Author's Preface Pompeii: Vesuvius Dominus - a novel On the afternoon of AD 79, a white cloud appears above Mount Vesuvius and begins to deposit a layer of ash on the nearby town of Pompeii. Gradually, the people of Pompeii become aware that an awesomely destructive natural force has unleashed its full fury against the lives that they have established in their community. As they are swept up in the destructive experience, three people - Pliny the Younger, Pliny the Elder and Julia - consider the premises by which they have been living their lives. The Making of Vesuvius Dominus - a reflective journal This journal records my reflections on the process of the crafting of the novel as it evolved through the stages of planning, writing, editing and polishing. It constitutes an effort to be as conscious as possible of the process whereby the single idea that suggested the topic of the novel was expanded into a complex work of art. Topics range from the nuts and bolts of novel-building to the nature of the novel as an art-form. Planning Vesuvius Dominus - a planning notebook During the writing of the novel, I kept a hand-written notebook which records the day-by-day development of the novel as it found its shape and style. The notebook - now in print form - reveals how a vast cluster of thoughts was sifted, selected, structured and polished into novel-form. The Project Together, this novel, journal and notebook comprise the fifteenth installment in an on-going novel-writing project in which I am exploring the concept of form and meaning in the novel, and of the novel as a form of expression in the 21st Century. All of the published journals and notebooks are available for free download at www.johnpassfield.ca.