If You Like "The Forbidden Game" You Might like My Novel (minor spoilers for both works...though nothing that gives the stories away)

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The original Forbidden Game book cover I picked up over a decade ago found via google.

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Follow Me: Tattered Veils wide image art work created by Jake @ J Caleb Designs

The Forbidden Game: A series by L. J. Smith about a highschool girl Jenny who's gained the attention of an immortal being, Julian.  After many years of watching over and protecting Jenny, Julian lures her and her friends into his world through a board game.  The group needs to make it to a tower before dawn to escape his clutches, but to do so they will have to each face their own worst nightmares.  

What does this series and Follow Me: Tattered Veils share? 

Gerry, like Julian has an obsession for the protagonist, Roxi and Roxi, like Jenny, is unaware of Gerry’s obsession until he enacts his plan to capture her.  Both stories have a friend group whom the protagonist must save.  Both characters romp through a supernatural world that doesn’t seem to follow any hard and fast rules.

The better question might be why two separate books for what feels like very similar ideas?  It's hard to spell out the difference without spoiling each individual story, but I will try to hit some larger points.

Julian is portrayed in the first two books as an all powerful being.  He is far more powerful the the human protagonists.  However book three reveals Julian to be a young and far weaker member of his race.  Book three also shows that Julian, who is portrayed as lacking empathy or emotion actually has more than he revealed and is an emo kid compared to the elders of his race.  

Meanwhile, Gerry is the king of the fae.  He is the most powerful of his people and expects praise, worship, and deference as his due.  Gerry shows emotion often, it isn't alway in sync with how a human would react to a situation but he shows joy, amusement, boredom, anger, and frustration to mention a full range of emotions.  There is no emotional moment where are tearful Roxi says something like "you don't care at all do you?" and Gerry smiles and shrugs, though Julian and Jenny get this moment multiple times in their work.

Jenny and Roxi are very different characters.  Jenny's popular, has a long term boyfriend, and still in high school.  Roxi is isolated and resents the society she lives in.  Jenny is used to people and systems that work for her while Roxi is more used to fighting for things.  This creates a harder protagonists vs one who can fall weepy at times.  

Roxi is older than Jenny too.  At twenty-three she stands in the "adult" camp, though her actions indicate she has some emotionally stunted growth related to an unrevealed past.  Roxi sometimes acts with a younger character's immaturity but she never hesitates to take advantage of all the rights and privileges adulthood bestows.  She doesn't answer to parents or any other authority structure.

Jenny is attracted and repelled by Julian at the same time.  There is no romantic subplot between Roxi and Gerry.    Some of this may be a when it was written and who the works were written for situation.  There was a period in the 90s when a boy/ immortal being stalking you was considered very romantic, especially when written a certain way.  I never agreed, so I'm thankful that now we call this kind of story out for promoting unhealthy creepy behavior.

The Forbidden Game is a young adult series, a good one adults may also enjoy, but the story beats, the scares, and so on are geared for a fourteen to seventeen audience.  Follow Me: Tattered Veils is geared for a new adult audience.  The situations, scares, and story beats are all for a more mature audience.  I think if you like one series, you'll like the other too.  And I'd love to do a more detailed post comparing and contrasting all the little tidbits, but I don't want to spoil a novel I haven't released yet!  

Did you love The Forbidden Game?  Were any of these elements you loved?  If so consider picking up Follow Me: Tattered Veils when it releases in February.  Check out my website jessicadonegan.com for more details.

If You Like "The Jujene Institute" You Might like My Novel (spoilers for the game—not my novel)

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The Institute Cover art for the documentary

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Follow Me: Tattered Veils wide image art work created by Jake @ J Caleb Designs

The Jujene Institute: An alternate game that sprung up in San Francisco in 2008.  The 2013 documentary “The Institute” (youtube trailer) provides some details.  

What did this experience share with Follow Me: Tattered Veils share? 

