Newsletter #1

Excerpt from Colum’s first newsletter, December 2019:

“The good folks at Random House asked me to do an occasional newsletter in the run-up to my new novel, Apeirogon (coming Feb 25, 2020), a glimpse behind the curtain, a step behind the pages, to give a little glance into my world.

It strikes me that I’ve never really written publicly like this before: it feels like a private letter to my family. Decades ago I used to write letters from the road when I was cycling across America. I wrote them quickly, heart on my sleeve, bad grammar and all. There I was, on some far-flung American riverbank, scribbling away on blue airmail stationery.

Actually, here’s a glimpse from my days in the late 80’s in Colorado . . . Ah, nostalgia . . . and how odd to see myself with hair!

I suppose in many ways the bike journey was the beginning of it all. I rode an 18-speed Schwinn with four pannier bags, two front, two back. On the back of the bike I also carried a tent and sleeping bag. Along the way—from Boston to Texas to Mexico to California—I met all sorts of incredible people, all of whom had stories to tell. I suppose those were the days when my ideas about story-telling began to germinate…”