Tag Archives: psychiatric halfway house

The Swanson Shuffle

The Swanson Shuffle now ready to read

More than any book I’ve written, I am so pleased The Swanson Shuffle is now officially published. Don’t get me wrong, I am excited whenever a story I’ve been immersed in for oh so many months is officially a book. But The Swanson Shuffle has a long and complex history.

First, there was the inspiration. Like the book’s protagonist, Bia Fernandes, I lived and worked in a psychiatric halfway house. To be clear, however, this book is not a memoir, but Bia’s story to tell. The characters, including her, are fictional. But having had that experience, I felt I could write her story with authenticity. The only similarity in our experiences is that the halfway house is located in a funky old mansion that would be torn down after a highway is built.

Anyway, I wrote the book, which I called Walking in Place, in 1999. I failed to lure an agent. I entered it in publishers’ contests with no luck.

The following year, I did have an agent, but he passed on the book and instead agreed to represent my hilltowns novels, which alas, he couldn’t get published. Yes, it’s been a long, strange trip.

Then in early 2014, I rewrote Walking in Place and renamed it The Swanson Shuffle. Both titles refer to the side-effect of one drug a few of the residents of Swanson House take. (I also considered at one point the title, Crazy Daisy.)

The two versions have many of the same characters. But the protagonist is named Rose in the first book and Bia in second. Walking in Place is written in first-person past tense, and The Swanson Shuffle, in first-person present tense.

Walking in Place begins when one of the residents has been arrested. The Swanson Shuffle starts with Bia coming for a weekend as part of the interview process.

The first version has hardly any chapter breaks. The second, as is typical of my current writing style, has lots.

In the first book, a lot of the plot revolves around Rose’s relations with the staff, including a bit of romance. The second focuses on Bia’s relationships with the residents, who, frankly, are far more interesting than the staff.

From time to time, in between writing new books like my mystery series, I returned to The Swanson Shuffle, making changes here and there. And, the masochistic writer that I am, queried agents and small presses, now that they had become popular. Unfortunately, darkstroke books, which published nine of my books, closed shop last year. And the book doesn’t fit the catalogue of my current publisher, Bloodhound Books.

Though I received encouraging words about the book from some in the business, I am at the point now that I say, “No more begging.” I will do it myself. Certainly, self-publishing is acceptable. I taught myself how to do formatting, and I am fortunate my artist son, Ezra Livingston, creates great book covers. (Wait until you see the one he created for the next Isabel Long book that will be out June 4.)

And so, voila! The Swanson Shuffle is yours to read in Kindle or paperback on Amazon. Here’s the link.

I thank you in advance. And if you love reading the book as much as I did writing it, please leave a review.

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The Swanson Shuffle

Who’s Who in The Swanson Shuffle

As promised in my last post, I will share info about residents who live at Swanson House — the psychiatric halfway house in my new novel, The Swanson Shuffle, which has an April 30 release. Yikes, that’s getting closer.

I confess the characters I create in my novels are real to me. I know how they look, speak, and act. That’s true of the residents who live at Swanson House.

First a little info. Except for one, the residents are former patients from a public or private mental hospital. They pay minimal rent and have a job, typically at one of the factories in town. The residents are expected to keep up with their meds and have regular visits with a shrink. They have a few household chores.

Bia Fernandes, who tells this story, gets into being their helpmate despite zero experience. She also likes the residents, actually more than the other staff members, Ben, Nina, and Paul — with good reason.

Here’s a brief look at several.

Lane is a smart 20-something who came to Swanson from an upscale private hospital when the insurance runs out. He compiles his observations in small notebooks with titles like Twisted People. This from Debbie, the staff member Bia replaces: “Lane’s a smart goofball. His folks have bucks. I don’t understand why they let him stay in a dump like this.”

Kevin, the youngest resident, maybe 18, is Lane’s sidekick. If Lane is doing something, Kevin is with him — like going on the weekly grocery trip with Bia. He’s thin, with short brown hair, ears that stick out, and really bad skin. Not much is known about his background. The kid hardly talks. He’s a listener.

Angie is one wild woman, who claims to have been a groupie to big rock stars. She doesn’t hold back on her comments or actions. As Debbie warns Bia: “Don’t believe a damn word that comes out of Angie’s mouth. She’ll brag about being a groupie. She was probably a stripper or maybe a hooker. She’s just found a good place to hide out for a while.”

Jerry is the house’s cool guy who grew up poor in a New Jersey city. He got into drugs, and all the old stuff started coming up in a troubling way. He began hearing what people were thinking, and as Debbie tells Bia, “Nothing good’s going to come from that.” Jerry has a relationship of sorts with Angie. But he has goals beyond Swanson.

