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| The NaNoWriMo site encourages you to create a cover image, so I made this tonight when I should have been at the grocery store. |
At first I thought I'd try to finish my middle-grade fantasy novel, "The Weirdling Woods," during November's NaNoWriMo challenge to complete a 50,000 word novel.
Then I read the NaNoWriMo FAQ and saw that you are absolutely forbidden to use existing prose, and are supposed to come up with something original to start and finish all in one month. (I've already written about 7 chapters of The Weirdling Woods, so that's out!)
A few days before November 1st I put together a quick outline for a supernatural horror novel. Why not, right? It's my absolute favorite genre. My inspiration was a weird Slovak nursery rhyme my Grandma used to tell us kids, accompanied by tickling her fingers up and down the insides of our arms so that we giggled. Little did we know, until someone finally asked her to translate what it meant, that the tickling down our arms was BLOOD running out.
I've written 10,000 words so far of this thing that's not for kids, and it's not a comic book. I'm trying something new. Sort of.
Before I jumped into making comics, I had written a slew of short horror fiction in my late teens and very early 20s, none of which saw publication. Not that I didn't try. But it was the comics that got me published, and that was a lot of fun.
I would still like to come up with a horror novel manuscript that I feel confident enough to submit somewhere for publication.
It's still like a big unwieldy lump of raw clay that is just beginning to shape up into something, but here's the initial brief synopsis for BLOOD RUNS BACKWARDS:
Seb, curator of a small art gallery, is preparing an installation of "blood poppets" made by his grandmother, who is currently incarcerated in a psych ward for attempting to poison Seb and his 2 cousins. As he delves deeper into his family's mysterious ways, a creature called the Blood Hound comes hunting those of his grandmother's bloodline. Is Seb as crazy as his grandmother, or should he believe the uncanny things he begins to experience?
Here's a brief excerpt:
In the dirty light from a buzzing security lamp near my truck, something moved feebly near my feet. I gasped and jumped back.
I had almost stepped on it. A horrible, twisted creature lying on the gravel.
"Oh, god!" I panted, gulping and pulling the coat tighter around my chest.
It was about the size of a very small cat, but with a pointed pink snout, and matted fur sticking up in mangled tufts. It looked wet. It hissed weakly, showing tiny pointed teeth. There was red in its mouth, and red in its fur. Its body was contorted in such a way that I couldn't tell if it was even all there, or if some of the sticky wetness was exposed entrails. One skinny limb twitched. Naked toes splayed.