Pina and Charlie return in Voice of Sonoma, a new serialized novel by author and KCP editor Bart Schneider. Featuring art by Sonoma-based artist Chester Arnold.

_{New chapters will be posted every three to four days.}

• CHAPTER ONE – SHIVER MY TIMBERS
  I feel I’ve had no choice in the matter. Consequently, I’ve kept most of my work with Roscoe a secret from Pina. I got the feeling early that a little bit of the parrot would go a long way for her. She found the bird tedious and once asked whether my obsession with teaching Roscoe …
• CHAPTER TWO – I LOVE SA-SA MONA
  On Monday, Charlie and I took the morning off and headed to the ocean. The heat in Sonoma has been brutal, with the addition of something we rarely have: high humidity. We saw the pulses of dry lightening and heard thunder, the night before. The little bit it rained didn’t correspond with the lightening strikes, …
• CHAPTER THREE – THE VOICE
  Last night before dinner there was a knock on the door. Pina and I were not expecting anybody, and unexpected visitors are truly a thing of the past. We were sipping Negronis out on the deck. Smoke from the fires had blown east and the air quality, at least according to our phones was rated …
• CHAPTER FOUR – CHERRIES
  I heard my nonna’s voice coming from outside my childhood home, and rushed from my bed to the window. She stood beside a disorderly silver maple, dressed in her black widow garb, except for an uncharacteristic straw hat, ringed in faux cherries. I threw on one of Charlie’s flannel shirts but didn’t bother buttoning it. …
• CHAPTER FIVE – HOBBY SHOP
  Today would have been my father’s hundredth birthday, and I haven’t been able to get him out of my head. He was a sweet man, always encouraging, but often abstracted by problems from work he couldn’t seem to leave at the office. He spent most of his career as an industrial designer at Merz Tool …
• CHAPTER SIX – SORRY FOR YOUR LOSS
  The smoke and toxic air has finally lifted, courtesy of the west winds. Even my afternoon was clear—I’ve been doing Zooms with my clients in the morning—and Charlie asked if I wanted to take a picnic to Ocean Beach in San Francisco. The Marin County beaches are still closed to parking. Charlie was enthused in …
• CHAPTER SEVEN – VOICE BOX
  I tried to get a little work in with Roscoe this morning but he wasn’t up for it. After Sally woke and departed for the day—where she goes I’m not quite clear—I visited with the parrot. He’s been down, the last few days and has gotten in the habit of greeting me with a “Sorry, …
• CHAPTER EIGHT – A ROSE BY ANY OTHER NAME
  I made a birthday cake for Charlie today, a horribly misshapen pineapple upside down. It looked like it was going to explode at the sides and collapse. After buying two packs of mini birthday candles I decided to tempt fate and puncture the surface fifty-nine times. Charlie closed his eyes before blowing out the candles. …
• CHAPTER NINE – CHINOOK
   Vince came to the door of the condo this afternoon. I should say, he assaulted it. He leaned on the doorbell like some angry trick-or-treating kid who figures the residents are blowing him off.  “Sorry,” he said, apparently about going rabid with the doorbell, “but this is getting rather heavy.” In his arms he cradled …
• CHAPTER TEN – YOUTH
  This afternoon I stood beside the slightly open door of Charlie’s study for a few moments as he worked with Roscoe. I suspected that he left the door ajar for my benefit. He confessed to me some time ago that he had the room sound-proofed to keep me from freaking out about Roscoe’s extraordinary abilities …
• CHAPTER ELEVEN – DO IT FOR ROSCOE
  I worked late into the night tweaking Roscoe’s video but, when I awoke a little after nine, I wasn’t ready to post it. I needed to clear my head. Pina was on a Zoom meeting in the living room, so I left the house, and hiked up through the cemetery and down the other side …
• CHAPTER TWELVE – INJUDICIOUS
  The last couple of days have been bats, what with Roscoe going viral and Charlie getting requests for custom videos from the Biden-Harris campaign and Project Lincoln, among others. Charlie had been as stressed as I’d seen him until he got his old saxophone out of the closet. I didn’t even know he played the …
• CHAPTER THIRTEEN – INDECENT
  I was so absorbed filming new election videos with Roscoe that I didn’t notice, until after six, that Pina hadn’t returned from her lunch. At first, I didn’t think much of it. Pina often gets restless in the late afternoon and drives off somewhere to walk or catch the sunset. I went down to the …
• CHAPTER FOURTEEN – JONAH
  When I drove off Thursday afternoon, I had no idea of a destination. I was more or less sober by then, but, as I’ve experienced innumerable times the morning after, I dripped with shame. Why did I do this damage? Who was I trying to hurt most—Charlie, Vince or myself?  I drove south on 101, …
• CHAPTER FIFTEEN – LOYALTY
  Election night was a horror. Biden lost Florida and it looked like Pennsylvania might be lost. I could feel the PTSD from the 2016 election forming like a calcium deposit on my frontal lobe. My executive functions would soon start to deteriorate. I’d been thinking for some time that I wanted to work on the …
