I’ve been a busy bee.
Which is why the blogs have been erratic. I’m launching three new titles over
the next three months, and I’ve been working on a new novel.
The new novel I’m
working on is called Spellbound. Spellbound is the prequel to Spinsterella, the Goth romance novel I
wrote last year. I wanted to write this one for tweens and teens, but I’m
having quite a hard time keeping the dialogue PG-13 like my Isis series books
and The Thetas. Teenagers curse. A lot.
I really want to
keep Spellbound kid friendly so kids
who want to be part of the Goth Subculture will have something positive to read
about it, and their parents will come to understand that there is nothing
negative about their kids being Goth. I’ve spent close to two years talking to
Goths and researching the subculture and I’ve found there’s nothing in it any
parent really needs to worry about. Most of the people who are part of the
subculture are some of the kindest, friendliest people I’ve ever met in my life.
Spellbound is set
in 1989, and follows the teenage Matilda Crowley as she first enters the Goth
subculture. Like The Thetas it’s a
coming of age story. However it’s a much darker tale. The late 1980s were a
very dark time in New York City. Crime was at an all-time high, crack was
destroying lives left and right and the city was just a hell hole filled with
abandoned buildings and vacant lots. While Matilda is into dark stuff like horror
movies, Vampire novels, and Beeteljuice,
the real horror is being part of a Huxtable type family living in 1980s Harlem
where crackheads roam the streets like zombies and dope dealers terrorize the
neighborhood in their battles for turf and pussy.
As readers go on
Matilda’s journey from the Ghetto into the Goth Subculture they also come to
understand the dark side of being light skinned. I was inspired by what actress
Persia White said on a radio show seven years ago about being so dark inside because
she was so light skinned. And I drew from my own personal experiences from
having to deal with the dark side of being light skinned. Dark skinned Black
people believe you think you’re better than them. And their insecurities about
color can make it hard for a light skinned person to get through a day.
The title Spellbound is taken from the Siouxsie and
the Banshees song Spellbound. It fits
the commentary I wanted to make about Black people and the cognitive distortion
they have regarding anything they deem White or close to White. Many Black
folks have a love hate relationship with light skinned and biracial people and
act like they’re entranced in their presence. Either they love them or they hate
them.
I draw a lot from
my life experiences and my time at Park West High School for parts of this
story and that makes writing it very emotionally draining. This was one of the darkest
periods in my life and that makes it a challenge to put words on paper
sometimes. Everything in the first 50 pages detailing Matilda’s life is
practically autobiographical, give or take a sequence.
I’m fifty or so
pages into Spellbound, and nearing
the fist plot point. I’m hoping to have a first draft done by the end of the
year. No promises to when it’ll be ready for publication, but I’m hoping
sometime in 2017. There aren’t
that many YA novels featuring contemporary Goth Characters and I want this one
to be a great one.
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