactly where things are going to go. I have always, in the creative work that I have done, tried to write for as wide an audience as possible, and that’s

Collin Hansen

certainly true in this book, no doubt about it. Thank you. That’s

Allen Levi

great. That’s that. That is my goal as a songwriter. I did that, and I used to really appreciate it when people would call to book me for a gig and they would say, hey, look, we know that you’re a man of faith or a Christian or religious or whatever term they wanted to use. We do not want you to make any reference to that in your concert. This is a secular event, and I used to love those gatherings when I started doing music, having left 13 years of law practice at that point and having to justify to myself the move, I came up with a little mission statement, which in its shortest form, is use creative gifts to provoke Godward thought. And there are some times that I can provoke it all the way to the finish line. I can, I can give a complete, at least understanding, as I see it, of the gospel. There are other times where I really can’t do that. I can just kind of use illusions, metaphor, tell stories that that point people to something much bigger than our daily reality. So when I was writing Theo, I did not have in mind to write a Christian book as as a believer, a follower of Christ, like all of us, I am bound, I think, by two book ends. One is the great commandment that Jesus gives us love God with heart, soul, mind and strength, and our neighbor as ourselves and the Great Commission. And so as a songwriter, as a lawyer, as a judge, everything I’ve done, I try to remind myself that those bookends apply to every day of my life, and everything that I do somehow ought to fall into one or both of those categories. And so when I was writing Theo knowing nothing of the story. When I started, I just started writing and hope, hope that something would bubble up. I knew that I wanted this character, even by his name, by virtue of his name, to be something of a head nod toward deity. And you probably noticed, because you were a careful reader, that he referred to heaven a lot. I could just as easily have made some reference to Jesus, to Christ, to God. Chose things at the same points, but I did not want readers to put the book down, and so I chose the most palatable language that I could until the end of the book, when Theo is celebrated and the gospel is presented, you know, at least a little more, right?

Collin Hansen

Yeah, no, I think that’s part of what makes the book so broadly appealing, both to a Christian who would approach it knowing, okay, this is written by a man of faith. This is going to be edifying to me, which it is, but also to a non Christian who would just not expect anything else of that. And I think one thing that a novel allows the author to do is to operate in that slow burn. And so you really become a part of that community in the book, and then it’s a lot easier toward the end of the book, once you were a part of that beautiful community around gold and around Theo to kind of hear, okay, what are the ultimate motivations? What are the ultimate purposes? And things be much more explicit in there. Now, despite my many recommendations, not everyone yet has who’s listening and watching to watching us now has yet read the book, but, but you take us a little bit more we’ve alluded to a few things, give us a little bit more of the basic premise of the book. Of the book. I do also find it fascinating. As a writer, that you did no idea where the story was going to go. I would imagine novelists are kind of across the board on this. Some of them know exactly where they’re going to go before they start at the end in view. And some of them also like, I’m going to see what a story takes

Allen Levi

me. Yeah, yeah. And Colin, when I started, I really had no idea how to begin the process. I had written some essays, and I’ve toyed with some short stories. There’s a really interesting book by Stephen King called on writing. It’s the only thing I’ve read by him, but it’s to me, it’s wonderful book. And his process is to start with a situation that could be very mundane, something very simple, nondescript, and just see what happens. And I have read of other authors that do this, so I thought, well, maybe that’s the way you’re supposed to do it, and that’s how I began. And I wasted a lot of ink, a lot of paper, a lot of time and energy, and it was terminally frustrating. But that basically is the way that I wrote the book. I just went draft after draft after draft. Amore Coles, on the other hand, the author of Jim London, Moscow, great book, great book.

