Pages of Possibilities
From Architect to Author: James Theimer’s “77 Days”…
James Theimer has long been fascinated with real-life politics and fictional depictions of post-apocalyptic worlds. With “77 Days,” the well-known architect’s debut novel, he combines both.
His novel is a political thriller (with an inadvertently timely twist) coupled with the threat of a cataclysmic viral outbreak. Calling it “electrifying,” an Amazon.com review says, “Theimer crafts a pulse-pounding narrative that challenges readers to confront the unimaginable: What happens when the world as we know it is stripped away, and only raw human courage remains?”
As a first-timer, Theimer freely admits he violated some of the “rules” novelists are supposed to follow. “They say ‘write what you know about, start with a single point of view, don’t get overly complicated.’ I kind of violated all of that. I’m an architect, right? You’d think I’d write about an architect as the main character.” Instead, in “77 Days,” Theimer’s protagonist is a former investigative reporter who signs on as the White House press secretary.
Theimer says two principal reasons led to his foray into fiction writing in July 2017. Disheartened by the upheaval surrounding the 2016 presidential election, “I came up with the idea for a novel, basically to distract myself from the news, and it just kept going. It was political therapy.”
Secondly, he says most apocalyptic novels give short shrift to the demise (nuclear war, zombies, severe weather, etc.) and focus on resultant dystopian aftermath. “The most interesting thing is how do ordinary people deal with extraordinary events? That’s a cool thing to write about. I was always dissatisfied. What created the disaster?
What events led to the end? I never saw a story that told that. I wanted to write an almost-apocalypse. I wanted to write the book that I wanted to read. It’s more about the characters than underground bunkers, etc. What was the government doing? How would the government react? Bad things are happening and I made it the whole book, the 77 days. It’s an infinitely harder book to write,” Theimer says.
To give his characters a degree of authenticity, Theimer says he had to do “a lot” of research into military, government and science fields. “And this was before AI (artificial intelligence),” he says with a laugh. “I learned a lot, which was fun.”
Theimer says he made a concerted effort to avoid writing a political polemic. “I didn’t use ‘D’ or ‘R’ in my book. Just that politics are dirty and there are good and bad people. I worked really hard at not trying to be ‘that’ guy,” referring to a patently biased narrator.
Even though the genesis of “77 Days” centers on an American president who refuses to accept defeat, it is not based on anything that’s been in the news lately. “I started it in 2017, so the premise was not based on current events,” Theimer says. “A big portion of this story concerns a serious pandemic. I came up with the idea in 2017, so 2020 (and COVID-19) comes around and I’m still writing the book, so people will think I’m writing this based on current events. It gets worse: I had an invasion of Ukraine in my story. Ukraine hadn’t been invaded. When it happened, I took it out. My wife said give it a good ending, because everything I was writing was coming true.”
Ultimately, Theimer realized there was only so much he could change. “My story is my story.” His novel, weighing in at a hefty 600 pages, was published by Amazon in October 2024, a month before the 2024 election.
“77 Days” has a rating of 4.69 stars out of 5 on Goodreads.com. Nicky Flowers, writing in the online publication Indies Today, says, “Self-serving egotists, a scripture-peddling politician, voter-targeted truck bombs, tsunamis, torrential rains, wildfires, and armed clowns who have commandeered an amusement park fuel this bone-chilling, mimetic novel. As a crucial counterpoint, the author includes morally rich protagonists, a lovable canine companion, opportunities for redemption, and a mighty equine hero to keep negativity from overwhelming the complex plot.”
Theimer says he feels good about the book’s reception, even though the prospect of sending a seven-year labor of love out into the crowded world was daunting. “To be honest, I was terrified of getting reviews. It’s not a bestseller and it never will be. Six hundred pages may be off-putting to some, but I feel it comes off as reasonably competent.”
