True, but a Backstory?

 Trust but Verify

June 2022

True, but a Backstory?

My blog, Trust but Verify, is my commitment to honest and objective writing. The phrase, trust but verify, is not original. President Regan learned it from Suzanne Massie, a scholar who sometimes served as an advisor to the president.

Suzanne, however, borrowed it from the Russians since their political leaders often used proverbs in their oratories…Doveryai, no proveryai (Доверяй, но проверяй). There you have it, Trust but Verify.

 

It was a practical thought…don’t take your friend’s or adversary’s word for it. Trust, but verify, was good business and good politics.

When developing and researching for my novels (which, by definition, is not a true story), I remain committed to focusing on actual life experiences. I don’t jump and run after bizarre, unbelievable happenings. There won’t be a hero jumping from a helicopter onto a racing car to apprehend a bank robber, no wild motorcycle rider pulling a wheelie on a railroad track ahead of a speeding train, and no gore for the sake of gore.

During my five decades of policing, I found a trite old saying to be true—being a cop is hours of boredom sprinkled with seconds of sheer terror. Writing faces the same challenges. The task in developing a novel is injecting real-life experiences into the storyline and weaving them together with creative writing.

 

It works. After countless hours of writing and editing, a final product is ready for the publisher. But it doesn’t happen overnight. It takes months or years from the time an idea develops in the writer’s brain before the manuscript is in print and in a bookstore.

To say you can’t tell a book by its cover is more than true. Each book has a backstory that is a non-fiction work worthy of its own manuscript. For example, look at this photo.

There is a wild backstory to it. Use a lot of imagination and a heavy dash of truth. Think Little Abner. A few of you may get it, but most won’t. Someday if I’ve had a Scotch or two, I might tell the story … or not.

Now see if you have a free audible book. Go to www.amazon.com/Thomas-J.-Nichols/e/B00BD861OM and click on whichever book you would like to receive. Those that may be available for free are “Arrows of Allah,” “We Were Young Once…,” and “The Russian.”

Good Luck.