Skip to main content

It's My Life - but it's shared trauma

 M

Maybe most debut authors, especially those who write literary fiction, have manuscripts chock full of past pain, or have fictionalized their own life experience in their first books.

But I can only speak for myself. 

My book is fiction, but the characters, most or all, are based on certain people from my life. Some are an amalgamation of several different people I've known.

But then, there's Steve and Carol Lancaster, my MC's mom and dad.

When my parents read my book, what will they have to say about the fictionalized versions of themselves?

The good news is that they have already read a section of my MS that started as a college short story. So, Dad knows he's a bit "aw, shucks" at times and Mom knows she is painted by the brush of  her young daughter, who's POV we're in. Maybe a bit naïve, certainly a worrier, anxious to the core. Mom and Carol both had their own traumas, and unprocessed pain makes Carol who she is on the page. And that's okay. Carol's a great character, and my mom is a great mother. She certainly gave it her all. Maybe realizes in hindsight that we all should have been in therapy. But, it was the 1980s and 1990s and plus we had Jesus.

But it was kind of hard to accept love from God the Father when the rest of the men in your life were stinking it up so badly. Until Steve came along, but even then. I'd explain but, just read the book.

When I told my parents I'd finished my novel, my initial plan was to send them printed copies and ask them if there was anything in the book that was too painful for them, or that I needed to edit/ delete/ change/ leave out.

And then I decided that was idiotic. They didn't write a book. They didn't earn creative control. And the greatest thing happened - they agreed. 

I'm forty years old. I'm a grown up. I'm an adult who wrote a freakin' fantastic work of fiction.

All they are is proud. 

 

Comments

Popular posts from this blog

in which i have a birthday and a giveaway

The blogger as a child. p.s. it's my birthday. And people at Starbucks like me. (I did get this for free, but it was not for the benefit of my blog.)  (Obvi, it was a gift .) There's a cupcake in that box! There's a hazelnut latte in that cup! In other news, I'm having a 100 Followers/ It's my birthday giveaway. You should enter. I'm giving away the following goodies: 1. A $25.00 VISA giftcard. 2. An original poem, which will be hadwritten and autographed on pretty paper. It might be about love, about being a writer, or maybe the winner will be able to choose the topic. We shall see. This giveaway is a bit seatofthepantsspice. 3. A frame from my wedding day. In fact, this very frame: 4. A mystery. The fourth goodie will be a surprise until you open the package! 5. The whopper: I will dedicate a karaoke song to you, personally, and put it on my blog, vlogger style. If you want to enter this smashing contest: leave a comment. 1 entry if you follow and comme...

love at first sight blogfest, or, go eat a heart-shaped cookie

Courtney Reese is hosting a love at first sight blogfest, in which writer's write about the icky love stuff. Check it out -- there are already a ton of entries over there. Okay, so my scene isn't really love at first sight for my mc, Laurel (in fact, she doesn't even want it to be) but this is the first time she interacts with her second love interest, David.  Read! Enjoy! Critique!      A sea of southerners filled the lobby of the movie theater. David Winter stood at a neon orange podium in the center of the throng, his head throbbing. He tore off one ticket stub after another, pointed the masses in the appropriate direction. The work was monotonous. Most of the patrons were lost in conversations with one another, and they paid David the same lack of attention that he showed them. He tried not to grimace at the giggling teenage girls, the smug looking guys in gold chains, the overweight middle aged couples: all annoyed him equa...

possessive

I watched Hoarders last night. During the first commercial break, I dared to look around my living room and I thought, oh holy mother of four-letter-word. Color me cluttered. Yes, it's true that most of my mess is hidden and collecting dust in the dark, but I know what's there -- like the 100+ VHS tapes in my bookshelf/ media cabinet, for instance. Yes, I love knowing that should I desire to watch my old school copy of Riding in Cars with Boys or Girls Just Wanna Have Fun or The Royal Tenembaums or Serendipity or Ghost World or Memento or... okay. You get the picture. It's there. If I wanted it, it would be right there. Also semi-hidden? Probaby 50+ copies of this weekly magazine from the late 1960's - early 1970's called Story of Life. My grandma gave them to me. Have I cracked the cover of even one issue? Hell to the no. I don't have time for that type of nostalgia. Plus, I can't even find a link for it with a quick google search. Something tha...