All posts tagged: novel-in-progress

Write On, Wednesday: Worldbuilding Idea 672

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By Leslie Lindsay According to Wikipedia, worldbuilding is the process of contructing an imaginary world, sometimes associated with a fictional universe. The term is often used in conjunction with science fiction, but in no way is limited to this genre. Think about it: every good book has a sense of place, time, history, geography, etc. that pulls us right into the story. No aliens or zombies, or oobeleck needed. As a writer, you may  think the only tool at your disposal to accurately develop a world is your words. Well, yes…and no. What’s worked best for me is to work on an idea board by gathering images, words, phrases that I feel best represent my novel’s world. Undoubtably,  you have a host of junk mail that clogs your mailbox. Why not use some of it to build your fictional world? That Ballard Designs catalog could have a really great bedroom advertised.  Would it do for your protagonist?  Snip it out and add it to your board. How about color swatches that you’d like to have …

Fiction Friday: The Caul

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By Leslie Lindsay I’m a getting a good sense of character, Melanie Dunbar (Mel) from my new novel-in-progress, “Zombie Road.”  Here she in the shower just after giving birth to her daughter, Enye. It’s one of those strange postpartum moments of elation and exhaustion, the innate need to protect one’s offspring. “The warm spray from the shower pelted my back, a strange tingling sensation that somehow made me feel whole, even though I was at my most vulnerable—naked and postpartum.           Suddenly, as the slick bar of pale-green soap slipped through my fingers, I stepped on Enye, my feet squishing through her tiny body slumped against the shower stall, a contusion of limbs—purple and unmoving. “My baby!” I shrieked, “Enye!”  The room spun, black and gray, the water cascading down my shoulders, a moment of vertigo. I clutched the soap dish to break my fall. If I fell, I’d be that much closer to my dead baby. I gripped the metal side rail on our double-shower, blood clots running down my puffy legs.  “Ran! Ran, I …

Fiction Friday: Mel & Leelah

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By Leslie Lindsay Welcome back to my novel-in-progress, ZOMBIE ROAD. If you are just now joining us, the idea of this book originates from an urban legend in St. Louis County, Missouri.  Story goes the very area nick-named “Zombie Road” is teeming with ghosts and ‘shadow people.’ Melanie Dunbar, my character has recently relocated to the area from Chicagoland, only now instead of being a deserted road, it’s a development of McMansions where she lives with her husband. Here’s some of Mel’s backstory to help give us some understanding of where she’s at now. Melanie Dunbar Chestnut Ridge, Missouri “I used to like to play dead.  It was a sick and macabre game to pass the long days in mother’s art studio.  She’d be lost in a vision of oil streaking her canvas and I’d lie on the rag rug on the floor, my breath held, wondering just how long I’d be able to hold out; wondering too if my face was turning indigo like the paint on mother’s brush. If I allowed my chest …

Fiction Friday: Met My Old Lover at Grocery Store

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By Leslie Lindsay What happens when your antagonist sees the love of his life at the grocery store?  It’s been years and she’s all grown up with a kid…why, you stalk her of course!   (image source: wikipedia.  Retrived 8.16.13) When the doors finally slide open revealing Annie and her shopping cart, my pulse quickens.  I toss back the remainder of the beer and watch like a hawk drawn to its prey.  Annie Fuckin’ Kelley.  God, she looks good, even behind a kid-laden shopping cart.  I swallow, part of me crazy-jealous of the man she married, who must be the father of this kid and the other part of me in awe, proud to say she was once mine.  I watch as she struggles with the cart over a pothole, unsnap the kid from the front seat and place her in the minivan.  If only I could help her.  I would; I’d smile and say, “Looks like you could use a little help with that.”  She’d startle because she’d recognize the voice; a familiar feeling would …

Fiction Friday: Novel Newspaper Article

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By Leslie Lindsay Here’s a glimpse into one of my newer characters, Nolan Baxter.  He’s a journalist for the Chicago Tribune who mostly writes things in the fluffy section of the paper–which just so happens to be my favorite section.  This is a mock newspaper article that will fit somewhere into that novel of mine…   Nolan Baxter Wednesday, May 22, 2013      Chicago Tribune           Every opera you’ve ever heard, every painting you’ve ever admired, every book you’ve ever read is reducible to a chemical released in the artist’s, composer’s, or author’s brain.  We can even map where in the brain that work got done.  Some may have occurred in the occipital lobe where imagery lives; some in the insula which feels emotion, and some in the prefrontal cortex where problem-solving and language take place.  It isn’t artistic beauty, it’s biology.            At least that is one way to look at it—but not the way we prefer.  Instead, we prefer the more esoteric way: that creativity is a flash in the pan summoned to you …

