Leo E. Walsh
My grandmother Walsh was a bit... eccentric. We grandkids show up and she'd tell us that our long-dead grandfather had visited her the previous night. Of course, I didn't, and still do not, believe in ghosts. But the "what-if he really did visit" caused me to write a short story in college.
The set-up was simple. A pregnant teacher, Peggy McLeary. visited her grandmother, Maddy O'Brien, known to Peggy as Gram. Gram speaks with ghosts of her deceased husband and his friend, a deceased African-American jazz musician Jimmy. Even though Peg sees and hears the ghost, she writes them off to her imagination.
The plot was also a bit home-spun and cozy. One of Gram's grandchildren, the drug addict Ben O'Brien, had committed suicide. Her priest had denied Ben the right to be buried on sacred soil. So Ben is buried in a municipal cemetery. Maddy has Peg transplant some perennial roots split from a border planted on her husband's grave onto a new border on top of Ben's grave.
After they're done, Peggy realizes why -- Gram was bringing sanctified soil to Ben and blessing his life on the sly. Sort of thumbing her nose at the Church.
The story earned me an A. But it sat with me. I liked the rebellious spiritual nature of it. But the style was stream-of-consciousness... you know, college boy trying to be profound, modeling himself on Pynchon and Joyce.
But after I read Alice Sebold's "The Lovely Bones" and David Mitchell's "Cloud Atlas," I realized that contemporary literature had moved on. And that plot and genre tropes were being used by serious writers to notable effect.
I realized that the story was urban fantasy -- magical realism to be exact. So I read the story again with fresh eyes, updating he style. Ditching the stream-of-consciousness and refocusing the narrative onto Ben and the grandfather's ghost, bringing in more pulp fiction elements, from crime fiction, like making Ben a top-shelf dealer for a ruthless mob family, and paranormal fantasy. Including giving Frank's jazz musician friend a Voodoo curse that he had to break. This expanded world became the novel LIVEWIRE VOODOO.
The set-up was simple. A pregnant teacher, Peggy McLeary. visited her grandmother, Maddy O'Brien, known to Peggy as Gram. Gram speaks with ghosts of her deceased husband and his friend, a deceased African-American jazz musician Jimmy. Even though Peg sees and hears the ghost, she writes them off to her imagination.
The plot was also a bit home-spun and cozy. One of Gram's grandchildren, the drug addict Ben O'Brien, had committed suicide. Her priest had denied Ben the right to be buried on sacred soil. So Ben is buried in a municipal cemetery. Maddy has Peg transplant some perennial roots split from a border planted on her husband's grave onto a new border on top of Ben's grave.
After they're done, Peggy realizes why -- Gram was bringing sanctified soil to Ben and blessing his life on the sly. Sort of thumbing her nose at the Church.
The story earned me an A. But it sat with me. I liked the rebellious spiritual nature of it. But the style was stream-of-consciousness... you know, college boy trying to be profound, modeling himself on Pynchon and Joyce.
But after I read Alice Sebold's "The Lovely Bones" and David Mitchell's "Cloud Atlas," I realized that contemporary literature had moved on. And that plot and genre tropes were being used by serious writers to notable effect.
I realized that the story was urban fantasy -- magical realism to be exact. So I read the story again with fresh eyes, updating he style. Ditching the stream-of-consciousness and refocusing the narrative onto Ben and the grandfather's ghost, bringing in more pulp fiction elements, from crime fiction, like making Ben a top-shelf dealer for a ruthless mob family, and paranormal fantasy. Including giving Frank's jazz musician friend a Voodoo curse that he had to break. This expanded world became the novel LIVEWIRE VOODOO.
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