Not exactly a song title, but here we invoke Billy Joel’s pseudonym plus a snippet of a Paul Simon lyric. No need to be coy, but why not?
History repeating in a similar but not exactly the same manner when LBDG becomes LGDB is another bit straight out of the original years-old outline. Having this happen before Local Boy’s first open mic night is in line with the whole “pinch off the old timeline” strategy used by the TP1 narrator, begging the question of who’s calling the shots.
When will you realize, the Tidbits wait for you?
- Halloween has oddly been mentioned in all 3 of my novels. I don’t even like Halloween all that much, so mostly a coincidence. “Why Halloween?” is stated as much by the author as the narrator here.
- “Take it on faith” is a little bit of alternate future self subconscious telepathic lyrical theft. Same with “The harder you work the luckier you get.”
- Allowed Aloud still amuses me to no end. I’m not the only one.
- At first I considered having Local Gal use the real song titles without going through the charade of changing them, but ultimately decided against it for reasons I might explain later (and honestly am still a little wishy washy on).
- “We had different reasons for that.”
- The real term for a phonographic memory is an echoic memory, but I like mine better.
- “You can’t judge a song by its cover, but you can tell how much it rocks” paraphrases a Carter USM lyric about books.
- Nelson as the new mastermind was how I originally imagined this going, but the chapter title calls it a “new plan” for a reason…
- Local Boy wonders if “dangerous folk rock appeal” has ever been uttered before. There’s a lot more DFRA to come. Anyone want a t-shirt?
- Do you know what happens when you presume?
- TP1’s narrator had strict rules about only borrowing a single song per artist, but Piano Man tackles three big Billy Joel hits here in 1969. An old draft used “Vienna” (retitled “Crazy Child”), but it felt like sacrilege to reappropriate one of my own all time favorite songs. I (sort of) took Local Boy’s advice on not mocking greats and used other hits.
- “She leaned in for a hug, but I put a hand on her shoulder to keep her at bay” is a more restrained echoing of the “Heisman” maneuver from TP1.
- This used to have a half page Doc Brown inspired explanation on how time travel works, mostly recapped from TP1. It was one of the final cuts I made to keep the story moving, only keeping parts that formed the Stolen Songs, Stolen Ideas part title.
- Main goals of the chapter ending were to set up the arrival of the TP1 narrator (Local Boy’s future son) as well as tease a return to the fateful wedding of his future daughter in year 2000. These were the last bits of the original outline…which is about to go out the window as soon as the next chapter happens.