The past three weeks I've posted childhood stories that show I have experience creating fantastic narratives others find creditable.  While I love high magic with spells, curses and fantastic beasts, I love it even more when I think all of it could be hiding just around the corner.

The experience created by the Jujene Institute encouraged those participating to question the nature of reality.  The game created a realistic modern cult.  People started "playing" by visiting an indoctrination station in an office building.  People probably weren't certain if they'd just joined a cult or started playing a game.  The Institute left clues in other real world locations, had a radio station releasing the "truth" about the Jujene Institute (otherwise known as a faction that opposed the institute), and had a missing person subplot.  The missing person is a real person and we don’t know what happened to that person.  I bow to the superiority of this art installation.  

Follow Me: Tattered Veils attempts to do something similar on a smaller scale.  By using real locations, referencing traditional myths, and creating a seasonal sense of time, I hope to create a small pocket of reality where Follow Me: Tattered Veils can co-exist with the mundane world.  In Jess’ infinite budget, there’s an alternate reality game for Follow Me: Tattered Veils, one I can’t share with audiences without spoiling the book and its planned sequel.  Trust me, it’s epic. 

As the player’s in The Jejune Institute seek the truth. the missing woman, or enlightenment (depending on the player), Roxi seeks the same ambiguous something more for herself.  Like the game has multiple aims, Roxi’s goal shifts and changes throughout the book.  Hopefully readers enjoy the chase and conclusion.   

Have you ever heard of The Jujene Institute?  Is it a game/experience you would want to play?     If so consider picking up Follow Me: Tattered Veils when it releases in February.  Check out my website jessicadonegan.com for more details.

If You Like "The O.A." You Might like My Novel (spoilers for the show—not my novel)

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promotional imagery from The O.A. found via google

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Follow Me: Tattered Veils wide image art work created by Jake @ J Caleb Designs

This is part of my Honest Comparison series.  Hopefully, it helps you decide if my novel might be something you'd enjoy reading.  Thanks for tuning in!.

The O.A. : A Netflix show featuring a female protagonist who disappeared years ago and when she resurfaces, the once blind woman can see.  Prairie, now referring to herself as the O.A. has been through something traumatic, but she won’t share with the FBI or her adopted family.  Instead, she recruits four highschool students and a teacher whom she tells her story to and asks they help her save four other captives she left behind.  Teeming with supernatural, scifi, and fantasy elements, the show is a slow burning mystery told at the survivor’s pace.

What does this series and Follow Me: Tattered Veils share? 

Follow Me: Tattered Veils and The O.A. season one share a slow burn full of tension.  Both stories unfold at the protagonist’s pace instead of the viewer’s desired speed or the speed the surrounding cast may prefer.  The O.A. and Roxi make readers wait for it, but the release is all the sweeter because of the building.

Both the O.A. and Roxi have spiritual and esoteric knowledge the world around them doesn’t value.  As their respective stories unfold, their knowledge gains value, and becomes the key to their ability to survive their situations.  

Both The O.A. and Roxi share stories of strife and survival against all odds.  Their antagonists have an insidious obsession with them and even when they break free of these men’s power, the men refuse to leave them alone.  Questions of stalking, possession, and the toxicity of the male gaze are rife in the narrative.

Lastly both stories use established myth as a connecting foundation.  Even though views consider these myths and not truths in their lives, the audiences' familiarity with the original myth helps to build credibility and a sense of realism to the experiences the O.A. and Roxi go through.  Like an urban legend one might debate the validity of because a cousin's friend once said something like that happened to them, these old myths help ground the fantastic and bring it into the realm of possible.   The O.A. uses angelic myths and after life experience stories to weave it’s narrative.  Follow Me: Tattered Veils uses a collection of Italian, Greek, and Irish mythology to grow its own story.

Did you love The O.A.?  Were any of these elements you loved?  If so consider picking up Follow Me: Tattered Veils.

Still unsure about purchasing my novel? Check out  Lost Girl Comparison and American Gods Comparison for more context.

