Jayne Investigates a Conspiracy

I think I may have been hanging around Fallon Jones too long.

As readers of my Arcane Society novels know, he's the 21st century director of the West Coast office of Jones & Jones, the Society's psychic detective agency. (The director of the agency back in the Late Victorian era was his ancestor, Caleb Jones. By the way, just so you know, the head of J&J on Harmony is a woman — Marlowe Jones. You'll meet her in the third volume of the Dreamlight Trilogy next summer).

At any rate, Fallon is a chaos-theory talent. Folks with that kind of psychic ability tend to see patterns where others see only random facts or coincidence. In other words, they are world-class conspiracy theorists. Of course, when it comes to Arcane there is an actual conspiracy to be confronted, but that's another story, so to speak.

The thing about the human mind is that it is programmed to look for links and connections. We like order and predictability. We get nervous about random stuff and for good reason. Think: earthquakes, volcanoes, rogue waves and tornadoes. There's a reason we have a tendency to think in terms of conspiracies and patterns. And as we all know there are those who take this tendency to extremes.

And I must admit, I'm getting sucked into the fun side of Fallon's talent. Not that I'm ready to join the Area 51 crowd or the Black Helicopter society, mind you. But as most of you know by now, Fallon is on Twitter, tweeting about a small case there in Scargill Cove (http://twitter.com/ArcaneSociety— no you don't have to register with Twitter to read the story). He had to take the case. After all, he's the only psychic private investigator in town. Actually, he's the only PI in town.

When I started this little micro-novel I intended for the story to be completely separate from what was going on in the contemporary Arcane Society novels. And it is. But, dang, if I didn't start uncovering connections where I least expected to find them: Scargill Cove. Now I see that the little case Fallon is handling for the owner of the local bookstore has links to the case in RUNNING HOT. And, most astonishing of all, it seems likely that we're going to catch our first glimpse of the woman who will eventually become Fallon's assistant.

I think I get that six degrees of separation thing now. And I think that, by doing this micro-novel, I'm getting a glimpse into Fallon's private universe. Weird.

What about you? Are you into conspiracy theories? Do you see connections where others see coincidence?

Inquiring minds...
Sincerely,
Jayne