A to Z Challenge: Z is for Zzzz...

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).

Z is for Zzzz...

Which is what I'm going to do for a nice, long time after today! Congratulations, A to Z-ers: WE MADE IT! Any bets on how many people will use the same 'word' for today's posts? I'm guessing at least two other people, personally.

Believe it or not, I do have a snippet related to this topic: it's another brandest of the brand new bits from the lifetime in India. Refresher for all newcomers (are there any at this point? If so, I salute your perseverance!); if you know all of this already, feel free to skip to the next paragraph: soul #1 is Emma, the the daughter of a British Civil Service official, living with her father in India around 1890; and soul #2 is Aryahi, Emma's mysterious new Indian maid, who doesn't act like a servant at all, is far too beautiful, and who seems much more interested in Emma's father's military intelligence than she does in cleaning the house. Oh yes, and who also happens to be an incarnation of the Hindu goddess Durga.

Today's snippet comes at a moment very early on in this story, when Emma is allowing herself a moment to rest (or 'zzzz') before she continues working on her monumental list of tasks for the day. It's a bit long, I know, but it's the LAST DAY of the challenge, so I thought, why the heck not? It really is brand new - I free-wrote it as a brainstorm a few days ago and haven't even read it again since - and I'm also experimenting with POV, with mixed results, as you'll see:

It was the third most important day of her life, but of course Emma didn't know that until many years later. Had she known, she might have dealt with the new maid quite differently; but then the future is always much clearer once it has already passed. Exactly what she would have done differently is something only Emma herself could say, and she refused to speak of the events recounted on these pages for the rest of her life.

But that was much later. On this particular day, when everything was about to begin, Emma leaned against the door frame of the parlor and allowed herself a moment of stillness. All around her, the house chattered with an urgent list of items that needed her attention; she closed her eyes, and listened instead to the city. Sound streamed through the window, bright and clear and hot as the sun: tea sellers hawking their sweet, spiced wares in strident Hindi and broken English; the clatter of wheels and hooves on the packed streets; bicycle horns; shouts and laughter and arguments in at least five different languages; in other words, all of the churn and chatter and joyful misery that was Calcutta. 

Emma told herself often that she quite liked this new life in India, and so she was surprised, that hot spring morning, to find tears of homesickness in her eyes as she rested against the door. She brushed them away with quick, impatient hands, and straightened. There was plenty more to do; no time, she thought, for mooning about London. She had thought this many times over the last few months, and would think it many more in the months to come, and indeed if she ever stopped to wonder why she had to tell herself so often not to long for England, and to enjoy her new life, she would have been quite puzzled by her own emotions. Luckily, Emma was at that time exceedingly stubborn and determined, and so blissfully ignorant of her own internal life that she was able to escape the depression and frustration that such awareness of her feelings would have brought. She therefore lived in a state of relative contentment, marred occasionally by unexplained bouts of dissatisfaction and anxiety, which naturally irked her exceedingly, but always passed. That is, she had been able to remain ignorant and content, until this exact spring day, at this exact hour, which brings us back to the reason for this story.

Emma shook herself out of her silly stupor (or so she called it), and walked briskly down the hall to her father’s bedroom, where the bedclothes had to be aired, and the windows cleaned, and the fire set for the evening, which were only the first in a long mental list of her chores for the day.

Imagine her surprise, then, when she walked through the door and found all of these tasks already completed. She stopped, frowning, until she saw the slight form kneeling by the fireplace, placing the last of the kindling in the freshly-swept hearth. Then her brow cleared.

"Good morning," she said, "You must be the new maid." 

Thanks to the very smart Nicki Elson, I realized that I forgot to add a closing statement. Oops! Here 'tis! Congratulations, A to Z-ers!! We made it! A huge THANK YOU to the creators and hosts, who I know worked much harder than everyone else - and considering how sleepy I am, that's truly amazing. You guys rock! I'll be back on my regularly scheduled Wednesday posts next week. Thanks to everyone for coming by!

A to Z Challenge: Y is for You, Only You

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).

Y is for You, Only You

Updated with new addendum at the end...

I know I may have stretched a little for yesterday's post, but today's is better. Not much better, mind you, but better.

At its heart, this novel I'm working on - and blogging about incessantly - is about love. I can't call it romance, since it doesn't really fit that genre, but it certainly has romance in it. Above all, it's about the long, as in millennia long, journey two souls undergo together.