Looking for more posts about the writing and publishing process?  Check out more posts on my novel publication process: Going Through Copy Edits, 1st Daft vs 2nd Draft, Goal Planning: Getting Through the First Draft, My Character Looks Nothing Like My MC, Cover Art: Turth in Advertising, and Post Book Launch: Reflections.  

Want to know more about my novel?  Check out my childhood stories recapping themes in my life I hope prepared me to write this book: Remember the Magic of Santa?, Closet Monsters: Gone too Far?, and Garden Gnomes and other Evils.

Need an introduction to Roxi Starr? Here's her performing an Imbolc ritual to help whet some appetites.

MY BOOK IS AVAILABLE AT AMAZON!!!  Please go look at "Follow Me: Tattered Veils" and see if it might be a story that interests you.

And for updates please check out jessicadonegan.com and subscribe.

If You Like "Lost Girl" You Might like My Novel (spoilers for the show—not my novel)

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Lost Girl, a promotional image found via google images. 

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Follow Me: Tattered Veils wide image art work created by Jake @ J Caleb Designs

This is part of my Honest Comparison series.  Hopefully, it helps you decide if my novel might be something you'd enjoy reading.  Thanks for tuning in!.

Lost Girl: A supernatural drama tv show spanning five seasons from 2010 to 2015.  The show features a female protagonist, Bo, moving constantly to hide from her past.  First episode she discovers she’s a fae (specifically a succubus) and part of a secret magical society living alongside humanity.  Bo struggles to understand the rules of this new society and find her place in either a human or fae society.  Throughout the seasons Bo gains friendships and loyalties of many around her.  These relationships teach Bo more nuances in fae society but also set her on a path to seek a more just and fair system for all fae and humans. For more details check out the Wikipedia article.

What does this series and Follow Me: Tattered Veils share? 

A surprising amount.  I found this show in 2015 and was hooked.  There is so much in it I want in my media (and therefor was building into my novel).  If you're looking for an urban fantasy with attitude and heart, I can't recommend Lost Girl enough.

Both works feature a strong female protagonist who embraces both “feminine wiles” and more physical strength as needed.  Bo, as a succubus is far more sexual than Roxi, where Roxi relies more on brute force.  It’s unexpected for a petite woman in heels to punch first and ask questions later and Roxi takes full advantage of this surprise to spend less time with people she’s decided aren’t worth oxygen.  I love that both Bo and Roxi are honest in their relationships and don't hesitate to let others know when they've crossed a line.

Bo and Roxi both start their journey as outsiders.  They've decided various aspects of the society they live in are stupid or unjust, and neither have the patience to work "within the system" for change.  Instead both choose to live outside the prescribed social system.

Both characters struggle to connect with others around them.  The two tend to pick up "strays" or fellow disenfranchised people/fae, become protective of these people, and then strive to make changes in their respective worlds for these people they've begrudgingly come to care for.  

Both Follow Me: Tattered Veils and Lost Girl have dramas focused on many various kinds of fae.  Lost Girl fleshes out the fae using different categories and names to explain why some fae are sensitive iron and others song.  If Follow Me: Tattered Veils were a longer format, it would also categorize fae and explaining the contrary reactions some fae have to the same stimulus.  Since it’s a single novel, it leans in too many fae myths and hints at elements more explicit in Lost Girl.

Lost Girl takes place in a modern Canadian suburb and Follow Me: Tattered Veils takes place in Huntsville, AL.  Both the tv show and my novel incorporate today’s technology.  Our versions of fae embrace the new tech as human counterparts have.  Instead of magic “breaking” technology, the two work together to build on the character’s strengths and weaknesses.  Allowing technology and magic to blend is rarer in the urban fantasy genre, but can lead to unique and interesting results.

Did you love Lost Girl?  Were any of these elements you loved?  If so consider picking up Follow Me: Tattered Veils when it releases in February.  Check out my website jessicadonegan.com for more details.