Write On, Wednesday: Tour of Non-Sites

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By Leslie Lindsay I was driving around my neck of the woods here in southwestern Chicagoland the other day when it dawned on me how much of my novel-in-progress really could be set here.  Okay, full-disclosure: it is set in this area–at least parts of it are–but the names have been changed.  I can’t give everything away, lest there won’t be any point in using faux names for these suburbs I have created, the street names, the style of housing.  As my car wound around the US highways,  the suburban landscape having morphed into housing developments seemingly overnight from corn fields, I see a strong resembelence to the world I  created for my characters–Annie, Steve, Joe, Beth and their counterparts.  We could go south a ways and I could show you the real Cherrydale, inspiration for Steve’s stomping grounds.  If I shot over west, I’d point out the McMansions that made an appearance in Annie’s chapter on the secret shopping adventure for a real estate developer.  If we go back to the US highway I mentioned, …

Fiction Friday:

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By Leslie Lindsay Working on something new to piece into my novel-in-progress, this is meant to show Steve, a biomedical engineer’s obession with his first-love, Annie.  Let me know your thoughts!  “The only thing I know is promises should have been made.  A contract, an algorithm of love:  Girlfriend says she needs spaceàbreak-up.  End of relationship. Option Two: Girlfriend says she needs spaceàgive her space but not too much. Keep her hanging in your world.  Because you love her too damn much.  It’s like the fine art of balancing a chemical equation.  God, but Annie hated chemistry.  She was the entropy agent, blasting into the relationship generating thermodynamic heat, a contrast between order and disorder.  I will her into my mind, fast-forwarding the years. Annie is small, delicate, frail.  She sits in a chair at a sunny window.  Her hands are mottled with age spots, prominent veins blistering blue and purple.  I cup her hand with my own, watching it transform before my eyes—youthful, slender straight fingers spread forth.  I lean in and kiss her cheek.  “You’re …

Fiction Friday: Meet a New Character from my Novel-in-Progress

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By Leslie Lindsay After culling through  my completed manuscript and making notes…okay, about 100 color-coded notecards, I have come to the conclusion that I need another layer woven into the tapestry of my story.  Meet Nolan Baxter.  He’s there for a reason: to impart information to the reader that main characters Annie and Steve may not know or have access to.  He’s there to make readers say, “WTF?”  and he’s going to help tie things together in the end.  Take a peek.  Let me know your thoughts.  Remember, this is an original work of fiction. Please do not make your own.  ***Be sure to LIKE my Facebook author page at https://www.facebook.com/LeslieALindsay1?ref=hl*** “Nolan Baxter wrote the obligatory ghost story on Halloween, the stories of lasting love on Valentine’s Day and interviews folks around the Bean about homelessness.  Worse, Nolan Baxter was a chameleon, his colors changing based on who he was around—and how he could please them, never fully understanding who he was and what made him tick.           Human interest stories became his passion.  What interested …

Fiction Friday:

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By Leslie Lindsay Back to that novel of mine.  Revisions are still underway,  thought you’d like to see what I am up to with Slippery Slope.  [remember, this is original fiction.  Your ideas for improvement are greatly appreciated]  “I storm out of Steve’s driveway, backing the Odyssey out while punching in Joe’s number.  He picks up on the first ring.          “Hi, sweetie.  How are things going?  Make it to Pat Cooper’s office?”         “Pat?  Who?” I narrow my eyes.           “You know.  The message.  This morning.  Mystery shopper.”           “Oh…yeah,” I feign recognition.  “Just leaving his office now.”  I look to the homes lining the streets, big and new.  Not Pat Cooper’s office.  “Listen, I need to pop in to Target for a minute.  Madi needs some Pull-Ups.”            “Okay.  Don’t worry about us.  We’re heading to the hardware store after we finish at the park.  Love ya, hon!”            “Joe, you have no idea how much I love you.”  I say and I mean it.            I hear a smile on the end …

Fiction Friday: After-Effects

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By Leslie Lindsay Slippery When Wet.  This is an excerpt from my novel-in-progress.  Woman has just done the deed with her first boyfriend…oh, but it’s many years later and she’s married to someone else.  So is he.  [original fiction.  Reproduction or sharing, or passing off as your own is strictly prohibited] “On January 3rd—about 11 days ago—I pulled into the garage.  The clock on the Sienna’s dash read 1:47a.m.           I smelled of Steve.  I inhaled deeply, the scent wafting through my nose, piercing my olfactory bulb and traveling through to my limbic system; the most primitative area of the human brain.  Our bodies are particularly adept at recalling these memories of smell.  But I worried someone else—Joe—would notice and not like it.  It was probably nothing.  My senses particularly heightened, my body in tune with Steve’s pheromones.          I relished in the thought.          In my mind, the clock turned back years; instead of walking back into my own house in Grove, IL where I was the parent—the wife—it was my childhood home following a date …