tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-72365312011-08-01T14:54:31.133-07:00Henry Baumnoreply@blogger.comBlogger121100tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7236531.post-88938385175241001802010-03-04T15:59:00.000-08:002010-03-04T16:09:36.404-08:00

This blog is no longer active. It has been turned into a novel:New posting can be found at: http://www.theamericanbookofthedead.com

Henry Baumnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7236531.post-1093041413649498452004-08-20T15:15:00.000-07:002004-08-23T13:58:57.283-07:00

On the eve of the inauguration, Benjamin Winchell, diplomat, had a talk with his son. The talk both depressed the President-elect and filled him with a childlike glee. It depressed him because the diplomat told him that everything that he thought he knew--everything that he had campaigned on--turned out to be a lie. It filled him with glee because he was let in on a massive secret. As he

Henry Baumnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7236531.post-1092860448238025172004-08-18T13:20:00.000-07:002004-08-18T13:40:29.873-07:00

You’re getting now that this is the story of two men, both on opposite sides. Here’s what I didn’t tell you: Charles Winchell was my brother. Kidding, kidding. Nothing so dramatic as that. I was just a small town professor working on a novel. He was President of the whole Goddamn world. Our lives would eventually cross like brothers. I won’t invoke Cane and Abel. I’m not good enough to be

Henry Baumnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7236531.post-1092182241477814402004-08-10T16:43:00.000-07:002004-08-10T17:49:31.606-07:00

Fast forward to the oval office, two years in. (Note: The reason I am able to have a bird’s eye into what went on in the oval office during these years is not mere artistic license. In the present, we have mastered time travel, remote viewing, etc. so in a sense I was actually there. If this sounds far fetched, this will all make perfect sense when you get to the end of my story, and you

Henry Baumnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7236531.post-1091398673857207122004-08-01T15:17:00.000-07:002004-08-01T15:43:06.393-07:00

Charles Winchell was a diplomat’s son. He was a fortunate one. But he was many men, a kind of well-received schizophrenic. Charles was his presidential name. He went by Chuck to the unions, Charlie to the ladies, and Charles at the convention. He had a personality to fit every name. It was not surprising that Winchell was able to get elected. We were in need of a dictator. The world was

Henry Baumnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7236531.post-1090896909936402512004-07-26T19:52:00.000-07:002004-07-26T19:57:27.560-07:00

Before I go on, I have to talk a little about time travel. People wonder if I am really from the year 2020. For the sake of argument, let’s say this story is being written by a writer in the year 2004. Even if this is true, could it not be possible that he is channeling information from the future? Those of you who think a time traveler needs a "machine" are still caught up in a Newtonian,

Henry Baumnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7236531.post-1090432927286648452004-07-21T11:01:00.000-07:002004-08-18T13:22:12.240-07:00

I’d always had thoughts about writing a science fiction novel. I had grown up on "Star Wars." My father was a novelist who wrote the occasional science fiction novel. His father was a lover of science fiction with an encyclopedic memory of everything he’d read. So it seemed inevitable that I should try my hand. My idea was to write a sci-fi novel with the scope of The Brothers Karamazov or

Henry Baumnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7236531.post-1090175115451867592004-07-18T11:20:00.000-07:002004-08-18T13:21:01.350-07:00

After September 11, Stephanie and I fled New York. We moved to Willamette, South Carolina, on a whim. I always wanted to be a Southern writer and live in small town South. I quickly learned the obvious--that to be a Southern writer, you have to be Southern. My naivete can be amazing. The same could be said about my time in New York. I lived in New York for ten years trying to recreate the

Henry Baumnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7236531.post-1089853258630776432004-07-14T17:50:00.000-07:002004-07-14T20:00:32.113-07:00

I was lying when I said I wasn’t going to give any backstory. 2001. September 11. In a way, it started the rest of my life, all our lives. I was sitting on the couch with a cup of coffee in my right hand, watching the early morning news. I had spent the morning walking the dog around the neighborhood--I bought myself an egg sandwich and an orange juice, someone eagerly handed me an election

Henry Baumnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7236531.post-1089061745857460912004-07-05T14:07:00.000-07:002004-07-05T14:09:05.856-07:00

I should start earlier than the present tense. I'll start with 2004, when I started writing about the End of the World. I was doing it as a kind of exercise--to purge my underlying but pervasive fear that we were heading towards the end. We had a born-again Christian President, a Pentecostal Attorney General. These men believed in the Apocalypse and the Second Coming. They wanted it. Movies

Henry Baumnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7236531.post-1089058362664282462004-07-05T13:12:00.000-07:002004-07-05T13:13:49.233-07:00

I know what you’re thinking. If this is such important information, why bother posting it incrementally. My answer is that I can only post it as fast as I can write it. I’m living right now, twenty years from now. It’s July 5, 2020. I apologize in advance--there’s bound to be some confusion with this whole set up. Let’s just say this is written in hindsight. 20/20 hindsight. Believe me,

Henry Baumnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7236531.post-1086632580461426562004-06-07T11:22:00.000-07:002004-06-24T18:09:51.103-07:00

The year is 2020. Think of this journal as a warning. Call it a novel, if you like. It can be comforting to believe that this story is only the result of imagination. It seems trivial, almost, to use a literary medium to describe the end of the world, like using a billboard to tell the news. What can I tell you, humans are limited. We only have eyes and ears. Information can only be read

Henry Baumnoreply@blogger.com