The Virtues of Imagination: My New Book, Revealed

While I've decided to take a break on my much-beloved novel, I've started a new chapter in my life. As you may know, towards the end of my first draft I get a Brilliant Book Idea, and the last draft was no different. So, this one's pitch is: A Midwestern girl finds herself in the midst of adjusting to her newly-adopted brother, her twin sister's medical issues, and her relationships as she finds out where she can truly put her trust. (Barely functional, current pitch.) Sound familiar? It's about me! Its a bit of an adjustment to write. It even involves remembering, for extended periods of time. Who comes up with this stuff? Crazy, isn't it? Anyways, I digress.

In addition to starting sophomore year, I somehow concluded that I would be the perfect person to write a memoir. Of course, if you'd asked me at that time, I would've given some answer like, "I think it's cool. Plus, life is awesome." Which, of course, is still true, but it's not the full truth.

I've lived an interesting life, but it's been hard. People struggle more than you'd think, whether physically or mentally, and I've only lived fifteen years. However, those years have been fraught with death and  life and love and tears. I've learned just how crazy adoption, and its resulting uncertainty, can be, the meaning of a fresh start (wanted or not), and how to force-feed my twin sister sugar so she stays alive. All of those, by the way, are true. I did tell you I was unconventional.

I've begun writing my memoir, but it'll take me a while. So far, I only have about 3,000 words, though I am working on it, diligently enough for the GTW (Go Teen Writers) 100-for-100 challenge. I'll work on it between edits and drafts for my novels, and the first draft should be completed within a year. Through all of my life, there have been defining events, though the past few have been particularly formative.  I hope as I continue the narrative, a story will take shape. It always has in the past. (You know you're a pantser when you don't know how the story's going to go in your own memoir.)

Although I'm still a novice at the art of memoir (and how well I've learned that in the past two weeks), I've realized one key difference: writing becomes a lot harder when you can't just make stuff up.

Katia

P.S. Isn't my wisdom so brilliant? By the way, once I start editing, I'll be interspersing novel- and memoir- posts, as well as the very occasional book review. Enjoy!

Something Like Hope

                17-year-old Shavonne has been in juvenile detention since the seventh grade. Mr Delpopolo is the first counselor to treat her as an equal, and he helps her get to the bottom of her self-destructive behavior, her guilt about past actions, and her fears about leaving the Center when she turns 18. Shavonne tells him the truth about her crack-addicted mother, the child she had (and gave up to foster care) at fifteen, and the secret shame she feels about what she did to her younger brother after her mother abandoned them.

Meanwhile, Shavonne’s mentally unstable roommate Cinda makes a rash move, and Shavonne’s quick thinking saves her life—and gives her the opportunity to get out of the Center if she behaves well. But Shavonne’s faith is tested when her new roommate, mentally retarded and pregnant Mary, is targeted by a guard as a means to get revenge on Shavonne. As freedom begins to look more and more likely, Shavonne begins to believe that maybe she, like the goslings recently hatched on the Center’s property, could have a future somewhere else—and she begins to feel something like hope.

                I don’t normally read books like this. That is the understatement of the year. After all, who mostly reads about messed-up teenage girls in juvenile detention facilities? Anyway, I digress. The characters were amazing. Even though I have no personal experience with this, Shavonne’s voice captivated me. She was a really strong protagonist, and the side-characters were good as well. I empathized greatly with several of the characters; when you’re in there, everything can, and probably does, seem hopeless. The plot wasn’t predictable, and it was a page-turner. Also, for a middle-aged white guy, he writes black teenage girls really well. The voice was completely accurate. (I assume his background as a school psychologist helped.)

                This isn’t an easy book to read. There’s a lot of swearing, and they all had pretty rough pasts. The characters were so real.  This is a book that makes you think. If you like contemporary or books about detention centers (or even if you don’t), I’d highly recommend it. SOMETHING LIKE HOPE gives an amazing glimpse into the struggles that people nationwide face every day.

The End

This morning, I finished the first draft of The Tinkers. It’s 63,950 words, and 110 pages of single-spaced awesomeness. I’m so glad to finally be done with the first draft, since I’ve been working on it since January and towards the end, I was ready to be done. Still, I’m feeling a bit nostalgic.

Even though at the beginning I had very little plot and cardboard characters, by last night some of the problems were smoothed out and it’s a better read. Not good yet, maybe, but better. I’ve spent so much time in Dem’s head, being sarcastic and grown-up and awesome. The Tinkers was my go-to project; whenever I had a few minutes or an hour to spare, I’d sit down and tell a little more of his story. I’m sure it’s been subconsciously shaped by whatever I’ve been going through as well, so that’ll be interesting to see.  Good thing none of my betas are psychologists, eh?

This is a plot web that I made when I was nearing the end.

As I’ve said so often, writing isn’t easy, especially when you lose 30,000 words due to not backing-up, but the sense of accomplishment one gets is crazy. I’ve been focusing on finishing so much that I’ve neglected blogging, and while I do enjoy blogging, I think the story’s stronger for it. Sure, there are still plot holes and bland characters, but at the end of the day, I wrote a novel, running mainly on chocolate and adrenaline. Now I just have no idea what to do with myself until I can go back and edit it. I’m missing my characters so much. I may have to write my own fan-fiction just to keep myself occupied. J

I will resume blogging this week, and share more character posts and excerpts from The Tinkers in the next few weeks, while I’m giving it a break. I’ve learned a lot about myself through writing this, and whatever happens to it, I’m a better writer for it. And I’ve learned that paralyzing drugs do, indeed, exist.