THE WRITING: Page 1 - Page 2 - Page 3.

...it was going to be, simply, an Athens book. Not a book about Athens. But a book from Athens, from the version of Athens that I had lived in. It was going to be a book of kitchen-table folklore, the kind of document that has a certain kind of truth in it that's different from the kind of truth like how much rent was at the first 40 Watt Club. It would not be a documentary of Athens, but a document from Athens, and as such, I figured I could pretty much say what I wanted. Other folks could tell it differently, but this would be the story I heard during my long sleep in the town.

As the process went on, I began to slowly realize that not only was I writing about "this Athens thing" and the rock stars, but I was also writing about a place where I spent 10 years playing out nearly every drama and fantasy that a kid with artistic and intellectual pretensions can think of. I was never a music writer, so I wasn't obsessing on compiling anything like a comprehensive discography. The particular rabbit hole I was gleefully falling headlong into was one that took me back again and again to that imagined world of infinite possibility where all the young immortals live. And we were all and always young and immortal. I liked it there. I never wanted to leave. I wanted that to be part of the story.

Once I knew what I wanted to do, I started to write. Typety typety typety. I wrestled with the printer. I marked up pages. I showed chapters to friends. They thought it was hilarious. We laughed and laughed and talked about who would play whom in the movie.

Before too long, I had 350 pages. I sent it off to the editor in New York City.

That's when reality bitch-slapped me...