Jeri Smith-Ready is the author of numerous romantic and urban fantasies for adults and is set to publish her first foray into YA fiction next month. Today, she joins us with the first of three guest blogs for a behind-the-scenes peek at her debut teen novel, SHADE, out on May 4th.
Thanks to Teenreads.com for having me on your fantastic blog! I’ll be doing a three-part “behind-the-scenes” look at the creation (and re-creation) of my upcoming YA debut, SHADE. The second installment will appear here on April 23, and the final post will go up on May 4, the date of SHADE's release. I hope you enjoy this peek inside my head during the birth and nurture of a novel-in-progress. WARNING: it’s not always pretty! If you want to believe that writing is a neat, steady, completely sane process, you should probably avert your eyes. But if you enjoy a reminder that authors struggle with novels just as much as students struggle with term papers, then read on!
First, a little background to set the stage:
In the world of SHADE, everyone born since the moment of the Shift (almost seventeen years ago) can see ghosts. Aura, the first of the “post-Shifters,” is searching for a way to reverse the Shift and make the spirits go away forever. Then her boyfriend Logan dies and becomes a ghost.
I built a proposal for a series called Generation Ghost around this basic idea. The proposal --- which consisted of a synopsis and the first three chapters of Book One --- was bought by Simon Pulse in December 2008. After dancing on the ceiling for a week, I sat down to write the rest of the book. Months later, I finished a pathetically rough first draft and sent it to my intrepid critique partners.
Then I proceeded to brood. I puttered around the house, thinking, meh, the book is okay, but not great. The ghosts are too harmless. There aren’t even any major drawbacks to being a ghost, other than not being at peace.
The manuscript wasn’t dark enough, big enough, scary enough for my tastes. I write urban fantasy, a genre in which the world itself is often at stake. Generation Ghost Book One needed to be kicked up a notch, but I didn’t know how.
Meanwhile, my publisher asked me to come up with a new title. I made a list of approximately 30,000 possibilities, but my favorite by far was Shade. “Shade,” of course, is another word for “ghost” and was a term used in Greek mythology to describe the restless, miserable spirits in the underworld. But most importantly, it sounded cool.
I thought maybe the spirits would be called “shades” instead of “ghosts.” A slight improvement, but not what I needed. So I kept thinking. And brooding. And staring at the walls.
And then…I was making breakfast one morning (egg ‘n’ cheese on a bagel)…when it hit me:
Shades could be another kind of ghost. The bad kind.
The ideas began to snowball, almost faster than I could type them up: Shades are what ghosts become when they stay too long or get too bitter. Unlike ghosts, who glow violet, shades turn to black, so they can hide in the dark. Unlike ghosts, who can only retrace their life’s footsteps, shades can travel anywhere. They can make post-Shifters sick and dizzy, even causing them to fall down stairs or wreck their cars. Worst of all, shades can never pass on to a place of peace.
And without Aura’s love, Logan could become a shade.
Now we’re talkin’! I thought. I just have to rewrite the entire book to incorporate this new threat. In three weeks.
I couldn’t have done it without countless e-mails and phone calls to my critique partners, who kept asking, “Well, what about this?” or “Have you thought about that?” or “You have how many days before this is due? Shall I order you some intravenous coffee?”
Each time I create another novel, I relearn certain lessons. First, never be satisfied with a first draft. It’s just a starting point, not an end point or even a middle point.
Second, I’m reminded again and again that bright ideas, even those that seem to strike like lightning from a clear blue sky, are actually the result of many hours of work and thought and frustration. Only that last moment --- when the brain hears a click and the eyes open wide in amazement --- feels like a miracle.
Next time we meet, I’ll tell you how and why Aura’s mom became her aunt, three days before the book was due. Meanwhile, I would love it if you left a comment or a question for me here, or visited me at my website, on Facebook, or on Twitter.
Happy reading!
-- Jeri Smith-Ready
