How It All Happened.

Hey there, folks.

Happy Thanksgiving break!!

We are here at last.

I thought I would take this time of rest to chronicle a little bit about my book writing journey and what led up to the birth of The Amnesia Experiment.

STORYTIME!!

We’ll begin our narrative with freshman year Caroline. She’s pretty happy with herself and really likes going to the library, so much so that she has a better relationship with the librarians than she does with some of her classmates. We’ll pretend that we’re a camera in the ceiling, watching her browse the bookshelves. Zoom in on her face and she probably has a pimple or two, not a few baby hairs crowding her forehead (a fact that hasn’t really changed with the years), and she’s trying to find her next favorite book. Books are, you see, her great escape.

Lucky for us, this is the day that one of her friends decides to introduce to her a remarkable book series that Caroline has always heard of but never opened: The Selection. If you don’t know what that is, it’s those novels that have the pictures of girls in magnificent ball gowns on the front that’s probably always hanging around Barnes and Noble. Sparkle, enchantment, that kind of thing.

You should Google it.

Yeah.

So we watch as Caroline walks out of there with that blue thing on her person. And we’ll fast forward a bit as she comes back again and again, to a different library, then back to her school one, all in an effort to get her hands on the next book, because she’s obsessed. In the third book of the series, where the story comes to a partial end, she’s out with her family (it was supposed to be a nice, social event, you see, where they eat dinner and such things), and she cannot, I repeat, she cannot stop reading. I think she cries. It is a book full of dazzle, masterful storytelling, of grand palaces and self sacrifice and a great, reconciling love.

Her idea of love? Changed.

Her attachment to fairy tales? LEVELED UP.

This is something that ninth grade Caroline chose to do that present-day Caroline will still attest to. Seriously, I can give you a PowerPoint presentation on The Selection series, if you ask me. I’ll do it.

The next book series our younger Caroline encounters is also a set that influenced The Amnesia Experiment.

We’re getting there, friends.

This book series is one that’s quite famous, and it’s also a series that another one of her friends influenced her into reading. Moral of the story: Good friends know what you like and help you like it better.

It’s The Maze Runner.

Oh ho. Didn’t see that coming, did you? A book about memory loss. Now where does that sound familiar?

The Maze Runner is, for Caroline, a fantastic adventure bound into paper, a movie that you could unfold and pause whenever you wanted. There's James Bond-level action and survival and comedy.

Superb, superb, and SUPERB.

Now that we have those two ingredients, let’s get back to our camera lens vision. Still ninth grade year. I start writing my book.

I have to tell you: it wasn’t exactly wonderful. There’s a lot that changed between my first version and my final one, and as anyone who has ever written something will tell you, words have a way of being the most obstinate little terrors you’ll ever meet.

Anyways, we’ll watch as Caroline writes and goes to school and goes to more school and have summer roll around. Sophomore year hits and it’s an absolute war because she’s decided to take three AP History classes (hooray!).

It’s really, really hard.

We’ll hit the fast forward button here too because Caroline virtually has no time except for homework and school.

But then, Christmas break.

Oh, Christmas. The most wonderful time of the year. We’ll focus in on her sitting in a bunk bed in Colorado. There’s snow outside, she has on some pretty nice socks, and she’s going at it on a laptop. Nearing the end.

You see, at this period in our story, she’s on her second version of The Amnesia Experiment, having already done a lot of writing. She’s a little older now but she still loves the same things, and this book is a compilation of much of her inspirations. It has the princesses, it has the sacrifice, it has the action.

As it always does, winter break has to come to an end. Caroline returns to school and resumes her life.

Now wait a minute, you say. Wait there just a second. Isn’t this around the time—?

Isn’t this—?

Yes, yes, it is.

Although back then, this was not something I thought would change my life so drastically, and the lives of so many others.

*Cue the blaring sirens*

THE CORONAVIRUS MAKES ITS GRAND ENTRANCE!

So Caroline is shuttled back home and now she finds herself with a lot of time on her hands, a lot of time to take breaks, a lot of time to, well—

Finish the book.

She has other people look over it, she writes some new scenes, she finds a publishing avenue. At long last, she is gifted the completion of a dream she’s had since the beginning.

The Amnesia Experiment was on the market.

So much has changed since freshman year for me. I’m a different person. I now like Pirates of the Caribbean, have finished watching all of The Office, and can now eat alone at lunch quite comfortably (this used to be a rather fearful thing).

But a lot of things have also stayed the same.

For example, I don’t know that I will ever get over my passion for stories.

It was a long one this week, folks. Thanks for taking the time.