A to Z Challenge: M is for Magic

This year, I'm participating in the insane awesome A to Z blogging challenge, which entails posting EVERY SINGLE DAY during the month of April, except for Sundays. Each day's theme corresponds to a different day of the alphabet: 26 days, 26 posts. I'll be blogging each day this month on some aspect of my current work in progress (WIP).

M is for Magic

Nope, not the kind you get in fantasy novels, full of sorcerers and spells and potions; and not even really the kind you find in romance novels, where one look from that person's eyes makes your stomach flutter (although, to be fair, there is certainly some of that kind in the book); but instead the kind that comes and goes without rhyme or reason, in our very own world, here on planet Earth.

I'm talking about magical realism, which is the genre I'm attempting right now in my WIP. It can be hard not to slip into the fantasy sort of magic, but it can also be fun. This is the kind of magic I get to just use whenever I want, however I want, and I don't need to explain a damn thing about how it works, or why, or who can use it, or how. In fact, I'm not supposed to explain it. How often do writers get to say something like that?

I'm still working on how to use it in the text, but I've got a little brainstorming snippet ready for you, to show you what I mean. This is from the modern Australian lifetime, and it's Taylor's POV, referencing another time that Nat came roaring in on her motorcycle, unannounced (standard disclaimers about quality, as always):

All I had to tell me either way was another one of her notes, short and light as always, saying, “See you soon.” 

Well, “soon” was “a lot later”, but she did come back, one bitter cold afternoon. It was one of those winter days when the air freezes and the wind is sharp as a knife, and any part of your body that’s exposed to it ends up turning straight to ice. I didn't believe it until I saw it for myself, and then I never forgot. It was before James was born, so I was about five years old. The cold came on so sudden and unexpected that we didn't have time to get all the sheep inside, and we had to stand at the window and watch while five of our ewes hardened into ice right there in front of us, their bodies slowly turning to sheer crystal. We could see the fence they were standing by right through their translucent bellies. When the cold snap broke a day later, all that was left of them was five sets of hooves sitting in little puddles of water. We saved the hooves, and let the rest of the melted sheep sink into the earth. 

The day Nat came back was one of those days.