I’m on a quest!
In 2014, during the height of my novel Pennsylvania’s popularity, there was a lot of demand for Pennsylvania short stories (and a ton of fan fiction!) so I wrote two short pieces as the back story of one of the most popular characters… Goa Eeguls (or Eagles.) The two stories, which I don’t believe I’ve published anywhere outside of anthologies, are Wild Eagles, and Becoming Eagles. These make up the canonical back story of Goa Eeguls.
I originally planned for a third story, and then I would put all three together (with The Wild Ones,) into a short novella as the complete backstory of how Eeguls… well… became Eeguls.
I hope to eventually finish the third Eeguls story so people can read all of the stories as a proper introduction to the Eeguls of Pennsylvania.
For those of you who haven’t read Pennsylvania yet… well, why the hell not? You best just click on the link and get it read because the movie will come out and you won’t be able to say you were a Pennsylvania OG AZer and that you remember when it was just an indie book BACK BEFORE IT WAS POPULAR AND ALL THESE BANDWAGON FANS JUMPED ON BOARD. GAHHH! But in case you haven’t read Pennsylvania, Eeguls is a main character who (for some reason) became a fan favorite. We first meet Eeguls as a salvager in New Pennsylvania, scouring the bombed out wastes and old war torn and crumbling cities for anything he can use to his profit. He finds Jed (one of our main characters) after Jed’s airbus is shot down in the wastelands, and plans on taking Jed to (**** spoiler deleted ****) in exchange for gold. Eeguls plan is interrupted when the Jed squad that has been sent to make sure that Jed makes it safely to the Amish Zone shows up, and we learn that most of them are old “friends” of Eeguls. Acquaintances, really. When the whole group is then attacked by Transport, Eeguls is reluctantly forced to fight with those who are protecting Jed with their own lives, and he becomes part of the unit.
Eeguls is a “Wild One.” We learn about the Wild Ones in a short story I wrote that introduces them. The Wild Ones are ex-Amish and Mennonites who left the plain life decades earlier, some of them as children, to live as free men and women in the wilds of New Pennsylvania. We don’t learn about Eeguls himself until the other two short stories (Becoming Eagles, and Wild Eagles.) Eeguls speaks in broken English because of his youth as an Amish boy escaped as a young man into the wilds to live as the eagles live.
Eeguls is a big man, bearded and slovenly. He’s been a Wild One for a long time. Good in a fight, he has a great sense of humor and is generally happy and good natured. He also chews raw/green fermented tobacco and the gooey nasty mess is usually oozing from his mouth into his beard. For the most part Eeguls is a good man who just wants to live free and who will take up a cause IF he finds it worth the risk. He is a man with a long background and his story would be a great stand-alone that I hope to write some day.
Ok, so all of this is to say that I am on my own Quixotic quest.
Quixotic: foolishly impractical especially in the pursuit of ideals; especially : marked by rash lofty romantic ideas or extravagantly chivalrous action. In slang it generally means “a mission that is foolish and impractical and probably doomed to failure.” That’s how I mean it.
In several of my novels, I place myself into the story as a character. In the Legendarium series, Bombo Dawson is unmistakably based on me. In the Last Pilgrims (which links up with WICK,) I am the warrior named Piggy. So, none of my regular fans were surprised that I showed up in Pennsylvania as Eeguls. And, although I am not foolish enough to believe it will actually happen, I am romantic enough to enjoy being on a quixotic quest to become Eeguls in the film, and to constantly harass the producer to give me the part. Listen, I know the chances are near zero. They shouldn’t be, because I’m a fantastic actor and literally made for the part, but I’m not ignorant hayseed. I know when they say “we’ll see” or “we’ll talk about it,” they mean “ain’t no way, partner.” But the quest is the real meaning, you know? And the friends we made along the way?
In the next part I’ll share with you my new Becoming Eagles workout, and how I plan on underwhelming the film team with my method acting when they meet me. I’m thinking of stinking horribly and chewing green apple Twizzlers so I can get some good green spit going. What do y’all think? Help me plot this coup!
Comment below, and stay tuned for Part 2!!
Leave a Reply