Of Writers & Prose: The Muse is a Tricky Bitch . . .

I have been a sci-fi fan since 1975 when I saw my first Godzilla movie. More so when Star Wars and the original Battlestar Galactica came out. When I entered adulthood, I discovered dark fantasy and paranormal, so it was a given when I started writing stuff that I would, naturally, gravitate toward the genres that captured my imagination. When I was in my twenties, so where my characters, and as I grew older, they did too, so imagine my fucking surprise when my Muse gives me a story idea that can only be written where the MC is a teen!

Look at my Twitter account. It says ‘Author of dark Adult Scifi & Urban Fantasy novels & scripts.

Adult. ADULT!

So where the hell did this idea come from and why am I so excited about it? I tried to envision the story as an adult novel. Nope. So then I tried with a young adult age, but it still wasn’t right. This story had to be written from a teens POV, problem is, I haven’t been a teen in DECADES, and I just briefly encounter the teens at work. Sometimes I can listen in on their conversations, but a lot of the time it’s more work related than general teenage banter. Not to mention the dialogue.

That’s another problem, I’m not ‘hip’ with the slang of today’s teens, so I decided to set it during the 80’s; a time I am very familiar with. This turned out to be a blessing in several ways:

1. I remember how the world was back then. You could get away with a lot more then than you could now.
2. Technology was in its primordial phase. There were no cell phones or laptops. We had computers but everything was run on DOS.
3. Socially, things were much, much different. While there were bullies back then, the entire bully culture is taken so much more seriously now. For which I am grateful.

These three reasons alone excited me enough to want to work on the story. Plus, I have another set of magical realism novels that I could easily attach to this.

As of the writing of this post, I have cleared the 50k wordmark. Quite a feat for me. I’ve also decided that while the characters may be teens, the novel will be for adults; especially those who remember the 80’s and how we used to act. My memories of the ’80s are from a teen’s POV. Was it all sex, drugs, and rock’n roll? Pretty much, at least for me, it was and I think these characters will reflect that culture. I’ve already written a few scenes that are right from my memory and I will admit, it’s kinda fun looking back.