Haven't seen Lost Girl yet but want to now?  Check it out at Amazon or Netflix

Haven't decided if "Follow Me: Tattered Veils" is right for you? Here's: American Gods Comparison, and The O.A. Comparison.

Looking for more posts about the writing and publishing process?  Check out more posts on my novel publication process: Going Through Copy Edits, 1st Daft vs 2nd Draft, Goal Planning: Getting Through the First Draft, My Character Looks Nothing Like My MC, Cover Art: Turth in Advertising, and Post Book Launch: Reflections.  

Want to know more about my novel?  Check out my childhood stories recapping themes in my life I hope prepared me to write this book: Remember the Magic of Santa?, Closet Monsters: Gone too Far?, and Garden Gnomes and other Evils.

Need an introduction to Roxi Starr? Here's her performing an Imbolc ritual to help whet some appetites.

MY BOOK IS AVAILABLE AT AMAZON!!!  Please go look at "Follow Me: Tattered Veils" and see if it might be a story that interests you.

And for updates please check out jessicadonegan.com and subscribe.

Honest Comparison: Pitching a Book When You Have Too

photo of koi at Big Spring Park taken by me 

I’ve long disdained elevator pitches.  “It’s like if  The Shining and Anne of Green Gables had a love child.” *eye roll*. 🙄

“Why can’t your story ever be new?  Why do you always have to copy something else?” I thought.  

It never occurred to me that writers create something new and then try to come up with comparisons.  But here I am, a little over a month from publishing Follow Me: Tattered Veils and I have a new perspective on comparing one work to another.  

First off, I’ve realized that many (perhaps most) people start with an idea, create said thing, and then go back to find something successful they can link it too (or at least that’s what I’ve done).    I’m not trying to ride something else’s coattails, I’m trying to draw in an audience who enjoys stuff like what I’ve made.  One way to help people know if they’ll like the book, is to compare it to stuff they are already familiar with.  

Right now I have 9 works—10 if I stretch that I could compare elements of Follow Me: Tattered Veils  to.  Over the next few months, I’ll going to drop these comparisons here on my blog to help readers know “do I want to read this?”  

This is my first time pitching my book to a general audience, and I’m apprehensive about it.  I feels pretentious to compare my debut novel to some of these amazing works, and I worry my book comes out lesser when I place it next to something else.   

I worry about spoiling my book and the thing I’m comparing.  How much information is too much?  

Last, I don’t want to be too commercial.  I want to scream “I’ve got a book and you should buy it“ from the rooftops all day every day.  I’m that proud.  However, I’m also really sensitive to this idea I might annoy people or over saturate a small group of supporters with what feels like adds.  

So I am posting these comparisons in between other content and I’ve written this small burb explaining what I’m doing and why.  I feel the thin line between too much advertising and pointing people to something they might like is being stretched more all the time.

Talk to me!  How do you/did you find the right audience for your work?  What do you think of elevator pitches?  How do you construct them (if you do)?

Want to jump right into the creative works that have some similarities to mine? Check out: Lost Girl Comparison, American Gods Comparison, and The O.A. Comparison.

Looking for more posts about the writing and publishing process?  Check out more posts on my novel publication process: Going Through Copy Edits, 1st Daft vs 2nd Draft, Goal Planning: Getting Through the First Draft, My Character Looks Nothing Like My MC, Cover Art: Turth in Advertising, and Post Book Launch: Reflections.  

Want to know more about my novel?  Check out my childhood stories recapping themes in my life I hope prepared me to write this book: Remember the Magic of Santa?, Closet Monsters: Gone too Far?, and Garden Gnomes and other Evils.

MY BOOK IS AVAILABLE AT AMAZON!!!  Please go look at "Follow Me: Tattered Veils" and see if it might be a story that interests you.

And for updates please check out jessicadonegan.com and subscribe.

My 2020 Writer's Goals

image from publicdomainvectors.org 

I have my own mental and physical calendar that is different from the traditional western yearly calendar.  My system allows me to reflect on the close of last year and to structure my plans.  If my goals appear more thought out than yours, know I’ve been meditating on them and planning what they are and how I’ll measure them for 50-ish days. 

