So what is going on with my first novel?  For those of you who have been following me on the progress of this book, I am pleased to say that I have finished editing the story.  I have recently emailed the story to Tricia McDonald, a friend of mine who has published three books, and owns Splattered Ink Press.  If you haven’t checked out her work, I suggest that you do.  Her work can be found here and I talk about them in my book reviews.  Now Tricia is going to be editing my story.  Knowing how experienced she is, I know that she’ll do a good job on it.

For those of you who have not been following me on the progress of my book or are new to this site, welcome.

First, let’s talk about this site since a lot of you don’t know what the purpose of it is.  The purpose of this site is for me to display my work in an open and honest way.  I have posted short stories, numerous creative writing pieces.  movie reviews and book reviews.

If you are observant, you would notice a link that would take you to something unrelated to this site.  This was Walker on Politics, something that I decided to discontinue for obvious reasons.  There’s not much to see there.  Just my attempt at critiquing politics.  I didn’t like it after a while, so I stopped.  In fact, this site used to be called Walker on Politics, if you could believe that.

But I’m not one to dwell on the past.  Two main things worth noting are the following pages:

Think & Write

These are creative writing exercises that I decided to start, since I was experiencing writer’s block at the time.  Just 10 minutes of creative writing and I had something on my site for the day.  Some of them would make very good ideas while others are just trash.  Some are very imaginative, while others can be strange and bizarre.  If you check out Think & Write #100, there’s a “directory”  that has the first 100 Think & Writes indexed.  Over time, I decided to stop doing these, since I felt that my writer’s block was cured.  Having that said, I suggest that you check them out.

Me & My Muse

This is something new that I decided to start.  It’s pretty much my attempt to combine two things that you never see together:  journaling and creative writing.  It’s an experiment, if you will.  What I do is talk about a certain topic.  It can be about something happening in my day.  At some point during the discussion, my Muse interrupts me.  Hilarity ensues.  Maybe more wit than hilarity, but I’ll leave that up to you to decide.

So who is this Muse?  It’s pretty much my creativity personified.  She can be pretty predictable and shallow.  She’s the comic relief for this series and is very out there because of her creative nature.  She thinks that she’s funny, but that’s her own Achilles heel.  My Muse is pretty much a character that I designed with no boundaries.  She’s spontaneous,  shallow, naive, immature and obnoxious at times.  But she’s creativity.  And creativity cannot be restrained or harnessed (unless she’s in my head).  This, of course, is only demonstrated in the first 100 entries.  After Day 100, the truth is revealed.

At the end, she normally goes back inside my head, where she belongs.  Looking at this series, I really see it as something that I want to improve over time.  I haven’t gotten all the bugs out yet, so bare with me.  But if you read after Day 100, I’m getting pretty close.  I feel that everything after 100 is where this series really begins.  The first 100 were purely experimental, while the later entries more closely reflect where I want to go with this concept.  You will like the Muse a lot more after Day 100.  Trust me.

Now that I talked about the site, let’s return to my progress on this book, which was the purpose of this post in the first place.  For those of you who are new to this site, you’re probably wondering what this book is about.  What is the Tale of Zachary Willowbrook?

The Tale of Zachary Willowbrook is a biographical story about a boy named Zachary.  For the longer version,  I talk about the book here.

Here’s the cliff notes version of Zachary Willowbrook.  He is a boy that was born on February 29th.  And for some bizarre reason that the book never explains, Zachary ages one year for every four years.  So in one year, he would only age three months.

So this story is about Zachary, and how he’s treated because of his gift.  His parents and family will treat him well, of course.  His brother, sister, mom, dad, relatives and friends.  But how will the world treat him?  With Zachary’s gift, he’ll be able to live four times longer than the average person.

While the story was originally intended to be one book, I made it into a trilogy since it was too long to be one book.

The first book, The Tale of Zachary Willowbrook: A Leap Day Paradox is about Zachary’s earlier days, from birth to early childhood.

The second book, The Tale of Zachary Willowbrook: The School Years is about Zachary’s experience at school from his early school years, all the way through his college years.

The third book has no working title yet, but it will cover Zachary’s adult years all the way to his death.

An interesting fact about this story that’s worth noting is that the idea to write this story actually came from a Think & Write (Think & Write #23) and it can be found here.

Getting back to my first book,  I mentioned that I finished the editing process and that my writing friend was looking at it.  After I receive everything back from her,  I will work on a second draft.  I will let you know when that is, and will keep you updated on that.

If any of you have a creative writing blog that you would like to share, please post a link to it in the comments.  If you found this from a creative writing forum, I will look for your blog there.  What I want to do is start linking to other writing blogs, so that there’s more variety, and more traffic.

That’s about it for updates.  If you are new, enjoy this site and check out the different sections if you haven’t already.  If you’re a returning visitor,  I hope to see you again.  But whoever you are, just be sure to wipe your feet on the mat.

Follow me on Twitter to stay updated on the progress that I’m making on my writing projects.  Also click the like button.  You know you wanna…. 🙂

Besides that, just make yourself comfortable here.  You’re always welcome at the Estate.

