David Wickers’ first published novel, “The Uruguayan Women’s Walking Club,”published by iUniverse, tells a ghostly story of love, loss and rebirth. It’s theme? People moving on with their lives and getting over grief.
“The book involves a lot of dreams,” Wickers said during an interview at the Barnes & Noble bookstore in the Town of Poughkeepsie this week. “I think it would be appealing for people who like the surreal aspect of dreams and their strange link with reality. It’s a bittersweet ghost story and love story.”
Wickers, a Wappingers Falls resident for the last two years, said that he wanted to write a book that was dark and scary with “shock value,” but also realistic. The book’s central characters come to live in the United States from Uruguay and open a real estate business, which enables them to live well and raise a daughter.
However, they become split between a love for each other and a morbid obsession with their past in Uruguay. It takes an elderly woman to step in and save them from their ways.
The story is alternatively set in Uruguay and southern Dutchess County. Wickers said the book is not necessarily inspired by real events. But there are some similarities between the book and his personal life. He commutes to work in New York City on a Metro-North train out of the Beacon Train Station, just like one of his characters. His wife, Yanire, is from Uruguay and is a teacher in the Brewster Central School District. And he has an 11-year-old daughter, Ariel. There is a photo of his wife on the cover of the novel walking on the athletic track at Brewster High School. Wickers took the photo himself.
“I just felt there was a niche for something realistically scary,” Wickers said. “I tried to make the characters realistic. They are posed in a way that’s very genuine and believable. I felt it was powerful.”
The author has written four other books that have not been published. He says he has been writing since he was 8 years old, and was partly influenced by his mother and his aunt, one of the original editors of Sports Illustrated.
The Queens native graduated from Queens College in 1984, where he wrote for the college’s Phoenix Weekly. Wickers has published short stories and articles in Computer Retail News, Computer Retailers’ Guide, About Queens Magazine, New York’s Single Men & Women, Fate Magazine, The Standard, The Images and others.
He plans on writing and publishing another book.
“I think my next book is going to be something a little lighter, and possibly something humorous,” he said. “I hope to start working on that in the next year.”
Wickers has also displayed his photographs at various locations throughout the Hudson Valley. “I have some local photography projects planned of the Hudson River and some mountain scenes,” Wickers said. “There is an endless array of scenes that change constantly depending on the time of day and the time of year.”
“The Uruguayan Women’s Walking Club” is not yet available in stores, but is available online at www.amazon.com and www.barnesandnoble.com.
Wickers said he does not know when stores will sell the book, but he is working on it. He is also in the process of arranging more book-signings at galleries and bookstores throughout the region,
Due to the fact that the book’s main characters are from Uruguay, Wickers explained, there is a “real” tie to the Latin American culture. That is why he is traveling to Puerto Rico next month to promote the book, and is planning a trip to South America, Uruguay in particular, in the spring of 2006.
“People I know in the publishing field said they think the book has potential,” Wickers said. “I know a few people have cried after reading it. That’s a good sign.”