The makings of a novelist

Thirteen just may be Woodbridge resident John Miller's lucky number.

"My first novel, I started it 13 years ago. That's when I first got the idea," he said, recollecting the precise moment when "The First Assassin" gelled in his mind.

"I was on a business trip to Texas, researching my first book," a non-fiction look at immigra-tion issues called 'The Unmaking of Americans,' " he said. And for entertainment, he brought along an audio biography of Abraham Lincoln.

He was sidetracking to Carlsbad Caverns, pulling into the parking lot for a tourist timeout, and the audio book was at the point of describing Lincoln's inaugural journey, including a supposed assassination plot in Baltimore.

The book may have been factual, but "what's not known to this day is if there was actually a plot to kill him in Baltimore," Miller said. "There was so much concern about Lincoln's safety. He was scheduled to pass through Baltimore at noon on February 23, but … instead they decided to send him at night, at three in the morning."

The waiting crowds in Baltimore were disappointed, to say the least.

"This becomes a very controversial aspect of his presidency. He's called a coward … and he felt really bad about it. And they never even had airtight evidence of an assassination plot," Miller said. "There's always been this mystery about it."

Enter Miller's novel, "The First Assassin," which opens with the assumption that there really was a plot to kill Lincoln that day in Baltimore.

"I just said to myself that this would make a great thriller," he said, adding that the book only uses that idea to segue to the actual plot.

The real theme is this: "Washington, D.C., 1861: A new president takes office, a nation begins to break apart -- and Colonel Charles Rook must risk insubordination to stop a mysterious assassin who prowls a nervous city. He will need the help of an ally he does not even know he has: Portia, a beautiful slave who holds a vital clue, hundreds of miles away," according to the book jacket description at www.heymiller.com.

The description epitomizes a wide divergence from Miller's usual work. He's a national correspondent for the political magazine National Review, a successful author of three non-fiction, re-search-based books and a nationally recognized journalist whose work has appeared in a range of publica-tions, including The Wall Street Journal.

Imagination plays little role in Miller's day-to-day job. And yet, once the 'a-ha' mo-ment dawned, he couldn't forget.

"Hardly a day went by when I didn't think about it," Miller said. "But life got in the way. When you write a novel, you don't get paid. So it was the project I always put aside when something else came along, when I had another book to write, when there was the birth of another kid."

As the years passed, he worked in spurts, he said, with "periods of working every day" fol-lowed by weeks of nothing. He also spent considerable time researching America circa 1861, scouring first-hand sources and writings at the Library of Congress when possible, in order to keep his descriptions and references true to the period.

"My wife likes to joke there was this time I had these note cards of scenes spread out on the table and I kept moving them around," trying to outline plots and chapters, he said. "But this one was different [from the other books]. Whereas I enjoyed the others … this one was really a labor of love, more of an aspiration than a job."

The finished novel brought him a serene sense of accomplishment, he said -- followed quickly by a new level of challenge and frustration. Though previously published and known by New York agencies, he couldn't sell his work. Publishers were leery, Miller recalled, of taking on a fiction project written by a first-timer of fiction, and the dismal economy only exacerbated their reluctance.

So Miller self-published and crossed fingers, and put his faith in word-of-mouth.

"I quickly learned selling a first novel is really, really hard," he said. "People can love it, but they just don't want to buy it. So I thought, 'I just want to publish this thing as fast as possible.' I didn't want to wait … so I invested a little bit of money, and now it's sold exclusively online [at Amazon]."

His wife loves it, and may actually read it a second time, he said.

"When your wife says that, you wonder if they're just trying to maintain domestic tranquil-ity," Miller said. "But this one's dedicated to her. When I first told her I was going to write this, she could have been very discouraging … you know, and say a writer has to make money. But she didn't. She's been nothing but encouraging."

Favorite characters or parts?

The villain, Miller said in a follow-up e-mail describing Mazorca, is an assassin shrouded in mystery, with a name of surprising meaning.

"Oh, and there's a minor character named Hoadly, for the simple reason that I had to give a name to him and I live near Hoadly Road," Miller wrote. "Another (more important) character is Frank Springfield, after Franconia-Springfield, the Metro stop I once visited every workday."

Staff writer Cheryl Chumley can be reached at 703-670-1907.