I’ve always been a storyteller. My parents talk of times from before I can remember about the friends I’d make up—I was an only child until my sister came along when I was 4—and the interesting adventures and rich backgrounds I had for them all. In grade school, I loved writing short stories and, when I was about 9 years old, I had an idea for a book and started writing it. That was way back before every household had a computer with word processing software, so writing it out by hand was slow going for a young child with a limited attention span. After I’d filled up just one notebook with my chapters, I gave up, though I continued to write shorter stories for school.
Recently, I reconnected with a childhood friend on Facebook and she reminded me that I’d written a story about her and a boy she liked. I don’t remember the details of the storyline, but I do recall spinning a long, drawn-out saga that took them on adventures and included a little romance, as much as a 12-year-old mind could conceive of. My friend reminisced about how I’d give her a chapter at a time, and how she couldn’t wait for the next installment, especially after a long weekend or school holiday had kept me from delivering a new episode.
Mulling over those memories gave me an idea for this blog, one that I’d considered before but had kind of put on the back burner because I wasn’t sure it was a direction I wanted to go. Having my friend tell me how much she enjoyed the little episodic romance I’d written for her, though, made me rethink that, especially after a particularly brutal editing session resulted in cutting a huge chunk of backstory out of the manuscript for Cedar Ridge. It’s all well-written and, sure, I’m completely biased, but I think it’s interesting. It’s just that it really doesn’t need to be in this book. It’s kind of a story on it’s own. Could it possibly be a cutting that could take root and grow into a novel of its own? Or maybe even a series of prequels? Possibly. But, at this point, I think it might be of better use to publish it here, while we’re all waiting for Cedar Ridge to come out. Who knows? Maybe it will grow over the next few months and I’ll have a couple of novellas on my hands by the time it’s all said and done. Nothing wrong with that. If nothing else, you’ll be in on some in-depth character sketches and will be the first to read some interesting (hopefully) content before anyone else, and for free. Who doesn’t love free? And who doesn’t love a good story?
Warning, more than a spoiler alert: I’ve been focusing on writing rom-coms, but I’m not sure yet how much humor we’ll find in these backstories. Still, you can’t get away from funny. The most absurd things happen all the time, so there’s likely to be at least a sprinkling of comedy peppered throughout them. Whatever it ends up being, I hope you enjoy it. Heck, I hope I enjoy it. I think we will. 😁 Stay tuned for the first installment and we’ll see.
