by Dennis Dalman
Inside of Mark Wolter’s computer there are 16 novels incubating like chicks ready to hatch, and one of them has finally hatched – a published novel entitled “Meeting the Unusual.”
A Sartell resident, Wolters teaches language arts to fifth- and sixth-graders at Holy Trinity Catholic School in Pierz.
“Meeting the Unusual” starts this way:
“How wonderful to be drunk! Stephen Cryer, consummate youthful procrastinator, spent the night in his hometown of Green Prairie with his old high school buddies in a bar where they drank until their bellies were bloated and their eyes became blurred. The next morning he would drive over ninety miles from his home to attend the university in St. Cloud.”
Thus begins Stephen’s long descent into bar-hopping, outrageous drinking binges and wild partying. Is there any hope for Stephen’s headlong rush toward self-destruction?
During the course of the novel, Stephen’s out-of-control behavior causes him to lose his girlfriend and many others, including an estrangement from his brothers and his father, a widower.
Early on in the book, Stephen happens to meet a man known only as “H.” Stephen is repelled by H, who is vaguely sinister and talks in a mysterious, encrypted manner. However, as the novel progresses, Stephen, despite his misgivings, eventually forms a strange bond with his antagonist, the man known only as H.
Stephen, whose mother is dead, grew up on a farm with three brothers – one in Minneapolis, one in Missouri and another who took off 16 years before and was never seen again.
During a break from college, Stephen travels to a Thanksgiving dinner with his father and brothers and discovers to his shock that the long-lost brother has returned home. Tension and emotional conflicts arise within the family.
By Part III of the book, Stephen has made a total mess of his life, becoming more self-centered, reckless and lacking any healthy direction away from the mess he’s made. That is the point at which he and H decide to drive to Houston, Texas. Not long after they get there, things come to a head at Houston and the Gulf of Mexico.
Most of “Meeting the Unusual” takes place in St. Cloud – the college campus, the downtown bars. Green Prairie is a fictional town that Wolters places somewhere north of Brainerd.
Wolters, who is 57, began writing the novel way back in 1988, using an old manual typewriter. It took him four years to finish the first half. He abandoned the project for years, then after getting a word processor, completed the first draft in six months after which he made 10 major revisions. The 366-page book was published by Page Publishing in Pennsylvania.
Wolters described his novel as dark but at times comic.
“When I write, I picture it all as if I’m watching a movie and then kind of reporting on what I see,” he said.
“Meeting the Unusual” is based on some people and experiences from Wolter’s life, although he rearranged all of it, using bits and pieces of people to create each character. The mysterious H is based somewhat on a roommate of Wolter’s when he was working at Fingerhut in St. Cloud.
The many unpolished novels in Wolter’s fictional hatchery are there because for years he took up the challenge of National Novel Writing Month, November. That challenge is to write at least 50,000 words of a novel from Nov. 1 to Nov. 30. Wolters is working now on one of those first drafts, a somewhat allegorical account of Christ returning during modern times.
Born in Little Falls, Wolters spent a few formative years in Sauk Rapids before moving back to Little Falls. He graduated from Little Falls High School, then earned a degree in elementary education/language arts from St. Cloud State University, graduating in 1987.
He and Twyla were married in 1999, the year they moved to Sartell. She is an employee of CentraCare. They have two sons: Josiah, 19; and Elijah, 14.
Wolter’s favorite novelists are F. Scott Fitzgerald, James Joyce, Ernest Hemingway and Sinclair Lewis. A contemporary favorite, one also enjoyed by his son, Josiah, is Brandon Sanderson and his epic fantasy novels known collectively as “The Stormlight Archive.”
“Meeting the Unusual” is available via Barnes & Noble bookstores, at Good Book and Gift in Little Falls and on Amazon and on ebay.
Sartell novelist Mark Wolters holds a copy of his book entitled “Meeting the Unusual.” The novel is about a college student whose life goes off the rails because of excessive drinking, partying and self-centered thinking. The book takes place mainly in St. Cloud.