Collin Hansen

I’ve heard my similarities, by the way, with yours, some real similarities there. That’s,

Allen Levi

that’s high praise. But he says that he is a story designer, so but. Before he ever actually tackles the writing of the book, he will spend up to a year or two designing the story. And so I’m working on a sequel to Theo of golden and this time, I wrote an outline. It’s not exhaustive or comprehensive in any sense, but, but it kind of gave me some guardrails to work against, and there’s been a lot of changing since I started. Well,

Collin Hansen

you’ve, you’ve, you’ve engaged in a process of world building now around golden so you have to conform to that with Ellen’s. So we already know as readers, something about that at place reminds me of like Marilyn Robinson’s work as well on on that community there. Now, who? Who was your inspiration for Theo? Now, I always tell writers, write what you know, that’s always a good place to start. If you if you never advance beyond that, that’s still a good thing there. Know, a lot of writers put them, some of themselves in their main characters, too. So tell us some of that inspiration.

Allen Levi

Let me disabuse you of that notion right out of the shoot, I am not the I aspire to be like Theo. And some of the some of the names that you’ve already mentioned in our mutual friends, I would say that there are attributes in those, those men that very much reflect who Theo, the character is. I think if I had to to name one person that would be my brother Gary. He was 13 months younger than me. He passed away 12 years ago. He was my best friend, my mentor, my hero. We were going to grow old together as a couple of second hand lions. He’d never married. I’ve never married, but he was just the most winsome, authentic follower of Christ, and anything that Theo did in the book, my brother Gary would have done something comparable to that within the constraints of his financial situation. Theo didn’t have any barriers, but my brother would have. But my brother was outgoing. He was he lived like very incarnationally. He was hospitable, he loved beauty, he loved conversation. He was excellent at it, and I think he would be my template if I had to choose one person.

Collin Hansen

Yeah, that’s a wonderful tribute. David Brooks had come on this show and discussing his book, How to know a person and what He commanded in that book you have depicted in Theo it’s a wonderful application of that. I’m not saying that’s explicit. I’m just saying that’s what I saw from from reading those two works. Now here’s a brief section from your book, quote he would remark later that the old man listened in a way that made one dangerously willing to talk. A business partner had once described it as Theo’s superpower. I was going to ask if you know someone like that, sounds like your brother, anyone else who comes to mind, or just how we can all grow in that area. Because I think you set it up well to say, as the writer, the creator of all this, and we as the readers, we all want to be more like Theo as we come into the end of the book.

Allen Levi

Yeah, you know Colin, I’m very blessed to be surrounded Not, not to overstate it, but I’m surrounded by people like that. Wendell Berry once said of of his childhood and growing up years that he grew up around good talkers. And I believe that in making that observation, he was simply saying that a lot of his writing reflects what he learned through conversation in small town where he lived and lives, I think the same goes here, and good talking is not just a matter of this. It’s a matter of this. I believe David says listening aggressively, but I’ve had a number of people like that this morning. I had 35 guys at my house, but we’ve been meeting for 23 years now every Thursday morning. And a lot of those guys come to mind when I think who are the good listeners, the good talkers in my life? I could give you names.

