Novels

Work has been disappointing lately. Lots of unmotivated students, too much apathy. I don't do well when those around me are so negative.

However, looking over my novels and my work over the past few years has boosted my spirits a little. I finished my first novel in 1997. Since then I have finished seven others, and I have come up with ideas for four more, all of those partially written. Some of the seven other finished novels are not bad, in my opinion. There are a few I think I can really make something out of. There a few that need a bunch of work.

My goal is to rework them all and make them good reads, but most of all, my goal is to publish them all and more after that.

I hope that HERE, THERE BE DRAUGR does well with the Amazon Breakthrough Novel Award. I'm plannng to send out a few queries this month to see if I can find an agent for one or another of the finished novels.

I just know that even if I do get published, and even if I were to make any money from it (which is semi-doubtful with this market), that I woulnd't quit my teaching job. There is far too much material there.

Amazon's Breakthrough Novel Award

I have finished rewording my pitch for the ABNA, and I am going to try not to think about it anymore. I think I have gone through at least twelve rewrites this week. The mistake was when Amazon said you can edit your work after you enter until the final entry date, which is tomorrow February 7. So every night this week--except last night--I have been rewriting. I have gotten feedback from students, from writing friends, from Mara (poor Mara), and I have consulted several online sources as well as the books I have. I am sick to death of my pitch, but I think this last version is the strongest. Opinions?

PITCH:
Sixteen-year-old Martin’s life was once normal. Now he lives in a world where dads die, mothers turn into demons, girlfriends are kidnapped, and no one can be trusted. Here, There Be Draugr is a young adult thriller filled with action and dark fantasy, which also confronts the real issues of becoming an adult.

When Martin discovers his mother staring mutely into the distance and chewing on her own fingers, he knows something is terribly wrong. A stranger named Brett Roman says Martin’s mother is turning into a Scandinavian demon called a draugr, Martin thinks he is crazy. But his mother’s transformation into a yellow-eyed, pale-skinned monster makes him believe.

Together with his friends Carlos and Beth, and under the tutelage of Roman, Martin battles these demons in the guise of humans. The destiny of this ordinary teen is to save mankind from these soulless fiends and to avenge his mother’s death.