A to Z Challenge: Q is for Quiet Life

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).

Q is for Quiet Life

Sometimes we first meet the people we love in casual, simple settings - dinner with friends, a blind date, the grocery store - and sometimes they come barreling into our lives like a runaway freight train.

For Taylor, who lives what you might call an absurdly quiet life on a sheep farm in Australia, Nat's arrival on her motorcycle is like that train: just as wild, just as unexpected, and it leaves just as much chaos in its wake.

These two characters, as I've mentioned (too many times, probably), live in Australia in the 1950s or 60s, and it's their story that will carry us through the rest of the novel. The book will begin and end with them, and their story will weave throughout the other lifetimes. At least, that's the way I've planned it for now.

Taylor's life is so quiet that Nat can't help but wonder why, the more she learns about it. Here's a little excerpt about it from one of my brainstorming scenes (and as always, standard disclaimers apply, including the fact that I totally made up the sheep farming bits). And as a side note, on 'N' day, some of you mentioned wanting to see Nat's take on Taylor. Well, that's not really possible (and come back on 'T' day to see why), but today's snippet gives you a small insight into how Nat sees Taylor. :

“There’s not much to tell.” We were in the fields a week or so later; the dogs were running the flock back and forth, so I could watch for any lame ewes.  

Nat smiled. “Come on, I tell you stories all the time. I want to hear one of yours.” 

I shrugged. “It’s a quiet life, living on a farm. Nothing like traveling the country on a motorcycle.” 

“Well, tell me about the quiet life, then.” 

One of the ewes separated from the rest and made a move toward the open gate. I watched as Rafe, dense and black against the white flock, darted forward and nipped her back into line. Good boy. “You’ve seen it. This is it,” I said. 

“I’ve seen a tiny bit of it. That doesn’t count. What about all the rest?” 

“What do you want to know?” 

“I don’t know. Tell me about your family. Tell me about the other girls you bring over when I’m not around.” 

I shook my head. “There aren't any.” 

She laughed. “I don’t believe that for a second. Come on now, spill. I won’t be jealous.” 

“It’s the truth. There aren't any.”

Her eyes were hot on my face, but I kept watching the flock. “Really?” she asked. I didn't respond, just whistled at Rafe, who turned quickly to move the flock to the right. “Come on,” she said. “Not even one? What about that cute waitress at the diner – what’s her name? Susie?” 

I frowned and tried to think of what the waitresses looked like, but came up blank. “What about her?” 

“She was flirting with you, even with me right there.” 

“She was?” I thought back, but I couldn’t even remember what the girl looked like. I’d taken Nat to Brenda’s diner for lunch a few days before, because Nat said she liked diners. We ate eggs and bacon; I watched Nat’s face as she talked. Her hands moving through the air, helping her tell her story. The curve of her breasts under her shirt. Had there been a waitress? 

“Don’t tell me you didn’t notice?” Nat asked. 

I could feel my cheeks starting to burn. “I guess I didn’t.” 

“Lord, Taylor, she was practically drooling on you.” 

“You were paying a lot of attention. Why don’t you go after her, then?” I pushed myself off the fence and waved at the dogs, signaling them to bring the sheep back to pasture. There were a few I wanted to get a closer look at.  

“It wasn't me she wanted.” 

“Well, I don’t remember her.” 

Nat followed me around to the gate and helped me close it. “You really don’t, do you?” Her smile was light but her eyes were serious. 

“No, I don’t.” 

She was quiet for a minute as we walked across the field. “Men, then?”  

“No.” 

“I won’t be upset if the answer is yes. Either one is fine by me. Both, too.” 

I shook my head. “I don’t bring anyone here.” 

“No one? Ever?” 

“I told you it’s a quiet life.” I whistled the dogs off the flock, and patted their heads as they swarmed around us, tails feathered and waving.  

“That’s not quiet. It’s saintly.” 

“It’s just the way I live.” I watched the sheep settle in and start to graze. They were still a bit flighty, after the exercise, and I wanted to wait on walking through them until they were calmer. 

“Taylor…” Her tone was so serious that I looked up. She was frowning, the tiny lines around her eyes more pronounced. “Am I – I’m not your first?” 

I looked back at the sheep. “No.” 

“There’s no shame in it. Some people wait a really long time before – ” 

“You’re not my first.”

A to Z Challenge: N is for Natalie

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).


N is for Natalie

I teased you about this for far too long - but in my defense, it was t the alphabet's fault! 'B' and 'N' are just too damn far apart.

It's finally time to talk about Natalie, or Nat, as everyone calls her. A little refresher: Nat appears in the lifetime in 1960's Australia, and she spends her days driving around the country on her motorcycle. Yes, she does have the requisite leather jacket, attitude, and some seriously awesome - if also rather worn out and ratty - boots.

Nat is a true vagabond: she's in her 30's when we meet her, and since she was about 17 years old, she's spent her life on the road. When she runs out of money, she stops somewhere and picks up some work, but as soon as she has enough saved up, she's back on her bike again.