1.   1.  Launch my debut novel Follow Me: Tattered Veils. While I often treat this as a fait accompli, it’s far from that.  I’m still creating blog posts and considering what kind of author media I need. Even after the book becomes available for purchase, there are some blog posts and little extras I want to include as a “read along” style content.

2.   2.   Complete the first draft of both Follow Me: Gods and Monsters and Cress Legacy (working title).  Both are novel length projects with some word count already invested.  I imagine I’ll need 130,000 more words to complete both.  Given my calendar structure I need to write about 3,000 fiction words a week.  I’m most concerned with achieving these draft goals.

3.    3.  Co-teach “Hello World and Introduction to Creative Writing” with Ashley once and finish all PowerPoints and course material for “Aggressive Self-Editing” with a possible course run in July/August?

4.   4.   Weekly blog posts going into the release of “Follow Me: Tattered Veils” and bi-weekly posts after its release.  Remember I write for 2 blogs.  That means I will still have a new post up every week, but I will change which blog I’m posting in.  I am reducing production goals to improve consistency.

5.    5.  Social media circus has to come back up.  Each week I will dedicate 2 hours to Twitter, an hour to Facebook and an hour to Instagram.   I don’t have a consistent schedule, so I will have to change the days and times I provide for each.

6.    6.  Reading and reviewing books.  There are 44 weeks in my calendar year, I think it’s appropriate to read 44 books or a book a week.  And I’m committing to 1/3 of those books being in either my genre (fantasy/urban fantasy) or being independently published works. 

Talk to me!  What are your 2020 goals?  Do you have any advice on how I can achieve my own plans?

Want to see more?  Check out my 2019 writing goals and my 2019 wrap up. 

Curious as to how I plan to achieve these goals?  Check out my post on how to create realistic 1st draft goals here.  I also have a post on how Habitica, an online fantasy goal tracker can help and I have one more post reviewing my own personal planning system.

Want to see my year in books?  I have my 2019 year here and my top 5 for 2018 along with a full detail list of 2018.  For more what on what I'm reading, check out my GoodReads profile.  

Garden Gnomes and Other Evils

Emma, Jessica, and Kyle.  Photo taken by Elena Lewis.

It scared me to go to my great grandmother’s house.  Her home was clean and silent, which unnerved me, but the true terror awaited me in her gardens.  She had lush vibrant flowers I enjoyed exploring, but waiting in those flower beds was something old and malevolent.

Garden gnomes.

Before Travelosity, before Gnomeo and Juliet, and before R. L. Stine, I knew the true depth of depravity in these ceramic figurines.  I’ve always suspected figurines with humaniod forms, but unlike my dolls or horses, these gnomes were taller than me and had small squinty eyes, pointy ears and hats, and it was always pointing and laughing with its white teeth.  What was so funny and why did the thing need teeth?  It was alive and coming to get me.

When my great grandmother passed, my mother brought the gnomes home and put them in our gardens.

Seems simple as an adult, but as a child these gnomes materializing was a nightmare.  One morning my home was free and then our gardens were contaminated with the spectral evil I knew they held in their stone hearts.  All this time my great grandma had protected me from them, appeasing them and keeping them on her lawn, but with her gone, they were here and going to kill me!

I wasn’t going down without a fight, though.  I gathered my sister and brother and we launched a full war campaign against the ugly invaders.  We threw rocks at them.

When they didn’t retaliate, we got bolder.  My sister and brother would load up in the peddler car and I‘d ram them into the gnome, hoping to knock it down.  They would flail their arms and scream, stuck staring at the killer’s dead eyes. I fled from the scene screaming how it would get us.  They would remember how to use the peddle car doors and escape the staring contest.  We spent hours roping the car away from the gnome and start the process again.  Slowly, the thing crumbled. Sweet victory.

