#welcome2ny

So my cover artist sent through her sketches and ideas yesterday ... which means I feel compelled to finally read this thing (I haven’t touched it since November last year!). Considering The writing of this was like some weird fever dream, let’s see what’s ended up on the page, eh? 😅🤞 #Welcome2NY #editing #manuscript #yafiction https://www.instagram.com/p/CLqB_iKpsd3/?igshid=88wnia5yv5vs

Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland (here illustrated by the brilliant Rose Garcia) has been another huge influence on my writing - not so much his prose but his unimpeded creativity. It was like a permission slip to let my imagination run wild when I needed a break from trying to make my alternate-NYC as realistic as possible. I love creating worlds; trying to describe them in semi-poetic language less so. Breaking free from the constraints of logic and realism by sending Alyssa’s brain tumbling down the rabbit hole on occasion made writing this novel bearable (and a much more interesting read!). #welcome2ny #aliceinwonderland #rosegarcia #yafiction #novel https://www.instagram.com/p/CLjGZcxpfhN/?igshid=1412jyf36zd7f

NYC is closed off from the world, and as we know, necessity breeds innovation. Trust me, there have been a lot of innovations over the past three decades. For example: FlowerPower. There are fields of sunflowers along the deserted Jersey coast and the southern half of the Bronx. These seven-foot-tall monsters ripple and nod from the Bronx wall to the centre of the borough, a weird golden army rooted to the spot. It’s beautiful, and bizarre . . . Nothing gives away the soluble wiring threaded through their xylem, the hacked photosynthesis that releases electrons to be collected through their roots and shuttled to storage sites. These flowers, smelling of clean earth doused in honey, power the Bronx and most of Queen Bee. The rest of NYC’s electricity comes from solar arrays and offshore windfarms and waste treatment facilities. Apart from the water sucked up from the ocean and purified, and the over one-thousand square kilometres of permaculture farms tended by the New Yorkers themselves, electricity is the most important component of the city’s functioning. No gas, no oil, no steam. Just electricity. The EVs that the world drives guilt-free were perfected in NYC. #welcome2ny #nyc #yafiction #novel #sustainableliving https://www.instagram.com/p/CLd51R5ptHv/?igshid=1p2n25krmchyn

(So, Sarah, how did you learn to write a book?) I can’t remember being formally taught grammar (I still don’t know what a preposition is). I just liked telling stories and writing was the easiest way to do it (tbh, I really wanted to be acting those stories, but fat and the horrors of ballet have a way of crushing a preteen girl’s self esteem). So I focused on writing, and imbued with gross ambition and my parents’ work ethic, I decided I wanted to be as good as I could possibly be. Writing for me was kind of like learning how to speak, this weird osmosis and regurgitation, over and over, without knowing when you’re screwing up until a few stories later you look back at a past work and see how much you’ve improved. It takes practice, and lots and lots of reading. Eventually you develop an ear for what word is right in a sentence; OF or TO? ON or UPON? And if you do it for long enough, the words begin to take on your tone of voice, littered with quirks of grammar that are particular to you, accents of your prose style (journaling is helpful for this - and this book on Elements of Style would have been, if I got it earlier, before I got stuck in my weird fanfic-diary-classics hybrid style). Undoubtedly your prose style will be influenced by the books you’ve read on this journey (I am in awe of and will never be able to match Daphne du Maurier’s descriptive powers). It’s also important to learn from those who have been there, done that, and can admit that it’s damn lonely work that just has to be done, but you have a life outside it too (even if cocaine or alcohol (or sugar) makes you feel more creative, drugs are not your friends - thanks, Stephen King!) And more than all of this, you’ve got to love stories. Humans are wired for stories - some just need them more than others. For me, A badly told story stresses me out. A well told story makes me happy to be alive. I love for stories, the more personal the better. I love to hear about people being people. So that’s it. That’s how I learned to write a book. No formal training or anything. Just time, persistence, and a fascination with the human experience. #Welcome2NY #nyc #yafiction #novel (at WellingtonNZ) https://www.instagram.com/p/CLTqUFcp-e8/?igshid=yahkoz16tu16

‘I close my eyes to the ghostly light and fill my mind with home and its old, twisted trees that drip lichen and moss and native climbers spangled in tiny white flowers. My breathing fades against the constant cry of our bird sanctuary islands. I was at peace there, deep in the valleys full of choking undergrowth and sudden streams. The stress of our house and its relationships and its memories were far from me. Just Anna and I as we remembered that humans are a part of nature too.’ #welcome2ny #yafiction #nyc #novel (at Mount Kaukau) https://www.instagram.com/p/CLJcAYGJw5l/?igshid=6iknjuqp54lc

Inspiring Books Post! Today: Alex Rider. Written by Anthony Horowitz, these books are about a ‘teenaged James Bond’, though thankfully without the sex. They were fantastic for teaching me how to write quick, realistic fight scenes and how to keep up a cracking pace - Horowitz is a screenwriter as well as a novelist, so his books feel very filmic. But he always, always stays in touch with his characters’ emotional state. Alex in these books gets hurt, a lot. The fact that a teenaged boy in a book written for teenaged boys is portrayed with emotional damage is incredible to me, and it gave me license to do the same with Alyssa. Shying away from the pain is pointless. Life hurts, we get hurt, and that pain is our best teacher. It’s how we grow. This is why I like Alex Rider a lot more than the early, unchanging James Bonds (though Daniel Craig’s version is top notch) and most YA novels that focus on teen gossip and love triangles. Gah. Life is more than romance and cliques! (Alex goes to space!) (Also the tv show is incredible. But don’t watch the movie. *shudder*) #alexrider #welcome2ny https://www.instagram.com/p/CLEO4IapfO-/?igshid=1x1lvsgx2ui6i

Alias: Shade Age: 24 Family: Unknown Hometown: Unknown Motivations: Unknown Hobbies: Unknown Skills: Inciting civil unrest, guerrilla warfare, escaping prison Allies: Carter Williams, New York Rebels Enemies: American Government, Colonel Knight Relationship to Alyssa Knight: Complicated #Welcome2NY #nyc #yafiction #novel https://www.instagram.com/p/CK_CUtIJ0LJ/?igshid=1gm21z7uufp69

Who wants to see the first draft, complete with my first foray into the world of editing? (Gosh, it was bad. I hope you can't read it 😂) #Welcome2NY #nyc #yafiction #novel https://www.instagram.com/p/CKvmBibpYxo/?igshid=1g70yjfwdq1ej