This is how she met Taylor, the other soul and of course love interest: she was near the sheep farm when her money ran out, and was lucky enough that it was shearing time, and that Taylor needed the help badly enough to not care that she had no experience. Taylor hired her on the spot, and the rest - well, the rest is the whole story. And yes, to find out more about Taylor, you are going to have to wait until 'T' day. Darn that alphabet...

If you haven't guessed by now, Nat is of course the Free Spirit soul. She loves the freedom of the road; it's the only place she's ever really felt at home. Late in the story, Taylor accuses her of running away, and it's true, she does run - but she has far too much haunting her in her past to stay too long in one place. If there's one thing Nat's learned, it's that no one can catch you if you just keep moving.

In fact, before she met Taylor, she never returned to the same place more than once. But now, no matter how many times she leaves, she keeps finding herself back at Taylor's farm, over and over and over again. If she's not careful, she might find that the road suddenly isn't enough for her anymore...

I'll let Taylor give you a little description of Nat. This is from the day they first meet, when Nat shows up on the farm, and Taylor is desperate for help (and all sheep farming stuff is utterly made up for now, so please forgive the blatant inaccuracies):

I was in the barn, trying to figure out how in bloody hell I was going to shear the sheep with no help, and I’ll say it now: I shouldn't have been around the sheep. Animals can tell when you’re off; they smell it and sense it on you, like oil or smoke. It’s one of the first rules of the farm and I’d known it since I was a kid, and I was busy breaking it anyway. 

At any rate, I was wrestling with a sheep when she appeared in the barn door. I wish I’d been doing something else, something stronger and calmer, but I wasn't; I had my arms wrapped around a crabby old ewe, trying to push her into the stall I’d rigged up, and she was crying out at the top of her voice and telling the whole bloody flock to run for the hills. 

“Need a hand?”

I glanced at the door and saw a person, a real live able-bodied person, and nodded. I didn't have breath left for talking. The girl came over and helped me corral the stubborn ewe into the stall; I caught a glimpse of long hair and fair skin, and an old leather jacket, and that was about all I had time for. The ewe was bucking and kicking, panicking, and I knew she’d hurt herself if I didn't let her out soon. I got her sheared as fast as I could. She was so wild she barely felt it; she kept crying out, poor thing, and as soon as I was done I kicked open the stall door and let her go. She ran for the far wall, near the water, and stood there glaring at me. 

I turned away. She’d forgive me soon enough; more likely she’d forget before she could, and would let me handle her with the same irritated patience she always had. I let the ewe be, and took a good look at my helper.

She was older than I’d first thought; there was a leanness to her freckled cheeks, and a few fine lines around her eyes, that told me she was well out of her teens and through her twenties, and stepping into her thirties. She was shorter than me, and slighter, dressed in a black motorcycle jacket and jeans so old and worn that they looked like they’d been painted on her body. Not because they were tight, but because they’d stopped trying to have their own shape, and conformed to hers instead. 

“Thanks,” I said.

“Sure.” She smiled, a flash of white teeth and brown eyes, and for the first time, but definitely not the last, I felt like I'd been blinded. Like the sun flashing off of metal, bright and too hot, when you're not expecting it. “I’m Nat, short for Natalie,” she said. She held out her hand. Her skin was soft and her hand was small in mine.

I’m not the kind of person to make bold statements. I like to keep things simple and straightforward, and I stay away from pretty language. So now I don’t know how to say what happened. I looked in her eyes, and...something happened. Something quick and bruising, like a high wind blowing or the sharp kick of a ewe’s hoof. 

“I’m Taylor,” I said. I dropped her hand like a hot stone.

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. 

A to Z Challenge: L is for Love

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).

L is for Love

Note: The excerpt here is definitely PG-13. Nothing explicit, but quite a lot suggested. Not appropriate for younger audiences! 

There are so many different kinds of love: even romantic love takes so many forms. Infatuation (as some of you recognized from that snippet I posted); obsessive love; young love; falling out of love; mature, generous love. My WIP is going to move through some of these different kinds, from Apollo's dramatic crushes in the Ancient Greek lifetime to, eventually, a truer, deeper, braver love between Nat and Taylor in the modern Australian lifetime.

That deeper love takes quite a lot of time and effort to get to, though, and there are a lot of bumps in the road along the way. Many times both of them are sure they'll never make it; in fact, they're shocked when they realize they even want to make it. Both Nat and Taylor have scars and baggage in their histories, and neither of them trusts easily.

