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Steve Alten Newsletter
Some hurricane perspective, and parallels to Alten novels
October 2004
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in this issue
-- Meg Movie Update
-- The LOCH Debut
-- From A Fan

Some hurricane perspective, and parallels to Alten novels in the news in this month's update.

Meg Movie Update
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We're inching closer to a deal. More tweaks on my screenplay, a model of the Meg is being made by the Hellboy special effects team, and we can announce the Director - Jan Debonte, the amazing director of Twister. I couldn't have asked for a more talented team, now we just need to find the right studio, then the real fun begins. The sale of the MEG; Primal Waters hardback can only help, so please continue to spread the word about the book. It helps, and I appreciate all you do.

Remember, YOU can push us over the top. Word of mouth remains the best form of advertising.

* Send a review to Amazon.com and BarnesandNoble.com It helps.
* If your local bookstore is out of copies, ask them to restock. They will listen to you.

When the MEG movie eventually hits its big screens, I want you to watch the previews thinking, "hey, I get Steve's e-mail every month. I helped him spread the word about his books. Heck, I helped get this movie made!" Guess what? You absolutely did.

News parallels Alten thrillers Okay, this is getting downright freaky:

A. A Great White shark pup was captured and brought to Monterey Bay's aquarium. It's the first Great White that is surviving in captivity. For live updates, go to http://www.montereybayaquarium.com Maybe they'll name it Angel?

B. Florida experiences the worst hurricane season in decades. I live in West Palm Beach and we've just missed the eye twice now. We've had minimal damage, but my grandmother's condo was destroyed, and fellow author and friend Owl Goingback lost his home. No one around here removes their shutters, it's become insane. (See story below). So what does this have to do with one of my thrillers? I predicted all of this happening in RESURRECTION (Domain part 2) and it may get a lot worse.

C. And here's one for you DOMAIN fans: Scientists confirm an unexplained radio signal from deep space might be contact with an alien civilization! Check out http://www.cnn.com/2004/TECH/space/09/02/space.signals.reut/index.html

D. Last, there are rumors that a tooth, measuring close to 8 inches long, was found in a sheep carcass in Loch Ness. More on that story below:

Go to Steve Alten.com

The LOCH Debut
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The LOCH is finished and should hit stores in May 2005. While I had several generous offers from New York publishers, I decided to go a different route. The LOCH will be published under my own label, TSUNAMI BOOKS, printed by GREENLEAF PUBLISHING, (still distributed by Ingram, Baker & Taylor, and other major distributors to all book sellers in N. America.) It's a special kind of book, and by going this route, I can call the creative shots, insuring it receives the cover design and reader "extras" YOU deserve.

As to the Loch secret, there was a discovery last winter on Loch Ness while I was penning the novel. It seems the remains of a dead sheep surfaced (attached to a Scots Pine). A local fisherman saw the disturbance and pulled the carcass on-board. Wedged between the severed ribcage was a tooth.!

The local contacted a cryptozoologist he had met years earlier...who just happened to have worked for me as a paid artist on DOMAIN and RESURRECTION. So guess who got an inside track on this info! I'll try to get a few photos of the tooth posted as soon as I can get them.

Check out The LOCH Website

From A Fan
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This was sent to me several months ago from one of my readers. I really appreciate its message, hope you will too.

Heavenly Father:

Help us remember that the jerk who cut us off in traffic last night is a single mother who worked nine hours that day and was rushing home to cook dinner, help with homework, do the laundry, and spend a few precious moments with her children.

Help us to remember that the pierced, tattooed, disinterested young man who can't make change correctly is a worried 19-year old college student, balancing his apprehension over final exams with his fear of not getting his student loans for next semester.

Remind us, Lord, that the scary looking bum, begging for money in the same spot every day (who really ought to get a job) is a slave to addictions that we can only imagine in our worst nightmares.

Help us to remember that the old couple, walking annoyingly slow through the store aisles and blocking our shopping progress are savoring the moment, knowing that, based on the biopsy she got back last week, this may be the last time they go shopping together.

In this Fall season, let us be slow to judgment and quick to forgiveness, patience, empathy, and love.

Love & Forgiveness in an election year? Now that's something I'd enjoy reading in the news.

OCTOBER REMINDER:

Teachers: Borders Books (Oct. 8-10) and Barnes & Noble (call for date) are both hosting their Fall Teacher Appreciation Events. Teachers receive 25% off. Be sure to mention Adopt-An-Author!

Enjoy the short story below. It's dedicated to the citizens of Florida.

Stay well, stay in touch, spread the word, and know I appreciate you.

-Steve Alten

FRANCES

Like most people living in South Florida, I am originally from the Northeast, specifically Philadelphia. Hurricanes are rare in Philly, but in Florida, it sometimes seems like a shooting gallery. Still, every area dealt with some threat from Mother Nature. The north has its snow storms, the mid-west tornadoes. And California had earthquakes. We liked Florida, so we dealt with it.

