Tag: stories

“Daddy Mine” Revisited

~ Richard Solano ~ Leave a comment

I don’t know why, but my unfinished novel “Daddy Mine” has been on my mind a lot lately.

I decided I should revisit it this week and share a little with you.

It started as bedtime stories when my kids were little.

I wrote quite a bit of it way back then.

I just peeked at the manuscript.

Let’s just say my writing has come a long way since then.

So this evening I decided to rewrite the first few pages to share a little of the story with you.

It’s really not much more than an introduction to the main character.

Please keep in mind this is unedited writing. Much will likely change.

I’ll tell you a little more at the end.

Until then, here’s the beginning to “Daddy Mine.”

            “Sarah’s a loser!” The cadre of pretty girls came right up behind her.

            “Your uncle’s a dirty drunk bar keep.”

            Sarah kept walking home, ignoring the town girls. 

            “Your aunt is a mean old witch.”

            No objections from Sarah.

            “And your dad was a murderer!”

            Something exploded in her head.

            Sarah spun and decked 14-year-old Clara.

            Clara’s two friends jumped in and the dusty lane in Kearneyville, Colorado became a blur of punches, shoves, grabs, ripping dresses and screaming.

            Until Miss Heber, their teacher, rounded the corner.

            The girls scattered.

            Sarah gathered her books and made to run.

            “Sarah Hurdle, stay right there!”

            Sarah froze at the stern voice, torn between the rebel that wanted to run and the respectful 12-year-old girl who both feared and adored her teacher.

            “Care to explain that?”

            Her tongue froze as the words jumbled into a log jam that refused to flow past her lips.

            “You know that I cannot condone fighting, especially among young ladies.” The young teacher gently lifted Sarah’s face with a hand under her chin.

            Sarah struggled to maintain a stoic face even as a tear at the edge of her eye threatened to betray her.

            Miss Heber’s face softened as she pulled Sarah to her into a loose embrace. “You were giving those three girls a run for their money.”

            “You shoulda’ seen Clara’s face.”

            “Sarah!” Miss Heber’s scold was mild but unmistakable. “You’d better get home.”

            The two separated and the teacher looked Sarah over.

            “Your Aunt’s going to throw a fit when she sees that dress.”

            “I can handle her.” Even as she said it, Sarah dreaded Aunt Penny’s reaction.

            “See you tomorrow in class.”

            “Okay.” Sarah turned and ran down the hill to Lowtown, the section of Kearneyville below downtown where most of the saloons and gambling halls were.

            As she ran across the muddy ditch and over the train tracks, a story of slipping in the mud and tearing her dress in the fall took shape. The far side of the tracks, being in the shade still had plenty of snow in wet, hardened drifts.

            At least she could wash her hands in the snow and grab a chunk of the icy stuff to soothe her swollen knuckles.

            The summer of 1892 was just a few weeks away and she looked forward to spending her days in the woods, escaping the judgement she felt pressing around her.

            Despite it being the less respectful part of town, Sarah felt more at home in Lowtown. Music already poured from a couple of the saloons putting a bounce in her step as she passed.

            Uncle Harold and Aunt Penny’s house sat along the creek with a dozen other older run-down homes.

            Her two cousins, Jimmy and Teddy, sat on the front porch, shirtless in the chilly spring air. Each had a stick and a knife, carving what they surely thought were fierce looking spears.

            “No passin’ here ‘til you pay toll.”

            She leaned close to ten-year-old Jimmy. “How ‘bout I just tell your mama about you not showing up for school today.”

            Jimmy stared at her. “Maybe we could forget the toll if you forget about that little thing.”

            “What thing?” She walked past them and made straight for the ladder to the loft.

            “‘Bout time you got here.” Aunt Penny mixed something at the table by the old wood-stove. “Get outta your school dress and… Lord have mercy, what did you do?”

            Sarah forced tears to her eyes as she explained. “The trail is all covered in mud. You know how slick it is around the tracks.” She let Aunt Penny make up the lie in her imagination so she wouldn’t actually have to tell it.