Collin Hansen

Names grow. How do we grow in this area? How do you grow in this

Allen Levi

area? I think practice is like anything else. We have to make ourselves available. One thing that I realize as a 68 year old man now surrounded by other people about my age and many much older, is that we lose our ability if we don’t keep it sharp. Eugene Peterson talks about the three levels of language that we speak in the first being the language of intimacy. He said, It starts when we are born, and even the verbal but non articulate exchanges between a parent and a child, that’s the language of intimacy, and he says, that’s the language of prayer. It’s the language of authenticity. But we grow out of that into the second level of language, which is information. It’s just the language of academia and the marketplace and whatnot. And then the third level is the language of motivation, where we. Trying to exercise power or manipulate language to our end, but all of that to say that we lose level one language unless we really practice at it and make ourselves vulnerable to tell the things that we struggle with. There was a conversation in the book where Theo and Asher were talking about sadness and Asher, the portrait artist is saying, You don’t strike me as a sad man, but Theo was willing to say, No, I’m a deeply sad man. No one lives as long as I do 86 years without without encountering a lot to be sad about. So I think that that to make ourselves available, to have lunches with people, to invite people to sit on our porches, to go to public places, preferably in the company of just one or two at a time, because that seems to be the richest conversation, at least from my experience. But we practice it. We just we work at it. I will tell you that a couple of the things that I do because I live in a small town. We we don’t have theaters, we don’t have a shopping mall, we’ve got three or four stop lights in the whole county, and it’s one of the largest counties in Georgia. I have to really work hard to be around people in the mornings. I go to the high school three days a week, two or three days a week to greet kids. I’ve been doing that for a long, long time, and it makes me talk. It makes me engage with people. They’re short conversations, but out of those, invariably, there will be a real one from time to time, opening our homes, being hospitable. My brother was a master at that, and it wasn’t because he was a good chef or anything of that sort, but he knew that Jesus did that. You know, when I was writing the book, it was COVID time. And if there was a word that came to the forefront of my thoughts a lot, it was the word incarnation. And one Thursday morning, our men’s group entertained the question, Why did Jesus come when he came? It was pre technology, pre harnessing of electricity, pre industrial revolution, pre printing press. And it was not an arbitrary decision, I’m sure, in the mind of God to show up when he did. And to me, part of the takeaway from that is that Jesus wanted us to know that his kingdom works best when we are close enough to touch the people around us and COVID, I think, was a cautionary tale in believing that we can do things virtually, we can’t do it. One of my favorite studies in the New Testament has been in the gospels, just looking at every reference to when Jesus used his hands to touch people. He was close enough that he could do that. And if we’re going to become good conversationalist, we can do it this way, and praise God that we had these tools. But I don’t know that there’s anything better than sitting down with a person for a long, you know, a long conversation, someone you trust, so you can go to places that are real. Amen.

Collin Hansen

Now this next question is from a specific episode in the book, but I’ll turn it to you, the author, Alan, what is your happiest day? Oh,

Allen Levi

wow, you’re the first person to ask that. And years ago, when I was a songwriter, I wrote a song about a day I’m looking out at my front yard here in Harris County, Georgia, a farm. So I’m looking over a pretty good expanse of pasture land. And we were in this field one day, and I subsequently wrote a song called another happiest day of my life, and I have had lots of those. I’ll give you a couple, just from this week to make the point that I cannot pinpoint a moment. So Monday morning, I went to high school, and I said good morning to a few 100 kids, and I came home, and at 930 15 people from Knoxville, Tennessee who wanted to talk about Theo, had driven down the day before, stayed a few miles away from here, and we spent hours talking. We had communion, we talked about Theo, but we talked about lots of other things. That was that was my Monday. Yesterday. I spent most of the day with a friend of mine who was a pastor from Pakistan. Grew up in Pakistan. He’s a pastor up in the north part of the country. I met with him over in Auburn, and we talked for two or three hours about the work that’s taking place there, struggles, his family, challenges, that sort of thing. Those are happiest days of my life. You know, I’ve not had the great privilege of marriage. I’ve not had the great privilege of having children. So those are nowhere on my radar. I would like to think, if I ask you the question, those two would make it to the top of the list. But. It. But all I can say, Colin, in response to your question, is, my lines have fallen in very pleasant places, not without hurt and heartache and those sorts of things too. But I’m a blessed man.

Collin Hansen

One of the things I try to do, whether it’s an interview like this, or whether it’s in a group of friends or at a small group from church or something like that. Just ask people questions like that, or ask them a question like, you know, where did you feel safest in life? Just you can, you can cut to the quick with people and get real with people. I’m just I’m not the best small talker, despite growing up in the Midwest. I can talk I can talk weather with anybody, but it’s not I could talk sports and weather with anybody, but those kind of questions can help you to get to real places with people quickly. And then you realize things like what you just revealed there, which is that that question is, it’s somewhat circumstantial, ie, wedding, childbirth, things like that. But more than anything else, it’s really about attitude.

