I’m really pleased with this chapter. After all the ones that gave me hell in Part One, I was relieved to find I hadn’t turned into a complete hack. I tried to really jump right in with this one and not spend time summarizing Part One. We start off two or three weeks after the last chapter and I tried to bring in just about everyone we met before so you can all get a sense of where they are and what they’ve been doing. In a nutshell, Sage, Levi, and Gen are pretty screwed up. Levi probably less so because he at least tries to deal with things, but the others...not so much. And trouble’s brewin’!
I also brought in three new characters, all of whom I LOVE. First up: Peyton Rice. She’s meant to be like the anti-Janine in a lot of ways. While Janine is sexy, popular and perfect (to Gen) to the point of being intimidating, Peyton is the talkative, clumsy, cute girl-next-door sort. Essentially, she’s a walking Sandra Bullock movie.
I also introduced someone who is clearly a “love” interest for Michael in Krysta. One of the things I liked about the Michael short story SURFACING was that between his dreams and phone calls, he had lots of different people to interact with, letting me show different aspects of him. Krysta provides me with the same opportunity, and also makes something rather clear to the reader (I hope): he’s not opposed to witches in general, just Genevieve. But Michael is attracted to power more than anything—not merely that he wishes to obtain it, but that he’s attracted to it in others. And there’s definitely something about Krysta. Though she doesn’t have a huge role immediately, I guarantee she’ll be back a bit later...I mean, how could she not when Gen is so freaked out about her? In deciding where to pick up the story for the first chapter, my first thought was “I need a Michael and Genevieve scene” because they’re just too funny together. And that one as they’re leaving Krysta’s apartment is one of my favourites.
Finally, we have Thad Kincaid. He didn’t get to do much this chapter, but he’ll be around for a little bit in the next one, where he hopefully endears a few readers. He was originally supposed to appear briefly in Part One, but I had too many other things going on, so I pushed his introduction back to this first chapter.
Anyway, I felt this chapter nicely set up some important “mythology” development, and prepared for the coming character arcs of just about all the main characters—meaning Gen, Sage, Levi, Michael, and to a lesser extent, Merri. Meredith’s plot arc starts more next month when she finally gets a chance to take over POV, though there’s a hint in this one.
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"She wrapped evil around her like a large, evil Mexican serape."
Author Commentary
I’m really pleased with this chapter. After all the ones that gave me hell in Part One, I was relieved to find I hadn’t turned into a complete hack. I tried to really jump right in with this one and not spend time summarizing Part One. We start off two or three weeks after the last chapter and I tried to bring in just about everyone we met before so you can all get a sense of where they are and what they’ve been doing. In a nutshell, Sage, Levi, and Gen are pretty screwed up. Levi probably less so because he at least tries to deal with things, but the others...not so much. And trouble’s brewin’!
I also brought in three new characters, all of whom I LOVE. First up: Peyton Rice. She’s meant to be like the anti-Janine in a lot of ways. While Janine is sexy, popular and perfect (to Gen) to the point of being intimidating, Peyton is the talkative, clumsy, cute girl-next-door sort. Essentially, she’s a walking Sandra Bullock movie.
I also introduced someone who is clearly a “love” interest for Michael in Krysta. One of the things I liked about the Michael short story SURFACING was that between his dreams and phone calls, he had lots of different people to interact with, letting me show different aspects of him. Krysta provides me with the same opportunity, and also makes something rather clear to the reader (I hope): he’s not opposed to witches in general, just Genevieve. But Michael is attracted to power more than anything—not merely that he wishes to obtain it, but that he’s attracted to it in others. And there’s definitely something about Krysta.
Though she doesn’t have a huge role immediately, I guarantee she’ll be back a bit later...I mean, how could she not when Gen is so freaked out about her? In deciding where to pick up the story for the first chapter, my first thought was “I need a Michael and Genevieve scene” because they’re just too funny together. And that one as they’re leaving Krysta’s apartment is one of my favourites.
Finally, we have Thad Kincaid. He didn’t get to do much this chapter, but he’ll be around for a little bit in the next one, where he hopefully endears a few readers.
He was originally supposed to appear briefly in Part One, but I had too many other things going on, so I pushed his introduction back to this first chapter.
Anyway, I felt this chapter nicely set up some important “mythology” development, and prepared for the coming character arcs of just about all the main characters—meaning Gen, Sage, Levi, Michael, and to a lesser extent, Merri. Meredith’s plot arc starts more next month when she finally gets a chance to take over POV, though there’s a hint in this one.
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"She wrapped evil around her like a large, evil Mexican serape."