“A dog will look at the ground when he’s done you wrong. A snake will look you in the eye.”

I can’t remember where I heard that saying — it wasn’t that long ago, I’m pretty sure  — but at any rate, these are the first words of Sewerville: The Dark and Bloody Ground, and they ought to tell you something about where the story’s headed.

And, the first chapter is about a former U.S. Senator. That ought to tell you something, too.

So there you go.

One small thing. Sewerville II. I forgot to mention this earlier, but I changed the name. It’s now called The Dark and Bloody Ground, or if you want to be completely accurate, it’s now called Sewerville II: The Dark and Bloody Ground. I like the “II”; it makes it sound like a movie. And everybody knows the 2nd movie is always tough on the good guys — see Empire Strikes Back, Godfather II, Captain America: Winter Soldier, Wrath of Khan, etc..

If you’ve never heard, “the dark and bloody ground” is the mythical translation of the Indian name Kentucke. While that now appears to be a bit of a, shall we say, historical embellishment, it’s nonetheless fitting for Kentucky in the late 1700s, and in some ways, Kentucky of the 21st century. Certainly the Kentucky of Sewerville.

Go Cats.

Heads up: a substantial portion of Sewerville: The Gentlemen from Kentucky takes place between the last 2 chapters of the first Sewerville novel. The story starts immediately after Boone’s climactic hospital showdown with the Slone family, and tells the story of both his run to freedom and his fight against Walt Slone’s supporters. Some of those supporters are of the criminal variety, others strictly legal. Friends in high places. The such.

Something else. One of the main ideas behind Sewerville was the scourge of meth and pills on rural America. Sewerville II moves on to more current cancers: heroin, and politicians. Here’s a brief excerpt reflecting both:

*

“The heroin called, the veins answered. Trawley pushed the hypodermic into his skin, drove the plastic plunger downward, and released, warm, beautiful joy straight into his body. Not long after, he closed his eyes and felt as though he swam in golden honey, his very soul drifting through the world and around it and above it all at once, without any anchor holding him.

“Somewhere in the distance, not just miles but light years away, a faint electronic cadence pulsated, calling him like a signal fire from an extraterrestrial location. Mars, Andromeda, Centaurus A, galaxies and quasars, planets and moons. Somewhere out there. He felt vibrations, saw a pulsating green light from a faraway star. Cosmic tremors. Slow. Slow. Coming in. Slow. The universe spun about him, and he sensed himself at the center not just all existence but also all possible existence, as if everything that ever had been or might be now breathed together at that moment, harmonious inside his soul.

“The light. The vibrations. The signal fire, the cosmic tremors.

“The realization dawned that both the light and the vibrations emanated from the same source: his cell phone, which rested on his right leg. He looked down, saw blurred letters on a white screen, and deciphered them well enough to know he should pick up regardless of the opiate haze overtaking his senses.

“So he did.

“’Hello, Senator,’ he said, smiling as he put the call on speaker.”