Thursday, September 18, 2014

The road to New Adult and, ultimately, Rock & Release

Where to begin... where to begin...

*taps chin, all thoughtful-looking*

It was a cold day, the air scraping like the rough edges of icy bricks across my cheeks, when suddenly

Okay, on the real, here's how this all happened:

I started writing seriously with a career in mind back in 2009.

I wrote.

           a lot.

                  of books.

All YA.

Seriously. I love YA. Still do.

Then, in 2012 I got pregnant. Best decision I've ever made. Also one of the ones that's made me the sickest. (The only thing that even comes close is the great Salmonella Incident of 2011, which shall never, ever be discussed again.) So, considering I was too nauseated to do more than lie on the couch most days, I took a break from writing. Then when the sickness passed, I just wanted to figure out what this whole parenthood thing was going to be about.

"I'll start writing again three months after she's born," I told myself--and anyone else who'd listen.

HAHAHAHAHAHA.

No.

The day my daughter was born was the best of my life. The next four months were the roughest. One word: Colic.

After that period of complete hell was over, I wanted a few months to spend some non-screaming-in-pain time with my daughter. Those few months spanned into the rest of her first year of life--and right around that one year mark, my husband and I were given VIP tickets to a concert (Steve Miller Band and Journey, oh yeah!) The tickets gave us access to this pre-concert VIP bar and deck area, and I sat there watching the college-aged staff work their shifts and found myself thinking that it could be a good setting for a book. That it could be really fun to imagine what it'd be like to work at a concert venue during that exciting "new adult" period of life.

All the sudden, that drive to write, the one I'd tucked away for so long, slammed back in full force. And the timing was perfect, as one of my best friends' husbands had, for her birthday, booked a writing retreat for us and one other writer friend to go on. (Husband of the year right there, huh??)

We retreated, we brainstormed, and Cassidy's story came pouring out. Never, in my entire life, have words come so easily for me. Never have I had a college-aged protagonist before, either. But I rolled with it, with Cassidy, and I'm really happy I did. Because now I get to launch Rock & Release into the world! And SOON.

VIP, the first act of Rock & Release, launches November 17th, and I hope you're as excited as I am!