So I’ve started a new project that is completely out of my comfort zone. It’s not even in women’s fiction, which has been my go-to genre for years.
We were on vacation in Florida a few weeks ago, and I got a crazy idea for a young adult novel. What if a group of teenagers found themselves in some sort of purgatory-type afterlife and had to compete in some crazy challenges for one last chance to return to Earth and rectify a wrong or say goodbye to a loved one? And what if these teens didn’t know they were dead?
The more I thought about it and let it ruminate in my head, the more compelled I felt to write it. My friend, who is a children’s librarian, thought the idea was fantastic — especially when I pitched it to her as sort of a MAZE RUNNER meets THE SIXTH SENSE in the HUNGER GAMES.
I was, of course, hesitant to start writing something totally new and foreign. I don’t love to read YA as much as I love women’s fiction. And they always say, write what you know — right?
One of the drawbacks of writing for adults is that my kids never get to read what I’ve written. My daughters especially have been begging and begging for me to please write something that they can read. And so, NINE CIRCLES has started to come together. Slowly, painstakingly slowly. But the words are coming.
I’m still getting ready to pitch LAST DREAM to three agents at a writers’ conference next weekend. And I have 14,000 words re-written on my latest draft of LOLA. So with all these other projects going on, jumping genres is equal parts refreshing and distracting. But my girls are happy that they can hear pieces of what I’ve written. So there’s that.
This week, though, we are spending some time at our vacation property in Door County, and my girls have been begging me to take them swimming. So even though the views are inspiring and my chair by the fireplace is ridiculously comfortable, it’s time to take off the author hat for a while and go be a mom.