Ask a South Floridian about hurricanes and you will get an "Andrew" story. Since 1992, Andrew's been the measuring stick, the "where were you when Kennedy was shot" barometer. I was living in Boca Raton when Andrew struck, my family and I huddled in a townhouse, a relatively safe distance from those poor souls in Homestead. My claim to hurricane fame was merely, "the house shook."

That was before Frances.

When I first saw Frances on the Weather Channel, something told me this hurricane wouldn't be like the rest. When most land-bound hurricanes approach South Florida, they seem to curve north and bash the Carolinas. Not this one. Frances looked slow and steady, bigger than Andrew, and (for a while) just as fierce. Moreover, she was headed toward my home in West Palm Beach. This one required putting an end to procrastination.

With Frances predicted to hit Saturday morning, I made a Wednesday trip to Home Depot, whose stock must rise every time hurricane season hits. The line for plywood was long - seven hours long. Me worry? Nah, my home was only two year's old, and came with the required hurricane shutters, still stacked neatly in my garage. So I picked up $110 worth of flashlights, batteries, duct tape, and assorted hurricane supplies, and headed home, still hoping Frances would turn north.

When I arrived, my wife said her friend's husband was already putting up his shutters, and if I helped him, he'd help me. So I grabbed the power drill, some gloves, and headed over to the neighbor's for my first experience with hurricane shutters.

Let's be clear about something, I am an author, not a handyman. Sure, I have tools in my garage, but nothing elaborate. I don't have a workbench, or jars filled with nuts and bolts. And while I try to stay active, working out at the gym does not prepare one for standing on ladders, or fighting rusted bolts in 95 degree weather.

I was drenched in ten minutes, exhausted in two hours, and finished with my neighbor's one-story home in five. Now, with the sun fading and my neighbor planning to leave town in the morning, it was on to my two-story home for pay back.

Ah, but the morons who supplied my home's shutters had other plans. As we quickly learned, the two story plans were quite different. Our community's shutter design was standard, each window accompanied by screw-in bolts anchored above and below. Unscrew the bolts about a half-inch, then slip on the shutter and tighten. Easy right?

Wrong. First, the jerk-wads (actual profanity deleted) imbeciles who designed the second story shutters had not measured the upstairs windows correctly. To account for the additional two inch variance, these dick-heads from hell had left it to the homeowner, providing us with special tracts. Now us unsuspecting homeowners had to a) remove all 20 window bolts completely b) attach a tract above and below said window c) thread about two dozen special screws through the tracts d) hang the shutters onto these new screws, and e) attach wing nuts to the screws to hold the shutters. All while balancing on Spanish tile roofs or on 25 foot ladders. In gusting winds no less!

Add three more challenges to my personal list: a) the (insert four letter word) company had not included any instructions b) the bolts and wing nuts were missing c) for some idiotic reason, the shutter guys had decided to chain my tracts together at closing...with no way of possibly separating them, short of a very powerful bolt cutter or blow torch, neither of which I owned.

So, with Hurricane Frances now less than 36 hours away, I drove like a madman to the shutter company, was given a quick tutorial on tract mounting, a box of bolts and wing nuts, and, with the tract cut free by said company's bolt cutter, headed home for 5 hours of sleep before attempting to protect my home.

On Thursday I was up with the sun. Frances was now a Category-2 storm, but her 105 mph winds were aimed directly at Palm Beach County. Ah, but I was a man with a plan. Step one was to remove all 115 shutters from my garage and place them in some semblance of an order. That took an hour. So did window #1 of 21. It seems those anchor bolts were just a wee bit too tight for my power drill...or my arms. Now, I'm not Arnold, but I'm no pushover either. At 6-3 and 220 pounds, I can handle a bolt. But a few of these gems felt as if they had been soldered on tight.

Twelve hours, 143 swear words, and a few tears of frustration later, I had completed all but four windows - the highest windows on the house, none reachable by another access roof. With my own ladders far too short, I hastily made a deal with another neighbor - if he lent me his 30 foot ladder in the morning, I'd finish my home and help him with his.

And so I went to bed, Frances a mere 26 hours away.

I was up again earlier on Friday, determined to shelter my home from the impending storm. Extending my neighbors' borrowed ladder, I placed it under the first window and climbed. Heights are not my favorite thing, but hey, you do what you have to do, right? Except saving your home shouldn't be this strenuous or dangerous. This is America, we should be able to push a button or something to put on shutters, not risk our lives. I'm 45 years old and in pretty decent shape. What about senior citizens? What about single moms? Or the handicapped? Were they expected to balance 25 feet off the ground, holding 30 pound sheets of metal? And in gusting winds?