In every lifetime, these same souls find each other, over and over and over again. And in each lifetime, they find themselves inexplicably drawn to one another, no matter how many seemingly insurmountable obstacles stand in their way, their own fears very much included. They couldn't be more different, and yet they can't find happiness without each other.

So that's today's theme, in its essence: that gut-deep feeling that the person standing in front of you is vitally important; that you are somehow connected, in ways you may never fully understand; that this person, despite all of their faults and weaknesses, belongs in your life. This person is your person, for better or worse.

It's the feeling that each soul will have, over and over again, as they look at the other soul standing in front of them: "You, only you."

The feeling exists, strong and sure, in each lifetime, but the human capacity for ignoring these feelings is endless, until at last the pain caused by this avoidance is worse than the danger of true intimacy. And there is the story.

Now, this is where the original post ended, but blogger Stephanie Faris helped me realize that this post is a bit misleading: the message of the book isn't that these souls are each other's "one and only". As I noted in a response to her excellent comment, the overall message is about overcoming fears and obstacles to be true to who we are. In this story, that's about being brave enough to love. My concept is that we get second and third and tenth and more chances, from life to life, to grow and change, and that's part of why these two souls keep ending up in a romantic situation together. I imagine that these souls always turn up in each other's lives, but not always as lovers. I hope that makes sense...

A to Z Challenge: X is for Xinjiang Fine Wool

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).

X is for Xinjiang Fine Wool

Yes, I have a perfect 'X' for today! So, Xinjiang Fine Wool are a breed of sheep. And sheep appear in not one, but TWO of the lifetimes in my work in progress, in VIWs (Very Important Ways)! TOTAL connection, right?! I feel super lucky, 'cause X might be a really tough day for people, but I'm all set with my awesome sheep!

I mean, Xinjiang Fine Wool Sheep are from China, and yeah, OK, of my two shepherds, Damon is Greek and Taylor is Australian, but still, another lifetime in this book takes place in Tibet, and Tashi's family probably has sheep, and Tibet's, like, SO close to China!

Right???

OK. I know.

I give up.

I admit it, I'm seriously reaching for a topic today, but... Well, no 'but'. I'm just reaching. I really did try to find an appropriate 'X' for today, but this was the best I could do. I wish I could tell you that tomorrow and Wednesday will be back to normal, but, um, considering that the letters are 'Y' and 'Z', they kind of won't.

But while I'm pretending that Xinjiang Fine Wool sheep have anything at all to do with my novel, I should at least give you a picture of them, right?

Here you go:

Image courtesy of http://www.sheep101.info/Images/Breeds/Xmerino1.jpg

Cute, aren't they? Now I'll have to make sure that Taylor, at least, has some sheep that are part Xinjiang Fine Wool...

A to Z Challenge: W is for Wind

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).

W is for Wind

Everything I've read about Tibet - and at this point, that's getting to be quite a list - invariably talks about the landscape, and the weather. This is understandable: when your country is nicknamed "the roof of the world", it's for some very good reasons.

Take this, for example:

Photo courtesy of http://kristof.blogs.nytimes.com/2010/07/17/the-roof-of-the-world-melting/

And this:

Photo courtesy of http://phoebettmh.blogspot.com/2011/06/tibet-roof-of-world-om-mani-padme-hum.html

And this:

Photo courtesy of http://nickykelvin.wordpress.com/2010/11/06/the-roof-of-the-world-tibet/

I mean, I can only imagine, looking at these, that the natural world plays a huge role in the life of most Tibetans.

This was the jumping-off point for my next snippet, which takes place, of course, during the Tibetan lifetime, around 600 CE. I will say that I'm not sure that this is going to make it into the book, but I'm posting it anyway, because it's about wind, and that is today's theme, after all:

It was a cut-wind day. Tashi felt it as soon as he opened the roof door, and rose into the dawn light; felt it on his hand as it held on, in the joints, the slice and cold cutting of the air. He called for his wife, and as his mouth made her name, he remembered. She died, a long time back, too long a time for the remembering to hurt. It was his duty, once hers, to wake at first light, and climb to the roof, and make the offerings.