• CHAPTER SIXTEEN – WISHFUL THINKING
  Charlie calls me this morning. I didn’t expect it. It’s been ten days since we talked. I’m happy to hear his voice. That’s what I feel at first before the confusion kicks in. Charlie’s sweet. There’s no bitterness in his voice. He’s tentative. I suppose, I am too. Things begin to feel normal while we …
• CHAPTERV SEVENTEEN – IN HER COURT
  We made a good fire on the beach just after sunset, scraps from other fires, small sticks, and tarry hunks that it took some time to gather. Pina went wild with industry as if she were native to wood gathering on a barren beach. We no longer wore masks and any delicacy about keeping our …
• CHAPTER EIGHTEEN – GLORY
  My metabolism’s changed in the few weeks I’ve been in the city. Burning some serious calories now. Become a walking fool. I need new shoes. Going all the time like a speed freak. Afraid something’s going to catch up with me if I stop. I can sustain the pace as long as I remember to …
• CHAPTER NINETEEN – ROOSTER
  “Went through a rough stretch for awhile. That’s why you didn’t hear from me, Dad. The move from the Lost Coast was harder on me than I expected. I guess you could call it an identity crisis, you know what I mean. Or maybe you don’t know. Anyway I got a little out of control …
• CHAPTER TWENTY – WORSE, WORSE
  I can’t believe what I saw: Vince, who’s just crossed the street, says some shit about the dead rooster killed by the dog, that Gus, here, in the vegetable shed, has been yakking about. I don’t hear the words clearly, but they set Charlie off. He lurches toward Vince, who’s backing up. Doesn’t say a …
• CHAPTER TWENTY ONE – SPEED-HAIKU
  I barely remember Augie Boyer, although I saw him numerous times, years ago, at Bobby Sabbatini’s poetry church in Guerneville. Boyer, a stout, disheveled looking detective, had actually taken over the church for a short period after the attack on Sabbatini, but I’d stopped attending the church by then. Yesterday he called out of the …
• CHAPTER TWENTY TWO – THE DISTANCE
  Today I am at loose ends, after giving myself a two-week holiday from my clients. Almost all of them seemed happy for a break. A person can only work so much on her frailties. The only client who’s seemed to regret the interruption is good old Aubrey, who’s actually made strides with his stutter. He’s …
• CHAPTER TWENTY THREE – KNIVES OUT
  Pina came into the condo with two-dozen oysters and a big smile on her face. “What’s going on, Charlie? All this talk about Jesus. Have you gone and found religion?” I didn’t have the heart to reveal what Augie Boyer had told me and, surprisingly, Pina didn’t press me about our phone conversation and what …
• CHAPTER TWENTY FOUR – HALF-EATEN APPLE
  Days have gone by with little talk about my name being knifed into the back of a poor waiter named Jesus. I think both Charlie and I are pretending the whole business was a bad dream that we shared. I’ve made no attempt to contact Vince; the fragile truce between Charlie and me can’t sustain …
• CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE – WHAT WE DON’T KNOW WE KNOW
  Roscoe gave me the cold shoulder for more than a week. Since I’d been neglecting him, he regressed, or at least pretended to. He designed his limited speech to disturb me. Top of the morning, he’d say at nightfall, along with Sleep well at dawn. His repetition of Roscoe wants a cracker was a particular …
• CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX – BLOOD
  A crazy thought dawns on me as I pull a chef’s knife out of the block to butterfly a pork loin and stuff it with figs. I’m not sure whether it is the knife or the figs that have triggered the daft notion. I take a deep breath and gaze at the Pyrex bowl of …
• CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN – CROWN OF THORNS
  Aubrey smelled a rat when Pina called him. She and I have a difference of opinion about that. Aubrey told her that she’d hurt his feelings when she walked away from him in Sonoma. “Why,” he asked, “would he meet her again and subject himself to more humiliation?” Or so Pina related, without filling in …
• CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT – WOMANCHILD
  I see Vince’s BMW parked on the sidewalk out front and decide to pay a visit. Once I climb the stairs to his condo, it’s clear that he’s there; I hear his cough underneath a frantic smear of guitar jazz, broadcast at high volume from his Bose system. The music, if it can be called …
• CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE — KILTED
  Yesterday was a long day. It started in the morning at the Basque Boulangerie with Sally. We had an outing planned that made both of us nervous. Well, I know it made me nervous; since her journey to addiction it’s become increasingly difficult for me to measure Sally’s responses. I brought Roscoe along as a …
• CHAPTER THIRTY – PINA, WALK THE DOG
  It’s been more than two weeks now since Charlie and I came back from a hike at Jack London State Park to find the condo vandalized. Desecrated may be a more accurate word for describing the condition of the apartment. The front door was left wide open and, before we walked in, we were assaulted …