Remember, Nat is a wanderer; she spends most of her time on the road on her motorcycle, and her affair with Taylor evolves during many visits over a long period of time. The format is always the same: she shows up at Taylor's farm without warning, stays for a while, and leaves again, without warning, over and over. Here's a snippet about one of her visits, told from Taylor's POV. In many ways, it's about the strange things we do and say when we love but are afraid, especially as our pasts get in the way. I know, it's ridiculously out of context and too long. Oh well...what are snippets for?? As always, I make no foolish promises about quality, and all standard disclaimers apply:

I was fixing fences the next time Nat showed up, months later. She rolled into the yard early one morning in a racket of rattling metal and whining gears, and took the bike right into the barn without saying a word. I heard the clatter but I was fields away, patching a rotting fence, and by the time I made it back she already had parts scattered across the floor. 

I leaned against the door and watched her work. “What’s broken this time?”

She flashed me a smile, and as always it was like squinting into the sun. “Everything,” she answered. “Of course. Stupid bloody thing.” She gave the chrome frame an affectionate pat, and then went back to work. Nothing else.

So I went back out into the fields and hammered planks into the fence with so much force that I splintered the wood, and had to go back to the shed and cut myself some new pieces, so that the whole thing took three times as long as it should have. By the time I’d finished putting away my tools, and was washing up for supper, I knew what I had to say, down to the last word. It didn't involve her staying. 

I went inside the house. “Nat?” I called, “I need to talk to you.” The whole house, though, was filled with the smell of herbs and the sizzle of fat; I walked into the kitchen to find Nat pulling a well-browned roast out of the oven. 

She blew her hair out of her eyes and gave me another brilliant smile, and said, “Perfect timing. Come and sit.”

I followed her into the dining room. There was salad and mashed potatoes and this still-sizzling roast, and glasses filled with red wine, and two places set. “I got the meat out of your freezer; I hope you don’t mind?” she asked, settling the steaming platter onto the table. “I wasn't sure if I’d have time to thaw and cook it before supper, but I managed.” 

I shook my head, and picked up a wine glass. “Ah,” she said, her eyes laughing at me, “That I brought with me. I know you don’t drink during the week but I thought I might convince you to make an exception.”

“What’s the occasion?” I asked.

“No occasion,” she said, sitting down at the table and spreading a napkin over her lap, and avoiding my eyes, “I just wanted some wine. Are you going to sit down or what?”

I did sit, and even though I knew better, I drank the wine, which was rich and strong and full of smoke, and set my head spinning. 

Nat started spooning food onto my plate. “What did you want to talk to me about?” she asked, dropping a mound of potatoes next to the giant slice of mutton in front of me. 

I watched her fill her own plate; it was the first chance I had to get a good look at her. She was thinner, too thin, her cheekbones standing out in her face, and there were heavy shadows under her eyes. “Oh. Nothing important,” I said. 

She looked up and caught me staring, and then looked back down at her plate, and she didn't ask me again. Instead, she started eating in silence, so I followed suit. I was about five bites in when she dropped her fork and gave me a look so bright I could feel the heat of it across the table, and then she grabbed my chin and kissed me. Before I knew what was happening, she was in my lap, unbuttoning my shirt. We did eat, later, but we had to reheat the food. I didn't get a chance to tell her how good it all tasted until the next day.   

The rest of those three days were just the same. She would disappear into the barn for hours at a time and couldn't spare me two words strung together, no matter what I said or asked, and then she’d come up behind me in the field, or suddenly get up from working on the bike, and have her hands inside my clothes so fast I didn't have time to blink. One time, just before supper on the third night, she came up behind me while I was washing my hands at the outdoor sink, and shoved her hand down my pants. I jumped about five feet in the air and grabbed her wrist, and turned around to face her, expecting to see her laughing, but her face was so intent and so full of naked desire that I ended up making love to her right there, where anyone driving by might have seen us. 

A to Z Challenge: B is for Bike

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).

B is for Bike

Man, what a day! Not only is it Day Two of the A to Z Challenge, but it's also the first Wednesday of the month, which means that it's time for The Insecure Writers! (For those who don't remember, it's an online group created by Alex J. Cavanaugh for writers. You, too, can join us anytime!)

I have to admit, this post is gonna be a little more A-To-Z-Challenge-ish than Insecure-Writers-ish. I mean, the title of this post is "B is for Bike", so I kind of have to go with the A To Z theme. Y'know?

Which means that today is about bikes! No, not just any bike, but a bike bike. You know, one the requires a leather jacket and an attitude and a willingness to take risks, not to mention some seriously awesome boots. In other words, a motorcycle.

You see, one of the characters in my WIP - Natalie, or Nat for short - is something of a vagabond. Nat appears in the lifetime in Australia, in the 1960s, and she spends her days driving around the country on her motorcycle. Which would have looked like a dirtier and well, crappier, version of this (HT to http://auto.howstuffworks.com/1947-triumph-speed-twin.htm for the great picture):

That, my friends, is the Triumph Speed Twin, built around 1947. At this point, a true classic, but back in the late 50s, when Nat would have bought it (highly used and in bad shape, considering her very limited budget), it probably looked more like a pile of scrap metal than this gleaming beauty.

Want to know more about Nat's wandering life, and her bike? Come back on April 16th - you know, "N" day :)