But the wind. The wind was cutting, not a good omen. He hovered on the ladder, the top of his head just edging into the sky, and thought. It would be better, maybe, to skip the offering, and retreat into the house, and not let the wind slash him (and he laughed to think this, because his brothers – his dutiful, stupid brothers – would pale and faint to know he even dared to wonder about not lighting the fire). But then again, if it was a bad day already, he needed help. 

Tashi sighed, and forced his legs up the ladder. Hips creaking, another bad sign, maybe just age, but maybe the day, too. He lit the yak-dung as quickly as he could, shielding the sparks from the wind, and burned some dried fruit in the flame. The smoke lifted, a curling sweet-smelling flag. With the offering came the feeling better, as it always did; the warm spreading light in his limbs, the easing open of his chest. He nodded to himself, and even dared to stay on the ladder a few minutes longer, resting his arms on the roof, and watching. Watching as the other fingers of smoke rose all around him, thin black lines against the blue-ing sky and the high wall of mountains, as his family woke and climbed and prayed, and the sweetness of their offerings – barley, fruit, butter – filled the air, and softened the edge of the wind. 

He was feeling so much better that he almost didn't see it. Almost. Tashi was keen-eyed, though, always had been, and age had left his eyes alone even as it pushed down on everything else. So through the good feelings, and the ease, and the rush of color over the snowy peaks, he caught the wind in its moment of spite. A slice; a quick lashing; right at the smoke over the Big House. No more reaching finger; no more flag of offering. The smoke tattered, and wavered, and broke.

Tashi sucked in a breath and felt the cut hit his lungs, cold and sharp, and withdrew into the house so fast he almost fell off the ladder. He stood at the bottom, panting, pressing a hand to his chest; now he knew. 

It was a cut-wind day, because it was a day of death. 

A to Z Challenge: V is for Vow

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).

V is for Vow

For today's letter, we have to head back to our two souls when they're in Ancient Greece, where (and when) Apollo is busy falling in love - or at least, his definition of love - with Damon.

Before I explain what today's theme is about, I have to also explain that while I was researching and plotting this particular lifetime, I kept coming up against a character who just wouldn't go away: Artemis, Apollo's twin sister, and the virgin goddess of the moon, the hunt, and childbirth, among other things. She insisted on being involved, and who can resist a goddess?

Not me, certainly. Besides, she's Apollo's twin, and appears with him in far more myths than either of their parents (Zeus and Leto, for those who are curious) - and the mythology of twins, their bonds and relationships and stories, is nearly as rich as Greek mythology itself. Add to that the fact that Artemis is a sworn virgin who destroys any mortal man who threatens her chastity, in total contrast to her serially love-stricken twin, and you have a recipe for some slow-cooked delicious conflict.

Which brings us to vow. Remember, when we enter the story, Apollo has sworn off all love affairs, due to the regrettable fact that every single one of his affairs ends badly - death, transformation, and rejection seem to be the three main options. The key here, though, is that he has sworn them off; he's taken a vow - at Artemis's urging, and to Artemis herself - that he'll never love again.

Now, vows might not seem all that important to the Greek gods (marriage vows in particular tend to be about as binding as scotch tape), but Apollo takes his promises very, very seriously - and so does Artemis. They both believe that there are serious consequences when a vow is broken, and for a Greek god, beliefs can become manifest very, very quickly. Apollo would be the first to say that he should be punished for breaking a vow, and what Apollo thinks should happen very likely will. You might say, after all, that Apollo is a bit of a stickler for rules...

A to Z Challenge: U is for Unknown

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).

U is for Unknown

Confession time: I was totally going to fudge the letter 'U' today, and make today's topic 'Ugh, Research', which, yes, would definitely have been cheating. But, if it counts, I didn't do it! My conscience got the better of me.

Instead, I'm going to be honest and talk about what I don't know. No, not the unknown unknowns, but the known unknowns. I've spent all of the letters up until now posting about the characters and settings and themes in my WIP that I've explored, and at least started researching. Today, I'm going to talk about the one that I haven't.

You may have noticed that I keep saying that there are going to be six lifetimes for my two souls in this book, but I've really only talked about four of them: Ancient Greece, Tibet, India, and modern Australia. That's because of the other two, one - near-future London - is only hazily sketched out, and the other - pre-Columbus South America - is a big, fat I HAVE NO FREAKING IDEA. At least for London, I know who the two characters are, and how their love affair is going to take shape (the you're the last person I'd ever love plot is going to be featured pretty heavily there). South America? Nada. Zip. Zilch. All I have is a brainstorming scene I wrote months ago, and the vague idea that it's going to involve a nomad shaman who's the last remaining member of her tribe, and the young chief of a new tribe she encounters in her travels.