Who else is at Swanson House? Alice, who is much older than the other residents, falls asleep mid-sentence. Caroleclaims doctors stole her baby. Then there is Big Jim and Little Jim. Stanleyand Brian both have mother issues. Mark is the new guy.

Here’s a scene early in The Swanson Shuffle. Bia, who is spending the night as part of the interview process, plays cards with some of the residents.

Stanley deals me a lousy hand. No face cards, and I get low numbers and four suits. We’re playing for matchsticks. I haven’t won once although I came close when Jim’s three-of-a-kind beat my pair of aces. They tell me they used to play cards in the wards all the time.

“Don’t feel so bad,” Jerry says beside me. “We’ve had lots of practice.”

Jerry pushes against Kevin’s cards. All night he has to be told to keep them up. Kevin bats his lashes, and the skin around his acne reddens when he’s reminded.

Lane’s feet jump beneath the table and kick mine.

“What’s he got this time?” he asks.

“Never you mind,” Jerry says.

“I’ll take three,” I say.

Everybody laughs. They know I’ve got nothing, and the cards I’m dealt don’t help. I can’t even get a pair.

“Maybe we should be playing for money,” Jerry says, whistling as he lays two cards on the table.

Lane grins when he gets his.

Jim squints at him across the table. “Lane, you’d make a better poker player if you didn’t give away your cards. Don’t you know what a poker face is?”

“Poker face,” Lane says.

“Look at Kevin.” Jim nods. “He has the perfect poker face. Nobody can tell what’s going on inside. Now, if he can just keep his cards up, he’ll do fine.”

Kevin shoots Jim a grateful grin. The kid hardly talks. He’s a listener. Ben said Kevin is not quiet, he’s silent. He calls him Kevin the Spy.

I fold. Not even the best bluffer could fake their way out of this one. Jim is next, and he goes to the sink to fill the kettle for Sanka. He stands by the stove, waiting for the water to get hot enough while the others play out their hands. Jim marches in place because he takes the same drug as Lane. So does Stanley. They go every two weeks to get a shot at the hospital. They take Lane with them.

Angie enters the kitchen and begins circling the table. A bandana holds her hair, so it forms a lumpy halo around her head. She wears a long shift of paisley fabric with a v-neckline so low anybody could see her breasts.

“You gonna play all night?” Angie asks me on the third go-round.

“Why? You want to join us?”

Angie holds a square piece of paper by her side so no one else can see it. She sniggers.

“Nah, I wanna show you somethin’.”

“Hey, Jim, deal me out of the next hand,” I say. “I’ll be right back.”

Angie tips her head. She wants me to follow her into the pantry, and when I do, she yanks the pull chain on the bare bulb overhead and shuts the door. She lifts the paper.

“See. There.”

I bend closer. It’s a terrible photo of a man and woman, too dark, and whoever took it didn’t hold the camera steady. It could’ve been at a party or a bus station or any place really. I study the photo, and then Angie’s face. She thinks I should recognize these people. Angie frowns when the guys in the kitchen let out a roar. Somebody had a big hand.

“Is that you?” I ask.

“Yeah, me and Mick Jagger. It’s in New York. See his arm around me?”

I can’t see the arm, but I think I recognize her hair.

“When were you in New York?”

“When Mick was on tour. They let me go backstage. Neat, huh?”

She smiles when I tell her, “Yeah, really neat.”

Here’s the link to The Swanson Shuffle to buy as an eBook or paperback. Thank you if you do.

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The Swanson Shuffle

The Swanson Shuffle Launches April 30

Ta-da, my next novel, The Swanson Shuffle has an official release: April 30. For me, that will be a happy day as this novel finally will be available to readers as an eBook and paperback. The link’s below. 

Over the next few weeks, I will share posts about the book’s pieces, that is, its story line, characters, setting, inspiration, and what was happening in 1974 when the book takes place. Today, I am writing about the title, The Swanson Shuffle, and what that means.

Two years out of college, Bia Fernandes leaves a dead-end job to work and live in a psychiatric halfway house, where she learns more than she expects from the ex-patients who live there. The Swanson House is a century-old mansion that must have been grand in its day when it was owned by the Swanson family who got rich from the mills in that town. Since then, it’s been an inn, a rooming house, and now a psychiatric halfway house. The building will eventually be demolished when an interstate is extended through that town.

That’s the Swanson part.

As for the shuffle, I will let Bia, who tells this story, explain what that’s about. At the start of the book, she has arrived at Swanson House for part of the interview process.

