Yes, I’m still alive … for now!

I haven’t updated this blog in a while and for the three of you who’ve asked, no, I’m not dead.

Not that I haven’t thought about, you know, death.

I’m not talking swimming with hungry alligators death, but pretend death. Hiding out. Going missing for a year or so.

Think about it. There’s all kinds of stories about artists whose work became much more valuable after their demise.

Take Van Gogh. The guy didn’t sell a single painting in his lifetime. Well, not to anyone other than his younger brother, Theo. Not even cutting his ear off helped sales. But once he died? Boom!

Nowadays, only Jeff Bezos, the richest man alive, can afford a Van Gogh. (Can’t you hear Alexa now? “For Jeff, a shipment will arrive today, including The Starry Night, Sunflowers, Forest Interio and Wheatfield with Crows.”)

I can see the headlines now. Little Known Author, E. E. Williams Dies at 70. Latest Novel Skyrockets to No. 1

The book – “My Grave Is Deep” – will get turned into a movie, which will be followed by another movie about my life, and then a sequel to the first movie using my previous two novels – “Tears in the Rain” and “Tears of God” (hey, get your plugs in wherever you can, I say) – as source material, and by the time I miraculously return from the dead, I’ll be sleeping on a mattress stuffed with cash, in a castle high in the Alps, and humming Edelweiss.

The other question – besides “Have you died?” and “Who did you say you were?” – most frequently asked is “What does the E. E. stand for?”

I have the same initials as my late father, Edwin Earl Williams. I am named after my maternal grandfather Eugene and my dad, Earl.

Thus, I am Eugene Earl, although only my mother calls me Eugene and only when she’s angry with me, which is most of the time.

Though I am proud of the name, I wish my parents would have thought a little more about it and realized that my initials would be EEW.  Look up “eew” in the dictionary and this is what you get: “1. To excite nausea or loathing in; sicken. 2. To offend the taste or moral sense of; repel. n. Profound dislike or annoyance caused by something sickening or offensive.”

OK, so maybe they got it right, but still.

When I decided to write novels, I considered using a pen name. In any bookstore, Williams is going to be found on the bottom right shelf that can only be reached with scuba gear. I thought maybe I could change the last name to Able, but then I’d actually have to be “able” to get my books into an actually bookstore.

Besides, it was my dad who first gave me a book and told me to stop watching TV and read. How could I change my name?

The answer was I couldn’t. So E. E. Williams it is.

Look for it soon at the top of those bestsellers list.

Just don’t look for me.