Behind the Scenes: "Just Put the VHS in the Bag, Bro" Part 2
Why I Set a Book in Indiana and Why it Matters
I’m going to spoil part of the book in this section, and that’s on purpose. There’s a great reason for it. If you want to read the book free of ANY spoilers, then tap the heart, share it with a friend, and close Substack. If you’re game to hear a slight spoiler, then read on after the obligatory Substack Subscribe button.
I was born in Tustin, CA. For those who don’t know, that’s just outside of Anaheim. I moved across the country three times in twenty months. We settled in Mt. Juliet, Tennessee, a tiny two-stoplight town to the east of Nashville, the state’s capital. I grew up there. Started a punk band there. Lived life in that town as I watched time pass and the area grow into what it is today, a bustling upper-middle-class city with a suburban sprawl settling over the landscape the way a bear settles into its den.
After I met my wife, I left the Volunteer State for the great unknown. We lived in Groton, Connecticut, and then in Kingsland, GA, before returning to Groton, and then finally moved back to Mt. Juliet. We settled in neighboring Antioch, TN, for a short time while I worked in ministry before I was offered a ministerial position in Indiana. That was three years ago.
Now, my family and I call Indiana home. While we may not agree with the politics, we didn’t agree with the politics in Tennessee either. Indiana, however, brought me somewhere simultaneously new and familiar.
Indiana introduced me to the suburbs of Indianapolis, including Carmel, Noblesville, Fishers, Greenfield, Avon, and even Speedway, home to the Indy 500 track. In each of the suburbs, I noticed something similar—they all took pride in their history. Even outside the suburbs, the smaller rural towns also cared deeply about their history. It was more than just Civil War history, like in Tennessee. It was deeper than that.
Real World History
The town of Pendleton, Indiana, like the rest of the towns in this state, has its history, even with some moments they’d rather forget. Nestled on the banks of the Fall Creek River, the downtown strip is designated for historical preservation, giving it a charming, almost Hallmark movie feel. Nearby, the city’s park straddles the river and falls, where a rock stands in testament to a historical event not often told.
In the spot where the stone stands is the memory of three white men who were executed by state order for gruesomely murdering nine people: two men, three women, and four children of mixed tribal heritage. This event is catalogued in history as the “Fall Creek Massacre,” and a book by Jessamyn West from 1975 depicts its events and the eventual miscarriage of justice that this event was set to become the catalyst for.
In 1843, Fredrick Douglass and his friends were injured when a mob from Andersonville—now Anderson—knocked Douglass unconscious and broke his hand in a fight. He was helped to Neal Hardy’s home and nursed back to health. Fun Fact: Mr. Hardy’s home was also a stop on the Underground Railroad. It still stands to this day.
I took that photo almost a year ago, after learning the information from the caretakers of the home. During that time, Just Put the VHS in the Bag, Bro, wasn’t finished. This was the moment I knew what I had to do with the book’s setting.
In the Book
When we first meet our heroes in the book, they’re being investigated in a police station. As they share their story with the cellmates who want to know, we return to where they call home: Hollywood, Indiana.
The town of Hollywood does not exist in Indiana, although many Hoosiers would argue that it sounds like it should. In a state where towns are named Lafayette, Carmel, and Floyds Knobs, and yes, even Santa Claus and New Palestine. Dublin, Brazil, Moscow, and even Rome are names that dot the maps of cities and towns in Indiana. Hollywood is in good company.
The town of Hollywood, IN, serves as the base for Just Put the VHS in the Bag, Bro (even though it’s a road-trip style book), as well as the other books in the series. The sidequel, And the NEW, takes place entirely in Hollywood, five years before the events of VHS.
With this, and the rest of the saga—I’m tentatively naming it VHS WRS—using Hollywood as a central character, I knew I needed a town with enough size and gumption to be essential when the time came for it. Pendleton serves as its heart, its approximate location, and when mixed with elements from other neighboring cities, Hollywood, Indiana, becomes a town built for a nine-book saga.
Spoiler Below
It’s surprising how much of my personal history is mirrored in Indiana’s. I’ve been the one to move across the country, to serve the same country, and to preach justice, mercy, and love, only to get rejected, yet cared for by strangers.
Pendleton didn’t give me inspiration. It gave me permission. Its layers of natural beauty, resilience, and diversity give me the space to create Hollywood as it needs to be. The history isn’t erased here. It’s wrestled with. It’s challenged. It’s that tension between memory and story—the stories we inherit versus the ones we tell—that gives Hollywood its life, allowing it to be a character by itself.
Together with the surrounding towns, Hollywood is a place that can carry an intergalactic war, ancient technology, wrestling rings, and two high school losers trying to figure out why aliens want them to find a VHS tape.
Here’s your spoiler. Ready?
Turn back if you DON’T want spoilers.
Hollywood, Indiana, exists because history matters. The choices we make don’t just vanish; they echo, sometimes for generations.
If you stick with me, I’ll show you more of the places, the characters, the choices, and the strange histories that shaped the massive saga that I’ve somehow written myself into.
I’ll say more later, but just know this for now: Hollywood, Indiana is alive.
With All My Heart,
Geoffrey