A little more about Enchantia...and me

So it's back to Kayla, age 25, in NYC. And now for the thrilling conclusion of my last post's cliffhanger....and I need to stop being goofy because this is actually serious. To recap, the quote from my last post (taken from my 7th grade composition book) was, "I feel bad if I say something mean to someone; it really hurts. I really don't care if the person is the latest to be picked on, I won't do it." There's a reason why I said that so strongly.

Enchantia, I must stress, is fictional. It's not based on a true story. Nothing that happened in the book actually happened to me. But that said, just as I'm influenced by books I've read, I'm influenced by events in my life. I think that's true of most writers. I was in a class where teasing - or more like harrassing - was rampant, and I was sometimes a target, among several others. So in that way, I've been in Jane's shoes.

Of course, it's okay to write things that are beyond your own experience, and I do plenty of that in Enchantia too (e.g., although I had an imagination, mine was not nearly as wild as Jane's or Megan's). But I think when you draw from your inner resources, if you let yourself get inspired by your life, you can go places in your writing (or any other art) you couldn't go to otherwise. It brings a certain level of genuineness, because you've been there.

Bear in mind I say all this with no authority. As of now, I'm just a wannabe novelist. But this is one of the reasons why I would love to get this book published. I think it would be awesome to be in a role-model position, to be able to tell all the girls and boys out there who are struggling in similar situations, that yeah, I've been there just like my main character, and school can suck, kids can be mean, but you can still emerge from it all and be strong.