My Typos show I am real.

So, Ark Press was having a prize contest and after a whole year of knowing about this thing, I realised I had to enter, like, RIGHT NOW.

I was sitting around on the 28th of Sept and I was just starting at my pile of laundry when suddenly a story idea came to me like a Donut from Heaven and VOILA it fit in with the Ark Press Submission Prize theme. And I was all like, “But Baby Jesus, I need to keep writing WATCHER of the DAMNED because we are about to be in a knife fight…”

But Baby Jesus was super insistent that I do this thing. He was pretty serious, to be honest, but it was closing on the October 7th deadline.

So naturally I’m all like “oh sure why not, I’ve done stupider things” - and while this is TECHNICALLY true, “having done stupider things” is not a good reason for doing anything.

But “not having a good reason” has never stopped me before.

I tried writing an outline, but I really couldn’t get any farther that “somebody did something and it was awesome” , so I ate some snacks. Then I played Minecraft and then took care of some Family crises and maybe actually did some laundry.

The next day I determined to actually write. But I didn’t know what I was going to write-

and not knowing what I was going to write has never stopped me before.

But the first line just fell onto to the page with such a satisfying smack, I had to write an entire page. I could literally hear this character speaking to me, as if Mike Hammer was a Ditsy Blonde. So I wrote it, but it was first person and I’ve never written a first person story in my life, as in, a fiction novel, so I wrote two versions of the opening paragraph then called in my son to beta read for me -

and while he was doing that I played some Stardew Valley because the Calico Festival is happening and I’m all about those Calico eggs.

Now, my son actually took the great literature courses at University . He is super smart and I am but a wee bug crawling upon his tree of knowledge and he was all like “Go with the 1st person” and I was like “okay. “

So first things first. I have no computer. I have an mini iPad, a funky portable keyboard and a couch. I do not have a desk, unless you call a crochet pillow a desk. HOWEVER I do have a degenerative eye condition and that means I have to be within 18” of the display or we are all gonna die.

Surely this will turn out well.

So I asked myself “What Would Edgar Allen Poe Do?” and the answer was “Go get wasted” but that is not the appropriate answer for a MeeMee, even if she is an Author - so instead, I decided to just start writing.

THE RULES:

NO AI - that also means no spellcheck

WRITE STUFF - do it.

Okay, let’s get started.

Now, I have five dogs and one cat that thinks it is a dog living in this house, and that means they all have lots to time to demand to go outside, then immediate be let back in; goats are trying to invade my yard and I’m pretty sure there’s some kind of plague going around, as now I’ve got it.

But I already have the first like 3K words written and now I’m invested in this story. It’s a standalone prequel set in the WATCHER of the DAMNED Universe, so worldbuilding is already done.

So as soon as this ditsy dame started talking I knew I would have NO CLUE what she was going to do next - some characters just do you that way. I only knew what the opening lines were...

welp, I started writing.

Now, Days 1-4 are pretty much of a blur, The cat deleted some words, and I was starting to get a sneaking suspicion that this was a taller order than I had anticipated, as my keyboard gave up the ghost -

I was going to have to finish out a 50,000 word novel by doing hunt-n-peck on a virtual keyboard.

By Day 5, people on my socials wondered if I was dead. By Day 6 I had family members stare at me with those tragic eyes, like watching a turtle when it’s upside down; and by Day 7, I realised I had been up for 48 hours straight writing -

the last 24 hours, I had 25,000 words to write to meet the word count of 50,000.

So I decided to do it. No outline, just stream of consciousness writing coming from sweet Baby Jesus, Diet Dr. Pepper and a Bag of Takis that was starting to talk to me.

My Husband fed me, because he was afraid I would wither into nothingness. There was a lovely sammich, made with Bacon and Tomato, or perhaps I was just hallucinating but that sammich was really good.

The last ten hours before the deadline consisted of me listening to the ten hour loop of the Halo Warthog theme, set to go off by deadline.

I really like that music.

About hour 7, I still had 10,000 words to go. I was struggling just to type; and then the most wonderful scene came to me, and if you read the book, you will know EXACTLY where I was in the process. I was running, running for home - and my family was cheering me on.

The Halo music timer went off - I literally ripped SHADOWBAND out of my imaginary typewriter and woohooed at it, then popped it in-

aaaaaaaaaaand it wouldn’t go through on the submission form.

This is where the Angels came down and D. J. Butler actually saw my pitiful cries for help on X and for some reason sent me an email to use. The Dude literally saved me from a crying jag and a possible trip to lock up because by this point the children were coming in yelling at me to go to sleep and I would just babble at them…

Now, due to my terrible eyesight and my refusal to allow spellcheck to besmirch my lovely made up words, SHADOWBAND was absolutely rife with typos. This I consider to be proof that I wrote this book - and also the first million saves i made on the thing. I have the receipts. But due to the rush to deadline, it was absolutely a raw rough draft, without even the grace of a beta read from anyone anywhere, and I hadn’t had time to do my own read-through…

and the hardest thing I ever did was send it out on deadline, without any feedback or editing. Just…

BAM

Afterwards, I gave it to my daughter, and asked her to read it. Lovely AirForce Veteran that she is, she double clicked her blue pen and said she would make her notes.

I was absolutely wrecked waiting for that feedback. I couldn’t sleep, I was too nervous to eat and I looked like I had been on a liquor bender with Keith Richards. I waited… and waited…

I knew that I may not win the Wonderful Ark Prize; it may not be what they are need, or want. But when my Daughter came back in with tears in her eyes, she said; “This may be the best thing you’ve ever written” -

I knew I had a winner.

No, not because it’s actually true, although I hope it is. It’s because my Family were the ones that carried me over that finish line. Family is every thing…

and that’s exactly what SHADOWBAND ended up being about.

Sometimes the story we’re writing isn’t written on the page - it’s written on the heart.