I have been thinking a lot about my first novel, Water and Stone. I set it aside in April, as I was instructed to do via Stephen King's advice in On Writing, and I prepared for the day that I would "kill my darlings." I dreaded it. But, my mentor advised me it was good to let it sit for a while... until it became something strange... then and only then would it be okay to read the entire piece through and make the necessary edits.
In December sometime, I was finally ready to read it again. It happened sometime around when my mom took my printed copy of the manuscript to read. Anyway, it just so happened that my second novel was ready to be written at the same time. So, I started Tickets to See the Sun, and I have recently been readying my query and resume.
I have.... been...... through... SOOO... many drafts of my query... trying so hard to get it right... to get to the very bottom of what it was all about, what I wanted people to feel, what I saw was important, what was really at stake for my characters... It was, and still is laborious.
Here is something I worked on tonight to query my first novel:
Some things in life are fluid, and some of them are fixed. Varick’s past and his dreams, like Mia’s new understanding of emptiness, are immovable moments in time. However, the present is a fluid, alive thing, pulsing with opportunity. Each choice Varick and Mia make are influenced by two groups; one wants to use them to achieve access to the earth realm, and the other is conflicted, they just don’t know it yet. After Varick and Mia are paired on a quiet highway in South Dakot...a, each fluid moment is a chance… a chance to become something new, a spiritual quest of understanding. Love is always responsible for why people are willing to do anything in the name of protecting another, and it’s also something both of them have sworn to avoid. Varick and Mia… the perfect, broken vessels for manipulation. This… is Water and Stone.
If, in any way, I have snagged your interest with my extended logline for my book, please comment.
