THIS WILL HAPPEN GODDAMMIT!!

So I'm writing a novel: a YA dystopian novel.
And for the first time since I began self-pubbing short stories a couple of years ago I'm feeling like I would actually like to try to traditionally publish this one.

HAVE I LOST MY MIND?!?

I don't know. Maybe?

But I'd like to! I really feel like I've got something worthwhile going on here, you know?

But that, of course, means I have to finish the damn thing. SO I'M MAKING A DECLARATION!!

I hereby promise to you, to myself, to the NSA, and to any and all deities listening that I WILL HAVE THE FIRST DRAFT DONE BY NY 2014!!!


And here's a little taste, just for stopping by:

(The following is an excerpt from ROAD TO NOWHERE)

Cerulean met the little girl at Gruesome Point. That was where she met all the newcomers. The girl wore fuzzy pink slippers, pink bows in her hair, and a cheery nightgown that looked out of place with her gray surroundings and was all quivering lips, trembling hands, and wide, staring eyes. She looked like she had woken up to discover her nightmare was real. Which was pretty much exactly what had happened.

Meeting kids like this always made Cerulean want to cry, but she couldn't, at least not now. Now she had to put on a smile and be brave for the girl—assure her that life goes on, even in Nowhere.

She had to lie, in other words.

Cerulean smiled and approached the terrified child. “Hi,” she said in her most soothing voice, “I'm Cerulean. What's your name?”

“Where am I?” The little girl asked.

“This place doesn't really have a name,” Cerulean said. “We call it Nowhere. What can I call you?”

“I'm Indigo,” the girl said. “This place is scary. I don't want to be here. Where's my mommy?”

“Your mom's at home,” Cerulean said, knowing what question came next, and hating herself for how she was going to have to answer it.

“Can I go home?”

“I'm afraid not. At least not yet. We haven't figured out a way to leave this place.”

Indigo burst into tears. Cerulean wrapped her tiny body in a hug.

“Sshh,” she said. “You'll be OK. I'll take care of you. You can stay with my while you're here.”

Indigo just kept sobbing. “I...I want...my...mommy!”

“I'll be your mommy here,” Cerulean said. “I'll take care of you.”

She picked the distraught child up and walked toward home.

A short while later, after Cerulean's footsteps and Indigo's cries faded into the black night, Mayor Blue came prancing up the street toward Gruesome Point. He wore a pointy hat atop his head and a shirt five sizes too big that flapped around his bony frame like a sail in the wind. His skin was cracked and the yellowy-gray of old parchment and it was stretched across his skull so tight it pulled his mouth into a mean, tight-lipped grimace.

He paused at the spot where Indigo stood and bent over, examining something on the ground.

Presently he stood up and laughed. He held aloft a stoppered glass bottle. Its contents swirled and sparkled in the pale moonlight. A label on the bottle identified the substance as Tears.

“Girl's tears always taste the sweetest,” the mayor said in a voice like the rustling of leaves on a cold night.

And he skipped away into the night.