            “Well, you’re sewing it this time. I showed you how. First, get changed and bring in some more wood.”

            “Why can’t Jimmy and Teddy bring in wood?”

            “They’re just kids.”

            “Jimmy’s bigger than me.”

            Aunt Penny glared at her.

            “Fine.” Sarah’s skinned knee stung as she flew up the ladder and ducked behind the old curtain that defined her corner of the loft.

            She plopped face first onto the thin mattress, pulling the frayed old pillow tight to herself for a moment of escape into her own little world.

            She closed her eyes and tried to bring back the distant memories of her mom and dad, imagining being hugged by them as she squeezed the pillow flat.

That’s it for the little peek into the world of Sarah Hurdle.

If you hadn’t figured it out (then my writing is worse than I thought) Sarah is an orphan in the fictional mining town of Kearneyville, Colorado in the 1890’s.

It is a middle-grade (10-14 year old readers) novel full of adventure, drama, and suspense as Sarah tries to figure out what really happened to her parents.

Let me know if you want to read on as I am toying with the idea of completing this novel.

As always, thanks for visiting!

From Abduction to Action

~ Richard Solano ~ Leave a comment

Maewyn was abducted

from his family home at the age of 16. He was trapped in the world of human trafficking in a third world country for the next 6 years.

He was bought by a war lord who put him to forced labor.

He had no rights.

He had no respect.

He had no love.

He looked for escape at every opportunity.

As he labored, he turned to faith in God for comfort.

There were no other believers in that area but he remembered enough of his family’s faith to get him started.

When the opportunity to escape finally came, he jumped at it. The attempt nearly killed him.

When he finally made it home, he studied more about Christ, eventually becoming a minister.

Then came the call on his life.

He had a vision in which he received a note from the people of the land of his captivity. It begged him to return.

I don’t know about you, but I would be very hesitant to return to where life was horrible. Nobody wants to revisit bad memories, much less, live among them.

The closer Maewyn got to God, the more he understood God’s compassion and the need the people of that land to get to know God.

Maewyn obeyed the call.

By now he had taken a new name to reflect his changed life.

He returned to that violent land, Ireland, under his new name, Patrick.

He brought the Gospel to a land that desperately needed it and brought about the most drastic revival Northern Europe had ever seen.

Maewyn was just a normal upper middle class teenager in his day. He suffered some extreme trauma that turned his life upside down. No one would have blamed him if he had just found a quiet place to hide the rest of his life.

But he didn’t.

Instead of letting the trauma rule him, he channeled it into compassion and action.

I know that PTSD, social anxiety, and many other conditions are real. I don’t mean to belittle them.

But what would happen if we submitted our fears and trauma to God and let him heal and use them to bring healing to others? I know it’s not easy or simple but Patrick and many others have shown it is possible and the fruits of their actions show it is worth it.

This Friday, as you enjoy your corned beef and cabbage or shamrock shake (or green beer), remember the life of that guy who brought Christ to Ireland and ask yourself if there’s anything you can learn from him. It might just bring you to a life of healing and action.

Close Encounter of the High Voltage Kind

~ Richard Solano ~ Leave a comment
Southwest Virginia in the early ‘80s

 

It was just beginning to sprinkle as we started up the trail. Thinking the rain would cool off our hike on that hot August day, we happily hiked on,

blissfully ignorant

of what lay ahead.

I was one of thirty some 17-year-olds spending a week at Lynchburg College competing for scholarships. After a busy day of classes, this hike at Sharp Top on the Blue Ridge Parkway was just the diversion we needed.

Our steep mile and a half hike did indeed cool off. The sprinkles turned to rain.

We quickened our pace when we heard distant lightning. Someone said something about a cabin at the top.

The true downpour started as we approached the cabin. We all crammed into the small stone building. No one was brave or foolish enough to go out to the overlook just beyond the cabin.

We were young. We didn’t worry.

Besides, we knew there was a shuttle that would take us back down the mountain. We’d hike the quarter mile to the shuttle stop as soon as the lightning let up.

