Writer, artist, fire lookout and friend of this blog Jean Rukkila wrote this lovely piece about books we can’t find online — the books that we make ourselves.
The first blank book I filled for public consumption began at the locals’ end of the bar in Crown King, Ariz. When I lived up that dirt road I’d noticed how the fellows kept their personal cue sticks in the care of the bartender. ‘Hey Bob,’ I asked the owner, ‘Can I keep a blank book and watercolors with you?’
— Jean Rukkila, from “Not available online: a place for books that breathe”
Jean and I have never met, but as I type this, I’m enjoying imagining her at a lunch counter or a corner table in a bar, or high above the forest watching for the smoke to rise… with a book that she is making of the life that she’s part of, that is part of her. It’s especially the notion of sketches and words together that I love so much. I’m no artist (I have negative drawing talent, seriously, ask Nicola…) and it can be so frustrating, because images can say things that I cannot say with words. I think this is why I’m so drawn to screenwriting — because the end result is words and pictures of people doing, being, living.
As I said, reading Jean’s article makes me see her: or maybe it’s myself I’m imagining, magically gifted with hands that can draw the important things around me — my versions of men playing pool, gurgling ducks, a full glass of beer on a hot afternoon.
Jean, I hope I’ll see one of your books one day. And as much as I am a willing traveler in this land of pixels, I’m glad, like you, that some things aren’t available online.
I see what you’re saying. I, too, suffer from the drawing deficiency. I believe that’s why I’m drawn to poetry.
The writer reminds me of one of my favorites to read, Nevada Barr. And I don’t know about you, but I really like stories in the first person when the person just tells it so that the words are like leaves floating on water taking my mind’s eye on their eddies and whorls.
It really depends for me — how well written is the story, how deeply drawn is the character… I think first person is a very tricky POV to do well, and it’s often the first choice of beginning writers because it seems so much more immediate, but if it’s not done well it simply becomes much more distancing. Third person is still the quickest way deep into character, IMO.
But of course 3rd person is also the POV of choice for novels like The Da Vinci Code, in which the writing is so bad that I literally couldn’t read past about page 25…
I would love to be having a tall beer and looking over Jean’s shoulder some day peeking at her creation.
Maybe these books are not available online, but we would never have known about them otherwise. I could see a website with locations for all of Jean’s books. People could make it a trek to go visit each place and ask to see the book….