LHM: The Debriefing

 

"I’m here to say that, in years past, I’ve hated Kenneth Teague so much that I wanted to strangle him. And, in the years since, I’ve loved him better than my own father. Because my daddy lied to me an awful lot, and Ghost lies, sometimes, yeah, to protect us, but he always tells the truth in the end. And this is his club. His family. I owe every good thing in my life to him. So he has my vote.” 

Big Son has been live in the wild for one week, and yesterday, I dropped the compiled edition of Lord Have Mercy. All 1,609 (holy crap, guys) Kindle pages of it are now available in full, and I even managed to get a paperback version formatted and have ordered a proof. I’m not sure yet if I’ll release it as such, because the print is so very small. I’ll look at my physical copy first before I decide.

But in any event, it’s out there! It’s done!

I’m still waiting to feel something besides crushing relief and exhaustion. My mom said, “You should be proud,” and I’m just…tired. I wanted to recapture the setting and the feeling of Fearless, but this time there was a plethora of new characters to utilize, and an overarching enemy plotline to wrap up, and the entire effort became monumental, and monumentally stressful. The four parts altogether measured up to a whopping 469,000 words. I’m insane. I’m a crazy person – and I’ve felt it, physically and mentally, for the past month or so. I’m grateful that the book exists, but I’d like to sleep for a week, please and thank you.

I’ve been thinking all this past week that I’d wake up one morning ready to type out a stellar and comprehensive debriefing for Part Four, but in truth, since I’ve been blogging about the book for a year at this point, I think I’ve said all there is to say about its themes and characterization, and my authorly intentions with every installment.

But I will add…and here come the spoilers…

I think – hope – that it was clear all along that Remy was going to be found and that Boyle was going to get his comeuppance. I never care if the happy ending is predictable, nor if the action enables readers to anticipate what’s to come chapter by chapter. That’s called narrative follow through, and is an intentional feature rather than a bug of storytelling. I always deliver happy endings, but this one was buried at the end of a long, winding, tense road, and, though it’s silly, given I created her, I’m proud of Ava. Of the role she played. She’s never been a sweet, innocent darling, and has always been Mercy’s monster counterpart. But, just like with Mercy, that monster part of her doesn’t mean she doesn’t love her children fiercely, or that she can’t show them tenderness and leniency.

I think of Mercy and Ava’s storyline, chiefly its culmination here at the end, as a confirmation of everything we already know about them, rather than any sort of revelation. There was none of the usual romantic tension present in a romance novel: the will-they-won’t-they, the heat, the developing chemistry. In that respect, I don’t know that it can be classified as a romance, despite their romantic love being what ultimately saves the day. And without any of that traditional romantic tension, the whole novel felt like a big risk: will readers want to return to a relationship that is already well-established and not in danger of collapsing? I know I enjoy that, as a reader, but in general, writing a second book about a couple in a series isn’t always a recipe for success. Which is why, though this is their book, the emotional revelations happen for other characters.

For Alex, yes, as he wrestles with the meaning of his bloodline, constantly asking himself if he’s inherently violent or “bad” thanks to Remy’s DNA. One of several favorite moments for me was the scene outside the hospital when Tina assures Alex that he’s more like Mercy than Remy, and that both of them are better men than he ever was. At the beginning of the novel, Alex would have hated hearing that he was similar to Mercy, but by the end, is touched and comforted by the knowledge.

I think the most significant emotional storyline in the novel belongs to Aidan and Ghost. And, by default, Walsh.

My favorite scene in the whole novel is the conversation between Aidan and Ghost in the cathedral. From a strategic standpoint, I loved the contrast of their meetings being “church,” but this honest and raw moment between them happening in an actual church. But chiefly, I loved writing that scene because Aidan got to be as upfront and as vulnerable as he’s ever been with Ghost. And Ghost, well…Ghost is Ghost. Everything he says in this book is wholly honest, and like Tango tells him a few scenes earlier, they’ve all realized, finally, that being a good president and being a good father aren’t the same thing, but that he does love them, in his hardass way. His club, in turn, has decided to love him back, knowing what they do of him. He has grown, though; wanting Aidan to be his VP is a huge step, and a vital one. I know there were readers who were hoping that Aidan would never forgive him, or maybe even that Ghost would be excommunicated from the club, but those things were never on the table. The club’s one big messy family, and they fight, and they want to hate, but they love each other, at the end of the day.

Walsh’s storyline here is the culmination of a very slowly-unspooling thread from multiple books. I needed to keep checking in with him throughout LHM so that his decision at the end made narrative sense, and I think it does. He was a good VP, but, ultimately, he’s the Money Man, rather than an ambassador, and Aidan’s affable bad boy charm is, at this point, a better fit for the role.

In the vein of Fearless, this book has lots of small, delightful moments that I enjoyed writing: the Ava/Tenny team-up; Toly’s motion sickness; Ghost’s astonishment over Fox’s thoughtfulness, getting to see him on an op for the first time.

I feel like, as the weeks go by, I’ll think of other posts I want to write. Favorite lines I’ll remember; little nuggets that can be mined for future books. But for now, I’ll leave it here, and leave you with links. Thank you so much for sticking through a year of a slow rollout, and for reading. If you get the chance, a review would be greatly appreciated.

Xo

Lauren

Big Son:

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Complete Novel:

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