{"id":372,"date":"2013-06-24T15:22:59","date_gmt":"2013-06-24T19:22:59","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/chcobb.com\/?page_id=372"},"modified":"2014-04-05T11:27:11","modified_gmt":"2014-04-05T15:27:11","slug":"the-story-behind-the-story-of-falcon-down","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"https:\/\/chcobb.com\/?page_id=372","title":{"rendered":"The Story behind the Story of Falcon Down<\/i>"},"content":{"rendered":"

Spoiler Alert! Don’t read this until after reading Falcon Down<\/em>!<\/h2>\n

There is a story behind Falcon Down<\/em> that some readers might find of interest. Years ago I read and thoroughly enjoyed Louis L’Amour’s epic adventure novel, Last of the Breed<\/em>. It is a classic L’Amour tale: a captivating outdoor-adventure story, exciting, well-researched, and with well-developed characters. It’s one of those stories you read where you’re really disappointed when it’s over. I did not want to leave Joe Makatozi on the north shore of the Chukchi Peninsula; I wanted to know what happened next.<\/p>\n

So about eight years ago I wrote Makatozi\u2019s Revenge <\/em>(MR<\/em>), a 200,000 word novel that moved the story forward. I developed a panoply of new characters and new adventures. When I was done writing, I contacted the L’Amour estate, naively thinking that I could obtain non-exclusive rights for a sequel to Last of the Breed <\/em>(LOTB<\/em>). In a series of email exchanges with Beau L\u2019Amour, he made it clear that the estate would not permit a sequel to one of L\u2019Amour\u2019s works. Consequently, I abandoned the project even though the manuscript was complete.<\/p>\n

I moved on to a new project (Outlander Chronicles: Phoenix<\/em>), intending Phoenix<\/em> to be the first of a series (the next one is due out in 2015). But I just could not turn loose of MR<\/em>. I loved the story, the dialog, the characters I had created. It was a great tale, and it was a shame that it was just gathering dust in the basement.<\/p>\n

So I decided to write my own prequel to the story, using my own characters and events. In order to preserve the essential elements of MR, I needed to use five major plot points contained in LOTB<\/em>.<\/p>\n