Except, my mother loved her great grandmother’s gnomes.  She did not understand why it deteriorated—could it be acid rain?—but she would preserve them.  While we napped, she would glue the gnomes back together.

Words can not express the doom we felt when we woke from nap time to find the garden gnome whole again.  Before, there’d been a chance the gnome wasn‘t a living creature— I was known to have a wild imagination—but after the gnome regenerated?  And if there’d been a chance for peace between gnomes and children, it was long gone.  How could it want anything but our demise after all the times we’d torn it down?  It was him or us and he seemed poised to win.

But how does this gnome saga end?  Eventually our nightmares built and my mother learned about our campaign against garden gnomes and our all amorphous childhood fears of stone golems coming to life in the night and “getting us.”  She laughed.  We all laugh about it now.

Except I also tear up when I tell this story, because terror that bone deep marks a person.

What does this have to do with “Follow Me: Tattered Veils”?  My battle with garden gnomes went on for months.  For a child this was a brutal war of attrition.  Seasons changed and our enemy remained laughing and menacing.  I had the stamina as a child to face this horror.  My capacity to stare down all that terrifies me grew as I’ve aged.  Unshaped consequences that made me quake as a youth still live in dark corners of my mind just outside my ability to grasp.  Linger with me and face the unnamed possibility.

And ask: if a sheltered innocent child could inspire months of imaginative nightmares, what might a more worldly adult produce?

Like this post and want more?  Check out here where I reminisce over that time in our lives where we still believe in Santa. Or look at the terror a closet monster can add to one's childhood here.

Like this, there's a whole series!  Check out  Remember the Magic of Santa? and Closet Monsters: Gone too Far? for more childhood stories. ^_^

Looking for more posts about the writing and publishing process?  Check out more posts on my novel publication process: Going Through Copy Edits, 1st Daft vs 2nd Draft, Goal Planning: Getting Through the First Draft, My Character Looks Nothing Like My MC, Cover Art: Turth in Advertising, and Post Book Launch: Reflections.  

Want to know more about my novel?   Check out my series where I find similarities between my novel and other popular media.  Hopefully it gives you a better idea whether there are elements in my book you may enjoy.  Lost Girl Comparison, American Gods Comparison, and The O.A. Comparison.

MY BOOK IS AVAILABLE AT AMAZON!!!  Please go look at "Follow Me: Tattered Veils" and see if it might be a story that interests you.

Want more information?  Check out my website jessicadonegan.com and subscribe for updates.

Closet Monsters: Gone Too Far?

Jessica, Emma, Maurice, and Kyle going on a floom ride.  Photo taken by Elena Lewis.

Remember when the closet monster was a real prospect?  There are many varieties of the beloved creature.

First is the tidy child’s monster.  Their closet door presses shut, but somehow in the shadowed night, the door looms like a dark doorway, waiting for brave children to traverse to a realm of unspeakable horror.  

Next is the messy kid’s monster.  They shove their toys into the closet at the last minute, and the door never quite closes.  Frustrating in the day when they try to convince their guardians the room is clean and can they please go out and play.  At night, the door gapes open, a toothless maw.  The dark beyond is bottomless, any evil could await them.  

Third is the run down home’s monster.  This closet door never fully shuts.  Maybe the hinge isn’t lined up or maybe the door lost its latch.  No one cares about the why.  These children go to bed with a closed closet door, secure in their knowledge that nothing will harm them and wake up for water or to use the restroom, to an open door.  They race for the light and throw the switch like a medic to a defibrillator.  The world is incandescent, but it’s too late.  Something old and terrible lingers.  No light or company will ever make what crawled out of the closet go back in.  Creaky floorboards are its footsteps, drafty windows become its breath.  Whatever that thing is, it’s living in your house now, and there’s no way to exorcise it.  

The closet monster fascinated me.  How did it creep in at night and why did so many children assume it fled in the morning?  Does light hurt its skin like a vampire?  Does it sleep during the day like a bat?

And what did the monster want?  Was he guarding something on the other side of the darkness?  Did he eat socks, is that why I could never find matching pairs?