I pull my black VW Bug onto the long drive of Swanson House and park beside a maroon-colored car with fins. A man leaning over its chrome grill squints as he raises his head and pushes his long, dark hair back with the side of his arm. I remember him from when I came for the interview last week. His name is Jerry, and the man marching in place beside the car’s front fender is Lane, actually Lanford Dawson V. That’s what he told me, and I haven’t forgotten because he made such a big deal about the V and when he said, “I come from a long line of Lanes.”

I’m here for the overnight visit, part of the hiring process to see if I can cut working and living in a psychiatric halfway house. I’m early, but I’ve already driven once around Petersville, and it looks just like another Massachusetts mill town barely holding onto itself. The houses, mostly triple-deckers, are a little worn, and downtown is a strip of dusty stores a few blocks from the brick factories. A supermarket, an International House of Pancakes, and a couple of car dealerships are on the outskirts of town, where a patch of scrubby forest ends.

Lane stands beside my VW although his feet still move on top of a thin, gray crust of snow. Up and down. Up and down. Like somebody ordered Lane to mark time and forgot all about him, so he keeps doing it. I asked about it when I was here before. Debbie, the staff member who’s leaving, said it’s a side effect of the drug Lane takes. Two other guys at the house also take it, and they do the same exact thing. They call it the Swanson shuffle.

I witnessed such a side effect when I was a live-in staff at a psychiatric halfway house a long time ago. To be clear, this book is not a memoir. But I believe my personal experience allows me to give an accurate portrayal of what could happen when people with zero experience in the mental health field are hired to live with ex-patients. 

The residents are expected to have jobs, take their medication and do chores. They interact at dinner, meetings, card games, and activities such as volleyball games in the backyard. The staff members are supposed to be role models and help in any way they can. That’s how Bia feels when she is hired. But, alas, that’s not the what happens in The Swanson Shuffle. More soon….

Here’s the link to The Swanson Shuffle to pre-order your Kindle version. (Paperback readers don’t have to wait and can get a copy now.) Thanks for your interest.

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The Swanson Shuffle

My Next Book: The Swanson Shuffle

Today I am giving you a sneak peek at my next book: The Swanson Shuffle. Unlike my last release, this one is not for kids nor does it have anything to do with magic. This book is about a young woman’s experience living and working in a psychiatric halfway house and the people she encounters. That’s the Kindle cover above designed by my son Ezra Livingston. Release will be in April.

Here’s a brief synopsis:

Two years out of college, Bia Fernandes leaves a dead-end job to work and live in a psychiatric halfway house, where she learns more than she expects from its ex-patients — just as the Watergate scandal in the U.S. comes to a head in 1974.

Swanson House is a derelict mansion that will be torn down for a highway coming through a dying mill town in Massachusetts. The state, which is closing its mental hospitals, hires inexperienced staff like Bia to help people make the transition. 

But where others have failed, Bia has it in her to help what the staff member she replaces called dented cans. She tries to see the good in them.

Yes, I lived and worked in a psychiatric halfway house, but this is Bia’s story to tell. The Swanson Shuffle is strictly a work of fiction although I believe having that experience helped me create realistic characters and setting. As I’ve said before, I take what I know and have my way with it. 

I actually began this novel in 1999. I was about a hundred pages into it but my then agent, who I acquired the following year, wasn’t interested in representing it. So, I wrote other books instead.  But the story stayed with me. 

On my computer I have versions going back to 2012 when I took up the book up again. We were living in Taos, NM, then and I tore the book apart. I kept the same characters—more about them in future posts — but seriously changed how the story unfolds. Over the years, I kept working it. Last year, I added an epilogue after two trusted readers, Teresa and Fred, felt the book needed better closure. 

Besides The Swanson Shuffle, the book has had two other titles, Walking in Place and Crazy Daisy. Why call it The Swanson Shuffle? For a few reasons. The name of the halfway house is the Swanson House. A few of the staff take a drug with a side effect that makes them constantly step in place. And, unfortunately for some, there is the constant shuffle between a mental hospital and halfway house.

Yes, this book has been a Work in Progress for many years. I will be honest, I have queried oh so many agents and publishers who didn’t want to take a chance on it. So, here I am publishing it myself and hoping readers will prove them all wrong.

ADDITION: In the first graph, I mentioned my most recent book was written for young readers. The Twin Jinn and the Alchemy Machine is the second in a series. A family of magical beings move to a small town where their 11-year-old twins, Jute and Fina, go to school. The twins are supposed to keep their magic hidden — they can fly, be invisible, cast spells — but they get carried away creating an alchemy machine that works for their science fair project.

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