Allen Levi

Yeah, definitely, you know, Colin, I would bring another memory to mind, and This hearkens to the book that I wrote about my brother called the last sweet mile. This was not a day, but I can say with absolute honesty that the year that my brother was with me before he died, and he lived for 365 days after his diagnosis of a glioblastoma, was undoubtedly the best year of my life, and it was filled with lots of happiest days, painful, bittersweet, but I think maybe for the only, certainly one of the very few times in life, there was only one thing that mattered to me each Day, and that was loving him well and helping him get home. But yeah, so, you know, the the happiest doesn’t always mean the the most light hearted by any stretch,

Collin Hansen

but that can mean that poignant. I mean, it could mean bittersweet. I mean, there’s a lot of options in there. Another thing you learn about people, first and thus far, only article we’d love more. You ready for the gospel coalition, digging in defiance of death, December 7, 1015 referring to these circumstances. Now with view of golden I’m definitely not going to give away the ending. It would have been a beautiful book without the ending with the ending. It’s a great book. I’m going to turn the question around, though and ask, what’s the best novel ending you can recall?

Allen Levi

Okay, so best, obviously, can be defined lots of different ways, possibly for just sheer poignancy, shock, upset, maybe Grapes of Wrath. The last, the last lines are, is such an arresting image that’s one that that comes to mind.

Collin Hansen

I’m sure my wife, if she were on here, she’d say, The Tale of Two Cities. There’s a classic kind of Christian ending in many different ways,

Allen Levi

Right. Jaber Crow I’m terribly fond of.

Collin Hansen

Oh boy. The scene in the woods, right? Oh boy.

Allen Levi

I read lots and lots of Wendell Berry and credit him through a lot of the ways that I see the world anymore. About the time that I discovered him, or God placed him in my path, my brother and I had just by a legal transaction that my mom and dad undertook, became owners of the land that I live on now. And I will have to confess I was a bit ambivalent about it, because a piece of land is a big responsibility, and it meant, you know, a loss of significant freedom. But about that time, I started reading Wendell Berry, and he really gave me a whole new lens for looking at life in general, but a piece of land in particular. So the end of Jaber Crow, when that big cups of trees was cut down. Yeah, it just kind of thing, when you get to the end of it, just the love that he had for, you know, the young lady, now, old lady in the story, was breathtakingly beautiful to me.

Collin Hansen

Yeah, both. I mean, I’m glad you brought that one up, because that is definitely one that is stuck with me. You’re exactly right. And that the tree part, you see that coming a little bit more, and that’s a little bit more in keeping with with wendell’s commitments on land and farming and things like that. It’s building up toward that. But the way their relationship, the the you know, the woman and the man, the way their relationship works. I’ve just never seen anything like that in literature before. That was a true sort of innovation in some ways of talking about those relationships,

Allen Levi

I will confess to you that I am a a. A really poor reader. I read incessantly. I’ve always got books going. For most of my adult life, I’ve not had a television and I love to read, but my memory is Teflon. I can read a book that that I find profoundly moving, and a week later forget the name of the author the title, and I might be able to tell you something of what it’s about, but, and the only way that I can justify that desultory reading that I do is by is by convincing myself that I don’t read so much to remember as to be changed. And I do, I do. Sense that a lot of times, the books that I read, whether I remember them or not, really do change something.

Collin Hansen

They become part of you. Yeah, they do. The stories become, become part of you. I mean, we’re not in school anymore. It’s not about taking an exam to be able to to remember those facts and dates or the or the, I mean, even if even the author there. But it’s about, I think that’s what a novel does in ways that I don’t see quite the same way. I mean, obviously many works of theology and the Bible itself do work in that transformative way, but novels invite you into an experience that you feel in ways that I just don’t see otherwise as much in literature and truly transformative in that way. I

Allen Levi

don’t know if you’re familiar with a book called lanterns on the levee. William Alexander Percy, he was the cousin of Walker Percy, who grew up or spent part of his mountain Brook, right

Collin Hansen

it’s right around the corner from me, just across Birmingham Country Club for me.