“Oh no,” my uncle told me, “he just wants to get you.”  

“Get me?” I asked. 

“Yeah you know, take kids.  He got my younger brother,” he said.

“No you’re the youngest brother!  Everyone says so,” I said. 

My uncle shrugged. 

“Yeah, now I am,” he said with a wink.

My siblings and I were hooked.  Yes, the closet monster lived in everyone’s home, but my grandparents' home, became its main den.  When we were there, we hunted it in cupboards, basements, and closets.  Why, because there was a missing uncle we might save.  Even if that uncle was long gone, we could at least “get” the monster back and keep it from ever taking another child.  Bring the fight to its home and all those great metaphors.  As eldest, I was good at rallying the younger ones to a worthy campaign.

And my uncle played his part.  He’d hide in basements and closets waiting for us and then roar and grab us.  We’d charge the monster and hit it or kick at it and he’d let the trapped sibling go and we’d run out, believing we’d narrowly escaped the monster’s clutches.  

As I grew older, and began to understand the game we were playing, I added new rules to keep my siblings believing for longer.  We would use flashlights and “light” formations to keep the monster back.  In reality, my uncle couldn’t sneak up on us if we all used our flashlights together, but the reasoning I gave was that the monster’s eyes were photo-sensitive.  The light blinded it, giving us time to move past it.  

When one of my siblings would doubt the closet monster’s existence, I’d dare them to go in alone to the closet.  There in the dark my uncle would shake clothes hangers and growl, stomping closer and further away.  The terrified sibling would go to the door and try to open it, only to find it stuck closed (I was barricading the door).  

They’d scream and plead for help and I’d say things like: 

“It’s sealed the doors, I can‘t open them!  I think it’s mad you don’t believe!  Quick say you believe in it before it gets you, maybe then the door will open!”  

My sister or brother always agreed. 

“I believe, I know you‘re real, I’m sorry, please!”

And I’d let them out.  We’d go eat cake, because sweet things help you recover and then we’d play in the sprinkler, because the monster can’t get you outside.  It hates fresh air.   

So how do I capture this dark childish terror for adult readers in “Follow Me: Tattered Veils?”  Instead of using an uncle to help make the monsters more real, I use old myths.  Stories told and retold in many time periods with different players but the same over reaching themes.  Hear the same story enough but different people and anyone will wonder— is this real?

And I use humanity’s limited scope of empathy.  I terrified my siblings, not just with stories of monsters, but actions that validated those fears.  I thought nothing of this fun game, but there was casual cruelty in the act.  We all carry a thoughtless capacity to scar each other.

Lastly, I use the closet monster himself.  Because the fathomless darkness where all kinds of good or evil could spawn lives in my heart and I think it might live in your heart too.  Don’t we all have a certain wardrobe we think might take us to Narnia or a certain set of words we think will release Bloody Mary?  “Follow Me: Tattered Veils” lives in a world where we investigate the wardrobe or we say the right words.  The roads to different possibilities open and I hope you’ll walk one of them with me.  

Like this, there's a whole series!  Check out  Remember the Magic of Santa? and Garden Gnomes and other Evils for more childhood stories. ^_^

Looking for more posts about the writing and publishing process?  Check out more posts on my novel publication process: Going Through Copy Edits, 1st Daft vs 2nd Draft, Goal Planning: Getting Through the First Draft, My Character Looks Nothing Like My MC, Cover Art: Turth in Advertising, and Post Book Launch: Reflections.  

Want to know more about my novel?   Check out my series where I find similarities between my novel and other popular media.  Hopefully it gives you a better idea whether there are elements in my book you may enjoy.  Lost Girl Comparison, American Gods Comparison, and The O.A. Comparison.

MY BOOK IS AVAILABLE AT AMAZON!!!  Please go look at "Follow Me: Tattered Veils" and see if it might be a story that interests you.

Want more information?  Check out my website jessicadonegan.com and subscribe for updates.