The long and laborious errand of editing over 90,000 words of manuscript.  While I have already edited the first two chapters, I managed to edit the third one tonight.  With there being 28 chapters in this book, this is barely scratching the surface.

I’ll keep you all updated on my editing progress, and maybe even post a couple “samples”.

Until then, stay tuned and stay cozy at the Walker Estate….

My first book, The Tale of Zachary Willowbrook: A Leap Day Paradox is finished!  Well, the rough draft, at least.  I just finished it last night.

Now comes the fun part.  Editing over 200 pages of manuscript.  I might throw up a couple of sample chapters in the meantime.

This is going to take a while…..

But yay again!  I’m finished!  🙂

Did he really fall off the face of the earth?

No.  I’m still here.  🙂

I am still hard at work on the last chapter (or chapters, when it’s actually edited).

To all who actually still come here, I commend you.  Be patient.  It will be well worth the wait….

I’m still working on the last chapter.  Just hang in there, everyone!

I haven’t forgotten about this estate.

Trust me….

The Tale of Zachary Willowbrook: A Leap Day Paradox is nearly finished. The first part of it, at least, as this will be the first part of three.  The second part will focus on Zachary’s school years and the final part will focus on Zachary’s adult years.

With that, I am satisfied with the progress I am making on this story, and I hope to have the first part done soon.

More updates in the future!

But it might be a little longer before it can be looked at and edited.  In the meantime,  I will continue working on The Tale of Zachary Willowbrook: A Leap Day Paradox.

Please, bare with me for now….

For those of you who are unaware of what I have been working on lately,  it’s time that I inform all of you.

I have been working on a novel since August, so I feel that the time is long overdue to share with the world my most recent project.

Before I get to the project, perhaps you all would like to know what this story is about.  I’m glad that you asked.  Even if you didn’t, I’m going to tell you anyway.

To all who ever has undergone the long and perilous journey of parenting, I commend you.  Parenting may be old or new to you, depending on your age.  You may either be a new parent, an older parent, or even someone who hasn’t even thought about parenting yet.

Wherever you are in that journey, or if you are even on that journey at all, most of us can generally agree that parenting can be a very rewarding experience.  This is especially true when they’re all grown up.

With parenting comes the lack of choice.  None of us can choose the kind of kids that we have.  Furthermore, none of us can even decide whether our kid is normal or not.  For the kids that aren’t normal, they have some kind of disability.  Whether it’s a physical one or a mental one, these children are to be loved all the same.  They are the “special” children, and they are to be treated as such.  Not in a condescending way, but in very much the same way that a normal child is treated.

Now whether or not you even have a child, imagine this scenario.  You have just found out that you have a new child.  This child is a boy, and he has a rather unique disability.  Not satisfied?  Too bad.  I’m the one deciding the scenario, not you.

Continuing with the scenario, a lot of you are probably wondering what kind of disability this child has.  With your child having just been born, you’ll have to wait until he gets older.

To make this scenario more interesting, let’s say that your child was born on February 29th.  That would mean that you had this child last year.  In another month, your child will be a year old.

But what about the disability?  That’s the thing.  With your child being nearly a year old, he doesn’t look any older than three months.  Congratulations.  You now have a child with an aging deficiency, and he’s  the only one in the world that has that problem.  This is the premise for my latest project – The Tale of Zachary Willowbrook: A Leap Day Paradox.

The scenario is pretty much what the story is about.  The mother has a baby boy named Zachary.  Over time, she finds out that Zachary is not an ordinary child.  With Zachary being born on February 29th, he doesn’t age as fast as we do.  For every four years that we age, he only ages one year.  Is the date of Zachary’s condition coincidental?  I’ll leave that up to you to decide.

The story is about a family coming to terms with the differences that Zachary has as a person and learning to accept them.  By family, I am referring to the Willowbrook Family.  The mother, the father and Zachary’s two younger siblings, which will remain a surprise for now.

Now Zachary’s condition in the present is pretty minor.  His parents can raise him and support him.  In the future, however, Zachary’s condition will pose some major circumstances.  Zachary will outlive his parents, his siblings, his grandchildren and even his great-grandchildren.

For a preview on this story, I would check out my “Think & Write” titled The Gift of Time. Click there and it will take you to that story.  This is the “Think & Write” that inspired me to write this novel.  I have put a lot of work into it, and I hope to have the first part done soon.  With over 44,000 words, I have discovered that I have a lot to say about Zachary and the wonderful family that he has.

As for the new “Think & Writes”,  I’ll have more up as I’m inspired with new ideas.  For the new ones, don’t expect them to be like the previous edition.  I feel that the first edition was purely experimental and served as a way to express my creative ideas.  Over time, I feel that the form has completely changed from “Think & Write #1”, and is now shifting towards something of greater quality.  I feel that a more polished piece of writing will be a better thing to look at than all of my second-rate drafts.  While they have achieved my purpose, I don’t think they achieve yours.  I also feel that having too many stories will overwhelm any newcomers.

For any of my stuff, just stay tuned.  And I’ll let you know how my Zachary story is doing.