The imagined city

And you say, "What in the world is Derek talking about now?" Well, I'll tell you. A couple of years ago, I was writing a story and needed a city to hold a great deal of the action. I felt that I wanted it to be in the Pacific Northwest, but I knew nothing about any of the cities there. Oh, I know which ones they are, but I knew very little about them. I knew I could research them, but there was this nagging feeling in the back of my mind that if I got something wrong about whatever city I included in the story, there would be a million or so people lambasting me about their hometown. Any errors would throw doubt on the story and on my abilities to write. I couldn't have that, so I devised this fictitious city of Port Morgan.

To tell the truth, I've actually lost count of exactly how many stories I've used the city in, but I'm going to put them in chronological order for you. Because, you see, I also used or mentioned several characters in multiple stories. Or, I allowed characters from one book to walk down the streets of Port Morgan as 'extras' in the movie that played in my head and ended up on the page. But, you know what? I couldn't come up with an appropriate name for the city until my latest novel.

Okay, here they are, in chronological order according to what is happening in the stories: Dolly Games, Eggs of Empire, Cold Feet(A short story), Questionable Interests and Taken Apart.

I know this isn't exactly fair. In order to understand what I'm talking about, a person would have to have read all of these stories. Incidentally, Cold Feet is included in my book of shorts titled, The Empty Heart: A Collection. But you have to pay attention because some of the characters who have made uncredited cameo appearances in these books are not identified and only exist in the stories for a paragraph or two. Sometimes, they are only described in passing. but if you know the stories, then you know the characters.

No. I won't tell you which ones they are and I won't give hints.

Returning to the fact that I didn't give the city a name until recently; I don't know if a name never really popped out and made itself known to me, or if I was just being lazy and using a location that I had already invested a lot of time and effort on. Who knows? I don't.

Thank you,
Derek A. Murphy
Author of Dolly Games, Gulf of the Plains I and II, and Congruencies.