A NaNoWriMo Champion

I completed NaNoWriMo 2013! with a grand total of 53,500 Words. The word count was an accomplishment but even more, the leap into a new genre was the real challenge.

All of my published works are erotic romance, whether they're contemporary or paranormal. It might surprise readers to learn that the first book I wrote was an edgy Young Adult. I wrote it years ago before the New Adult genre popped up. Back then, I couldn't find a niche for my story so I set it aside. After reading and reading New Adult books and totally falling for them, I decided to give it a try. After all, I'd written that first book with characters breaching the high school/ college gap and that's exactly what New Adult is.

I came up with the idea for IVY INTERTWINED through a series of unrelated events I witnessed over a few years. Tossing in some of my imagination to fill the questions left by my observations, the story of Ivy and Chase evolved. It's raw and completely unedited but here's the working BLURB...

Ivy is poison. At least, that's how she feels when everything right in her world goes wrong. She runs to the safety of her grandparents' home where she won't spread her poison to the boy she loves. Her only thought is not to destroy Chase. What Ivy hadn't considered was that by leaving him behind, she accomplished the one thing she tried so desperately to prevent.

Chase is invincible. At least, that's how he feels as captain of the school's hockey team. With a college scholarship in his back pocket and the girl he loves by his side, he's on the brink of greatness. Until the day Ivy disappears and everything he thought was important no longer matters. All Chase wants is to find Ivy and make everything right in his world again.

Some say eighteen is too young to know love. Those fools have no idea how Ivy has intertwined herself around Chase's heart.

EXCERPT (unedited)

Ivy hesitantly steps off the ferry and gazes around, careful to keep her eyes averted from those around her. She just wants to blend in, to be another person visiting the island, and to be unrecognized by any of the locals. Her goal is to get to the house unnoticed. An older man passes her by. A girl about her age runs to meet the handsome man who shared her view of the ocean on the ferry trip across the water. To her relief, nobody approaches her and she recognizes no one. 

With years of practice behind her, Ivy appears untouched by the happy people around her. It’s not true though. She’s touched. Inside. It’s there, where she’s nearly hollowed out at the same time that she’s growing fuller with life. A new life that meant giving up an old life she adored. An exchange-one loss for another loss-that will be made in the end. Then Ivy will find herself alone.

She snatches up her bag that the crew tossed off the boat into the pile of suitcases accompanying the passengers to the island and begins a pace inward towards town. She carries just one bag, large enough only for an overnight trip. It’s not nearly enough but it was all she could manage. Ivy just needed to escape. 

A quick note to her father and Ivy had bolted before she could change her mind. This is the right choice. There was no other alternative without destroying someone she loved. She’d done that before and she couldn’t take doing it again, not to Chase who could do so much better than her. 

Passing through town quickly, she doesn’t stop to look in the shops or seem to notice the string of people stopping to rent mopeds. Soon enough the island will be flooded with tourists buzzing along the quiet country roads, creating a stir in the willows. By then, Ivy will be tucked away in a place that feels more like home than any place she knows. Needing none of these things tourists need, she looks out past the small town and sets her eyes on the open land ahead. In the distance, she sees a small gray house and smiles. 

Spending every summer here with her grandparents gave Ivy her most treasured memories. This is Ivy’s happy place. This is the home Sarah, her mother, had been raised and it was the only place she felt a connection to the woman she never knew. Even if he never admitted it, Ivy knew her father blamed her for taking Sarah from him. Living with her grandparents every summer was Ivy’s only reprieve from the man who hated her.

As she gets closer, the small gray house opens its door to her. Her grandmother waves as Ivy walks up the path to the old house. She doesn’t stop until Grandma Clara’s arms are locked tightly around her.
(c) Paloma Beck, Ivy Intertwined, 2013

What next? Editing. Then I need to consider the possibility of a different pen name to publish my non-erotic books. I definitely think there'll be more of these to come. It was a lot of fun to write but now the real work begins. With a heavy writing schedule, my goal is to publish this story within the next year. I'd love to see it out sooner but I want it to be its best. I'll keep you updated. -Paloma