Which is to say, I really don't know what the heck I'm doing. South America is my giant Unknown. And that's OK, because eventually I'll start doing research and finding the story, but, well, it's just gonna be mostly left out of this particular A to Z Challenge.

Just for fun, here's the beginning of that brainstorming scene I wrote, months and months ago (and no, I'm not posting the whole thing, because a) it's too long, and b) it's literally full to the brim of stuff I just completely made up, with notes everywhere saying "research this"). This is it, guys; this is all I've got for South America, for now. I can pretty much promise that all of this, including the name, is going to change:

The rushes feel hard and cold under her skin. She presses her face into Nahuel's back and breathes in the smell of him: salt and fur, rain, and the cool edge of something metallic; all together she imagines his smell as dark, rich brown, like the earth of her childhood after a long spring soaking. The earth here is different. Dry; red; parched. Even the air feels cracked and arid, and she is never sure she isn't thirsty, no matter how much water she drinks.  

She is already wrapped around him, her breasts to his back, her knees tucked in the curl of his thighs, and her arm pressed as far around the flat planes of his stomach as possible, but she moves closer, as close as possible, and he shifts a little in his sleep. She freezes, holds her breath, until he settles against her again. Then she relaxes, just for a moment, she tells herself, and breathes him into her, again, again, over and over.

A to Z Challenge: T is for Taylor

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).

T is for Taylor

I'll preface today's post by asking you to forgive the strange grammar I'm going to use, here. I explained this at length back in November, but Taylor's gender is never revealed in the book - and indeed, I've made no decision about it one way or the other, either. I wanted to explore whether or not souls have gender, and what it means to love, and I wondered if love between souls could transcend gender. I did notice that every commenter so far has assumed that Taylor is a man, but I'm guessing that's because the love interest is a woman; if there are other reasons, though, I would love to hear them!

This decision, unfortunately, makes it not so easy to talk about Taylor in the third person...which is of course why this lifetime is told in the first person, from Taylor's own POV.

At any rate, as you all know by now, Taylor is a sheep farmer in Australia in the 1950s or 60s. Taylor lives alone, and has for many, many years; before Nat arrives, Taylor's only company were the sheep, and the neighbors, who live out of eye- and earshot, and only visit occasionally. This might sound lonely, but Taylor is a naturally solitary person, and loves this stable, predictable life. Yes, Taylor is of course our Rule Abider soul.

Needless to say, Nat comes in to this quiet life like, well, forgive the Miley Cyrus reference, but, a wrecking ball. Against Taylor's better judgement, they begin a no-strings-attached affair that should be uncomplicated and easy, and quickly becomes anything but, as Taylor realizes that not having anyone to love doesn't mean that the heart stops working altogether. It just hibernates for a while, until someone comes along and wakes it up, and then the heart finds that it's wide awake and ravenously hungry.

Things go well for a little while, until, of course, they don't. We enter their story as readers after things have gone south: Nat's gone for good - at least, that's what she said - and Taylor is desperate to find her. I'll let Taylor tell you a tiny bit about it (and once again, I'm making all of the sheep farming stuff up until I can research it, and correct it):

It all started because I was crazy enough to hire a local kid as a favor to an old friend. If I’d listened to myself, I never would have let the kid on the farm, and then when Nat came knocking I wouldn't have had a job for her, and she would have left. And that would have been the end of it. I wouldn't be here in my truck, leaving my flock at the height of the season to search for a ghost. 

But I didn't listen to myself; that was my first mistake. I ignored the kid's skinny arms and long hair, and gave him a chance. Holding sheep for shearing is no joke; a full-grown ewe can weigh more than a teenage boy, and will buck and kick and blow that boy’s shins out if he’s not careful. The kid took one look at the jostling crowd of dirty white backs, and did a runner. And left me short-handed with one thousand head of sheep to hold, shear, and cut loose. Bloody idiot. Me, that is, not the kid. 

I’m thinking about all of this because I have more time right now, sitting in my truck, than any person should have. We’re not made for driving around the country, scouring the grass for a shadow. At least, I’m not. Nat's different. In every way I can think of.