Archive for Teaser Tuesday

Teaser Tuesday

Another snip from my current WIP, Interior of a Heart, a YA literary novel about a girl treated as an outcast in her town when she keeps a secret for her boyfriend, a soldier fighting in Afghanistan. George is an old vet Sophie has become friends with after her father forces her to volunteer at the VA Hospital.

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Teaser Tuesday

Another teaser from Interior of a Heart, my literary YA novel. Note: there is some nudity in the scene below.

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Teaser Tuesday

Another snip from my work Interior of a Heart. Quinn snuck out when her father told her not to leave the house.

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Teaser Tuesday

A snippet of my wip, Aromance. I’ve never had two wip’s going at the same time, but it seems to be working.

The gears grind as Mom downshifts, filling the car with an awful metal on metal sound. She cusses like a gangster, and I hold out my hand for payment.

“Dammit, Lark. That shouldn’t count. The car made me do it,” she grumbles.

We’ve been driving all night, and the sun hasn’t risen yet. She is cranky without her first third cup of coffee, but she reaches into her purse for one of the coins she keeps in an emergency stash for stressful times like these.

“It’s not Jack’s fault you can’t drive a stick shift. I offered to take over back in Louisville. Now pay up for using the “D” word, too.”

She gives me another quarter and spares a glaring glance my way. “I told you it was bad luck to give the car a boy’s name.”

I drop both coins into the Cussing Can at my feet. This cross-country road trip has nearly filled the Folger’s coffee can to the top. Sadly, this is our third can in less than a month.

“It’s sexist to think all boats, cars, and other modes of transportation are female,” I say by rote. We’ve had this argument before. “Besides, call me crazy, but no female would be caught dead in Jack’s condition.”

Jack is a 1977 VW Bug with faded red paint peeking through random patches of deep gray primer. He looks like an old man with a serious case of the chicken pox, pock marks, suspicious leaks, and all. We love Jack, though.

“You better hope he can get us the last twenty miles, or your ass is going to be pushing him into Elsinore.”

“Quarter, please.”

Mom clamps her jaw to hold back a string of curses and slaps another coin into my palm. She’s slightly bitter that I’m having an easier time reforming. I’ve explained to her that the trick lies in replacing words we’ve deemed “Inappropriate” with meaningless words.

Teaser Tuesday

More of my wip, Interior of a Heart. This is a literary YA I’m working on about a girl turned into an outcast in her town when she keeps a secret for her boyfriend, a soldier who has gone MIA in Afghanistan. Quinn’s father has just driven away from her house after her father has ordered her to stay home.

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Teaser Tuesday

More of my wip, Interior of a Heart. This is a literary YA I’m working on about a girl turned into an outcast in her town when she keeps a secret for her boyfriend, a soldier who has gone MIA in Afghanistan. Quinn’s father has just told her that Carey is MIA.

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Teaser Tuesday

A little more of my WIP, Interior of a Heart. This is a literary YA I’m working on about a girl turned into an outcast in her town when she keeps a secret for her boyfriend, a soldier who has gone MIA in Afghanistan.

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Teaser Tuesday

What’s this, peeps? A Teaser Tuesday? I know it’s frickin’ unbelievable since I haven’t played along in ages. Funny how switching tense can get a constipated piece moving along again. This is a literary YA I’m working on about a girl turned into an outcast in her town when she keeps a secret for her boyfriend, a soldier who has gone MIA in Afghanistan. Let me know what you think.

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Teaser Tuesday

A new work to tease from! Hallelujah! This is the opening of Chapter One of a new work – uncut and unedited. Working title: INTERIOR OF THE HEART. I’d love to know what you think!

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Teaser Tuesday

It’s Tuesday evening, but technically still Tuesday. This isn’t a teaser really, but another workshop exercise. We were given a picture and challenged to write from a POV we don’t normally use for twenty minutes. This is obviously very unfinished, but looking at it now, I love the unexpected “A Rose for Emily” quality to it.

Picture: Black and white print of a senior woman wearing a cape, hat, and dress standing on building stoop with a dog on a leash

What I Wrote (unedited – sorry for any mistakes):

Every day, at exactly six o’clock, whether the sun was setting into New Jersey or reigning the Manhattan skyline, Miss Prudence Devereaux stood on her doorstep. Year-in, year-out, we watched her step out the door of 121 Maple Street, handbag over arm, cape wrapped around her shoulders, and that hat – the grey one with the black ribbon and the scarlet flowers hanging on the front – until her eager pace turned to an awkward shuffle, slower but somehow no less eager. We watched her, our eyes the windows in the building at 123 Maple Street, and saw how she waited, glancing uptown – always uptown, as if expecting an old beau to pick her up for dinner and dancing at that cozy club on Fifth Avenue. At 6:20 sharp – we kept time by the clocks in the shop behind her, imagining the tick, tick, tick of those infinite minutes and seconds passing in the heart of a woman waiting for her lover to come – she disappeared back into her building. Miss Prudence Devereaux never seemed to age, but we saw the years passing in the gray fur on her silent companion, the canine that waited with her.