His editor took the news harder than he'd expected, considering it shouldn't have been that much of a surprise.
"C'mon, Tom. The book was set to be done in December. Don't tell me you thought I had it sitting on a shelf in my study or something."
"Harry, listen to me," replied Tom the editor, clearly frazzled. "We're 60 days behind on your next big hit, & you wanna go on a vacation? What the Hell's a matter with you?"
"Not a vacation, Tom; a quest. I keep hittin' walls & I can't work around em, so I gotta hit the road to find the magic again. End of discussion."
"A quest isn't gonna find a way around writer's block, Harry. Why can't you just take up drinking like everyone else?"
The celebrated author looked at his editor and friend for the past 5 years, and felt sorry for him. It wasn't about "writer's block" at all. It was about the magic; the real magic. It was out there; the man in purple had shown him, & dared him to seek it out. Back at his study, he pulled out a blank sheet of paper and began to write the first draft of a goodbye letter.