I figured it was time when I carried the plastic file folder box to the basement.
It bulged with all those government documents, handwritten notes, and letters.

I was packing away the raw material that had served as the foundation for my first book.

Now, though, I was forced to look at my freshly cleared desk and admit it was time to lock in on my next topic.

Ideas weren’t an issue. After spending a decade as a newspaper reporter, I still made mental leaps during conversations: “Hey, that would be a great article!” But book ideas were a different thing.

Not only did such ideas need to have enough areas to explore that a person could fill a book, but it also needed to be a topic that could hold my interest for the year and more that I knew I’d spend writing and marketing it.

I was lucky that the story I told in my first book, “Train to Nowhere; Inside an Immigrant Death Investigation” (Ice Cube Press, 2011), held my attention the entire time, despite the longer-than-normal period I dedicated to it and the companion documentary. I never got bored with the topic, which author friends tell me is an accomplishment.

The funny thing is that this search for a new topic seemed to come up so quickly.

Didn’t I just finish writing the last book? Wasn’t it just a few short months ago that I celebrated - over a glass of wine - the book being off to the printer? But in the flurry of releasing a new book, the time flew by and suddenly it seems to be time to settle on another topic.

I imagine it being like the mother of a 6-month-old finding out that she’s expecting another baby again already.

Well, like that, just with less crying.

Hopefully.