It didn’t let up.

If anything, it increased.

And the last shuttle of the day would be there soon.

Half of the people in the cabin decided they would stay put where it was safe.

I was not one of those people.

A dozen or so of us rushed out through the deluge.

I couldn’t see a thing. I just followed the person ahead of me. Lightning crashed every couple of seconds all around. I got soaked to the bone.

After a couple of minutes that seemed like a couple of hours, we made it to the bus shelter. I plopped my waterlogged self down on the bench on the far side of the shelter, glad to be safe.

Then it hit me.

Technically, it hit the shelter and the electricity ran through those of us on that far side of the bus shelter.

It was lightning.

Oh, and deafening thunder.

It was literally a pain in the rear. Very painful, in fact.

When it happened, a girl seated on the other side started screaming hysterically. Once she calmed, she explained that she saw us all light up and thought we would die.

The only casualty that I know of was my digital watch, which started flying forward in time. We were sore and soaked and had a new respect for thunderstorms.

As for those stayed in the cabin, the college had to send out another bus. They didn’t return until later in the evening.

Whether we played it safe or braved the storm, we each came home with quite the story to tell.

This story has found it’s way into many children’s and youth lessons. It even into Wil Clarey, The Impossible Summer (as told to Wil by his grandpa). My lessons and my books tend to be filled with stories like these. They tend to grab attention and illustrate a number of points.

Do you have stories?

Let ‘em out!

Write them and share them. If possible, teach with them.

Don’t let them fade in your memory.

Oh yeah, and don’t go outside in thunderstorms!

Where’d That Come From

~ Richard Solano ~ Leave a comment

Ever wonder where stories come from?

Have you wondered where you can find new stories?

This question came to the forefront when I recently came up with a new novel idea from a very novel source. But first, here’s where some of my other stories have come from.

Reymons came from a high school writing assignment. Mrs. Fender told us to write a short fiction story. She suggested we write about something we like.

I liked driving my dad’s Datsun 280Z. My short story had me going out for a short drive in the little sports car, only to have an obsession come over me that caused me to drive as fast as possible into the mountains. There I followed a line of traffic into a subterranean passage where we were sheltered from a nuclear holocaust (this was during the Cold War).

Reymons revisits that post-apocalyptic world four hundred years later.

Bob Wiley watches me write Wil Clarey: Mystery at the Mill

Wil Clarey came from my experience as a 16-year-old who was transplanted from the San Francisco Peninsula to rural southwest Virginia. Many of the scenes were based on actual events in my life.

It’s first iteration was, frankly, boring. Then I married into a son on the autism spectrum. I had to think, what if I had been on the spectrum? I rewrote it with that in mind. I lowered Wil’s age to make it middle grade which suited the story better.

Daddy Mine was a bed-time story. I wanted a strong female character for my daughter to look up to. I started with the concept of an orphan 12-year-old girl in a mining town. From the first scene where the neighbor girls are teasing her, it basically wrote itself as I told it to my daughter.

Countdown, or Synchronized, or whatever I end up calling it was a deliberate effort at coming up with an adult level action novel. Some of the situations are drawn from work experience. Other than that, it is made from scratch. It is on hold simply because I found that I need to do some significant research that I don’t have time for right now.

Finally, my as yet unnamed new story. The source?

A dream.

In my dream, I remember feeling very nervous going into an inner-city middle school. I was an adult, there to teach or give a speech. That’s about all I remember of the dream. But I woke up thinking, “this’ll write!”

I made an effort to remember the dream and at lunch, I wrote the first chapter so I would remember the idea.

The main character is now called Evan. He is a paraplegic, having lost the use of his legs in a brutal mugging. That made him re-evaluate his life. Upon recovery, he completed a teaching certificate and finally landed this teaching job after the previous teacher quit mid-year. His unique teaching style ruffles feathers among his fellow teachers.

I can hardly wait to write that story!

I hope this inspires you to find your stories. Look in the unusual places.

Get them written!