Allen Levi

William Allen Percy, his uncle adopted him. You know, his mother, father and grandfather also lives. Walker. Percy needed a place to go. William Alexander Percy adopted him. He was a void and a philosopher, but he talked about how his grandmother used to read to him when he was a little. William Alexander Percy and and she, she chose novels by and large. And he said, you know, a treatise on linen or electricity or aviation might have been more useful for the way that life is. But she wanted me to see life as it might be. And I think that novels can take us there in a way, sometimes that non fitting can’t. And even writing Theo, I know that it’s it’s sentimental on some levels, it’s light reading. I have been surprised and mildly flattered that kids as young as 10 years old have read it and seem to understand, you know. But then there’s some 80 and 90 years old, olds who have read it, but, but I think that my hope for the story is that it would say to us, okay, yeah, this might be a little over the top, but it’s credible, and maybe we can’t do the sort of things that the protagonist in this book does, but there’s not a one of us who cannot follow Jesus, about whom we read. He went around doing good. We can all do good, and we can do it not as a random act of kindness, but with heaven in mind. I’ve had a number of people describe the book in Book Club settings and whatnot as a book about kindness, and I’m I think that’s a fair reading of the narrative. But I do try to encourage maybe the thought that it’s not just about kindness, but the reason for kindness. Because for Theo, his reason was heaven. He was tied to that place and to his faith in being there. CS Lewis, as you know, talks about hope as one of the cardinal virtues of the Christian. And he says those who are most convinced of heaven are the ones that do the most good in the world. And I think, I think Christianity right there, yeah, that’s right, exactly. Yeah, yeah. Well, no,

Collin Hansen

you did a great job of depicting that in there. And I think you it is very accessible. Theo is an exceptional character, but what he does of simply paying attention to people and seeing them in light of what you just said, you never meet a mere mortal to borrow again from Lewis that is just very clearly depicted in him, and that does not require the money or the time or whatever that he’s talking that Theo has as this character. Now we’re really blessed at the gospel coalition that you’re going to be joining us for our national conference and leading a breakout session. What can people expect if they sign up for that breakout session? Colin, I have,

Allen Levi

I have a title for the session. Now, I haven’t qualified to teach a master class on this topic, how not to write a novel. I’m an expert on that, and I will talk about that some, because I think anybody probably doing it for the first time bumps to their of. That, you know, they’re ineptitude at every corner, but we can either let that defeat us, or we can just push through it. And I do think that there are a lot of people, even if it’s just to write something for their family, would would do a good deed for someone by taking the time to to write something down about their life and maybe their affection for someone in particular. So I’ll talk about the writing process. I will talk about Theo in particular. I’ll talk about some projects that I have that I think are going to spin out of Theo, which is two other books,

Collin Hansen

two other books about one other book

Allen Levi

I’ve been writing pretty diligently on that one. I can see light at the end of the tunnel. My commitment to my niece was I will finish writing it, but I will not commit to publishing it until I’m satisfied that it’s worth somebody’s while, and maybe we’ll get there, and maybe we won’t. But then there’s another storyline that is, in my mind, that might be a little more theological in content, and it will be about Tony, who is a bookseller. He owns a book shop in Theo of old and called the verbore. He’s a curmudgeon. He’s had some tragedy in his life, but I have an interesting friendship bubbling up in my imagination between him and another character from the first book and and I’m really kind of keen to start working on that, so I’ll be talking about that some with with anyone who wants to brave that session with me. And then I hope there’ll be some question and answer as well. I like that more than just just talking. So maybe we can get people to raise their hands and ask a question,

Collin Hansen

so people can come prepared for that so well. I hope to see that become a new I mean, a Gilead, or a port William, or all of these places, these beautiful, evocative places that have given us these colorful and memorable characters from those great writers that we’ve already mentioned in here, Marilyn, Marilyn Robinson and Wendell Berry. Well, gosh, Alan. I mean, I wish I look forward to seeing you in Indianapolis, and I wish we could talk much, much longer here, but I do want to you very kindly. Opened this, this interview with with some some words to encourage me. I want to use your own words to encourage you here in the end, and just to say thank you on my behalf as a reader and everybody else, many, many, many 10s of 1000s of people who have been blessed by your work. You write in this book, if a work of art makes us feel something familiar in a new way, or makes us feel something we ought to have felt all along, or shows us our place in the world more clearly, maybe then it qualifies as good. Alan, you’ve done good work. Thank you.

Allen Levi

Thank you, Collin, it’s a pleasure to be with you.