Up the ladder I went. Poised beneath the first of those four demon windows, I placed the drill's bit against the bolt head and...the entire anchor came out of the wall! Again and again I unscrewed bolts, achieving the same horrifying results. I screamed, I cursed, and I imagined the roof of my house disappearing into the blistering night sky as Frances's 105 mph eye-wall decimated my home and family. Refusing to give up, I borrowed a pack of concrete screws from another neighbor (our entire street now working together to save one another) and spent the next four hours, bashing and drilling and banging holes into my home, willing to do anything to make these damn shutters stay put. By one that afternoon, I was down to the last shutter, only to discover I had run out of concrete screws! Cursing, spitting, my face frying beneath a harsh sun, I searched on hands and knees in the tall grass for lost screws.

Eureka! Two more precious blue concrete-penetrating life-savers! Up the ladder I went, my feet swollen and battered from standing so long on metal rungs. Doing the best I could, I drilled and prayed, hoping these two screws would hold.

I finished at two in the afternoon, Frances's winds already blowing hard. My home somewhat secure, my body battered from three days of abuse, I dragged my neighbor's ladder to his home...and joined him on his roof.

Two more hours, and I was a dead man walking. Fortunately, another neighbor relieved me, and I limped home.

Out in the Atlantic, Frances was taking her good ole time, her new arrival time set for Saturday night.

My wife's friends arrived to share our abode, a single mom, her ten year old daughter, and her aging mother, whose own condo was in an evacuation zone. They had their dog with them, who was making friends with my German Shepherd. We welcomed them into our ark, hoping it would hold.

Knowing the power would leave us soon, I ordered the air conditioning turned on high, and crawled into the shower, my face and ears fried from the sun, my arms bearing lacerations from the sharp aluminum shutters, my left thumb swollen from the beating my right had inflicted with its hammer.

We gathered around the television to watch reporters standing on beaches, playing the "fear" card like John Ashcroft protegees. The power left us Saturday morning. Frances hit us that night.

The first 70 + mph winds swirled in from the west, taking with it one of my shutters. One down, 114 to go. . .only it takes one unprotected window to loose a home. From my perch at the threatened window, I prayed the other five concrete screws would hold, and asked God that if one home was destined to collapse, let it belong to the (insert expletive) owner of the shutter company.

What does a Category-2 hurricane sound like? Some say a train, but to me, the underlying roar of the wind sounded more like an approaching tidal wave. The fear is settled but constant, it's not panic. More like being in a plane, 30,000 feet up, when turbulence strikes. I'm not a good flyer, and when I feel turbulence, I sort of shut my eyes and rely on faith that it won't get worse, that I won't suddenly feel the plane pitch into a nose-dive. Same with a hurricane. One feels the wind, hears it howl, registers a window tremble, but faith tells you you've done all you could, that the storm will remain outside.. .hopefully.

Andrew, of course, was different. So was Charlie. Preparations meant little, those bad boys just took the wall, shutter, and roof with them.

My ten year old daughter lost it around nine that night. Hours earlier, she had been walking in the wind with her friend, now she was freaking. My two year old son lost it when she lost it, more upset about not being about to watch Finding Nemo for the 200th time. Assuring (maybe yelling) at her that all was fine, that the old man had secured those shutters like Thor had wheeled his hammer, we crawled into one bed, sweating from the heat, and listened to a bunch of exhausted radio announcers try to frighten us even more.

I cursed some more. I mean, was this really necessary? Just tell us where the eye is, what the wind speed is, and shut the hell up. I don't want to hear gory details, or how Frances compared to the storm of 1912. I don't need to know how bad things might get, or that the reporter is being lifted off her feet like Mary freakin' Poppins. We get it already, just give us the facts!

At some point my eyes closed from exhaustion and I drifted off to sleep.

I awoke to lightning strikes, filtering in behind the bedroom shutters. Frances's eye wall was passing over us, her 105 mph winds testing my handiwork. Feeling more than a bit uneasy, I crawled out of bed and went upstairs to inspect the remaining screws protecting my home's Achilles heel. They were holding...barely.

I stayed up, listening to the radio. Windows rattled and leaked, the wall shook. I thought about moving to Atlantic City. I fell asleep.

By morning, the worst of Frances was gone. She had taken a dozen of my roof tiles, destroyed palm fronds and a tree I was planning on cutting down anyway, but she spared our home. My neighbor was not as fortunate, his new screened in porch had collapsed into the pool, taking a few beautiful outdoor lamps with it. Trees were uprooted. Neighbors checked on neighbors. The power was out, so I removed a few shutters and let in more hot, humid, sticky wind. By seven that night, the power had miraculously been restored. I cranked up the A/C, put on Nemo for my son, and blessed those FP & L workers.

The cable came back an hour later. Out in the Atlantic, Hurricane Ivan was approaching. Maybe earthquakes weren't so bad after all?

(AUTHOR'S NOTE: Hurricane Jeanne struck the exact same locale 3 weeks later. The shutters are still hanging)

Check out SteveAlten.com Today...


Contact Information
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email: meg82159@aol.com
phone: 740-756-7650
web: http://www.stevealten.com
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