Nothing but Trouble
by Zelmer Wilson · January 2021
Dear Reader,
Thank you for spending time with Nothing but Trouble.
This novel is about the years when Bobbie Lamont is still becoming the woman readers will later know throughout the Black Springs Universe.
From 1986 to 1990, Bobbie is young, ambitious, curious, and convinced that she can figure everything out as she goes. College gives her freedom, but freedom also brings mistakes, complicated relationships, heartbreak, and choices that force her to learn who she is when no one else is making those decisions for her.
One of the most important parts of Bobbie’s life during these years is her friendship with Billie Carver. Their bond gives Bobbie something steady while so much around her is changing. They do not always make the same choices, but they remain part of each other’s lives in ways that will continue long after college ends.
I also wanted this novel to show that growing up is rarely a straight line. Bobbie is intelligent, but intelligence does not prevent her from making bad decisions. She sometimes mistakes attention for affection, confidence for certainty, and independence for having everything under control.
Those mistakes matter because they help shape the editor, writer, friend, and woman she eventually becomes.
Nothing but Trouble isn't simply a story about getting into trouble. It is about discovering what you want, what you will tolerate, what you are willing to leave behind, and which parts of yourself are worth protecting.
I hope Bobbie’s journey reminds you that some of the most important lessons of adulthood begin with the choices we once wished we could take back.
Thank you for walking through these years with her.
— Zelmer Wilson
About Nothing but Trouble
Get your copy of Nothing but Trouble!
Before Bobbie Lamont became an editor, an author, and a driving force at Black Springs Press, she was a young woman trying to figure out who she wanted to be. Beginning in 1986, Nothing but Trouble follows Bobbie through her college years at Tulane University as she takes her first uncertain steps into adulthood. Raised in New Orleans high society, Bobbie has always lived between expectations and rebellion, determined to build a life on her own terms. Beside her is Billie Carver, her best friend since childhood. Their friendship has survived different backgrounds, disapproving families, and the people who never understood why the two girls chose each other. But college brings new pressures—and new relationships that test Bobbie’s ideas about love, loyalty, independence, and the future. As Bobbie moves through romances, heartbreak, friendships, and complicated encounters with men who are not always what they seem, she begins to discover that intelligence cannot protect her from making mistakes. An intense relationship with Professor Lawrence Harris forces her to confront questions of power, desire, and the difference between being wanted and being valued. At the same time, Bobbie begins to find her place in the literary world, eventually discovering the talent and ambition that will lead her to Black Springs Press. Spanning September 1986 to June 1990, Nothing but Trouble is a coming-of-age story about friendship, bad decisions, first ambitions, broken hearts, and the difficult process of becoming your own person. Bobbie Lamont may be headed for trouble. But trouble just might be what helps her discover who she is.
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Zelmer Wilson (1975- ) was born in Fort Collins, Colorado. At the age of three, he moved with his family to Fort Smith, Arkansas. He would live there until he was eleven. In the summer of 1986, he left Arkansas and moved to Phoenix, Arizona, with his father and stepmother. During the summer of 1990, while visiting his mother and two sisters in Birmingham, Alabama, he discovered his calling in life to be a writer. His debut novel, In the Middle, is inspired by his own difficult teenage years in Phoenix, Arizona.
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