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 This is a continuation of my blogging here at WdC |
| Novel #23 Next on the journey came a novella called Valentine’s Day, which is a thriller about a girl exacting revenge on those who had wronged her in love, while being tracked by her best friend whom she secretly loves, but who starts an affair with his female room-mate. It is a different tone of writing for me, it’s just too short at 26000 words to go anywhere. Having said that, I entered it in a first-time novelist’s competition (minimum word count – 25000 words) and came in second. So there must be something there. It is one of my favourite things I’ve written… and its rejection count stands at 24! Anyway, now we come to Patch Of Green, at a little over 60000 words. Day Of The Triffids meets Cujo, essentially. Horror, sure, but there’s more emotion in the tale than I usually do, with the characters and their interactions central to the predicament they find themselves in. Basically, a family inherits a farm which is formed around a meteor crater, and is hence protected by Australian heritage listing. But at the base is a patch of greenery – trees, shrubbery, grass, etc – that is not all it seems. I think the tension in the house at the end is not quite amped up enough, especially as people die, but still in all, it’s not a bad effort. Having said that, it was rejected twice, but after the second rejection (which was positive), it was revamped and then sent out into the ether once more. In 2019 it was accepted by Little Demon Books, and was subsequently published by them in 2020. Excerpt: She looked out across the small holding they had inherited. It was only a few paces between this building and the brick wall that separated it from the rest of the farm land. She knew it was five hundred metres by five hundred metres, a perfect square as taken by the government way back when. But where the land beyond, while dusty and dirty, held some evidence of crops, the only plants that seemed to be growing at all in this area were down in the depression behind her. As though it was sucking the moisture and life from every other living thing in the area. And that was why the clump of dried grass by the brick wall stood out. Without a second thought she made her way across to it. The grass was only a few inches high, dried and withered, barely clinging to the last vestiges of life. Not a trace of green could be seen, even at the base of the shoots. Brown, yellow and even patched with black. But it was such a distinct patch, almost as though it had a predetermined, defined shape… She took a step backwards and stared over the top of her sunglasses. It did have a shape. Indiscernible in the bulbous centre, but the long protrusion at one end beside a second shorter one and at the other end an even shorter, almost knobbly piece. White and grey stones stood out amongst the dying foliage, almost giving it more body and depth. She jumped a little as it dawned on her, then laughed and nodded to herself. A kangaroo. This grass had somehow grown into the shape of a kangaroo. She froze and looked again. Those white stones… they weren’t… No way. They couldn’t be. How could a kangaroo turn into grass? That was crazy. She shook her head and turned back to the house. She was seeing animals in everything now, she told herself. The tooting of the horn of the ute as it made its way past her towards the entrance gate distracted her attention. She smiled in relief and waved at her father and brooding brother as they headed off with their unpleasant cargo, then almost jogged back down the side of the depression to help her mother in the house. And behind her, glinting in the sun where they were not hidden by dying grasses, the bleached bones of a long dead kangaroo, almost crying out for help, as they had when the beast had fallen… And the grass that covered them seemed to reach out for the woman walking away… and for the more fertile ground below. Trying desperately to return to… To life… So, this was my third book acceptance. Took a while after it was written, but Little Demon Books were very keen, went to a couple of conventions, offered me a multi-book deal… then went bust. The owners ghosted me, owing me a lot of money. Such are the vagaries of even traditional publishing. Still, this book made it out into the wild. |
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