THE WRITE PATH with Keith Wayne McCoy

Keith Wayne McCoy

In my series The Write Path, my guests talk to me about their books. Today I welcome author Keith Wayne McCoy, who will be discussing The Travelers with me.

So let me hand over my mic. The next voice you’ll hear will be Keith’s.

1. What is your book about?

My debut novel “The Travelers” was released by Champagne/BURST in February. It is basically a mainstream novel with a supernatural background. The very beginning, Prelude, describes a planet somewhere in the Pegasus Constellation 5 decades earlier in which a mother with two small children attempt to escape a fallen planet. Despite the obvious technological advantage her people have, residents are starving and finding sustenance for their children via stellar transportation to other worlds. Starving, the three board a ship.

In 2004, on our planet, Guy Turner, a black filmmaker, has an encounter with the now elderly mother and is drawn into a supernatural mystery involving James and Jess Bennett, a World War II GI and his British war bride who encountered the same woman on the luxury liner QUEEN MARY in 1947 but are now divorced. They had left Southampton with only each other but arrive in New York as a family. A hectic attempt is made to bring the old woman and the Bennetts together again one last time. Only 10% of the novel takes place on another planet and 90% takes place on the liner and an ancestral home in southern Illinois.

2. What do you think attracts readers to your main character?

Jess Bennett is an enigma from the beginning. She became a raging alcoholic after the deaths of the children she and her husband were entrusted to raise as their own. Jim moves to California while Jess remains in southern Illinois. I have found that both men and women readers are attracted to the character of Jess. She is a mystery and the veil of secrecy surrounding her evidently interests readers.

3. What message do you hope the reader takes away from your book?

I hope that as an author, I have brought forth the powerful bond of parenting and the language of grief all humans share through this novel. Guy is depressed and teetering dangerously close to a nervous breakdown and to his chagrin finds that he has more in common with Jess than Jim.

4. What do you think was it about your book that made it so easy to attract your editor?

My first editor with Champagne was Monica Brit and she also served on the acquisitions team. She told me the book haunted her for days. If a reader is solely interested in a science fiction tale, they will be disappointed as “The Travelers” is a character study of normal human beings facing supernatural forces. My former college writing mentor told me after reading the MS that if it were a movie, “It would be a David Lynch version of the film “Ordinary People”.

5. Comparing the ideas you had before writing the book with the finished product, would you change anything if you could travel back in time?

If I were able to change aspects of the novel, I would have lengthened the reunion between the old woman and the Bennetts. Also, Guy thanks Jess upon meeting her the first time that he appreciated her flying out for the documentary about QUEEN MARY but later, he realizes she had never flown as she was scared to death. I would have made her reply that she had taken a train in the beginning.

Thanks again, Carmen for the opportunity to visit with your readers. It was a pleasure

Media links:

​www.keithwaynemccoy.com
Amazon