GRAND TRAVERSE
Story Statement
A small-town kid tired of living in his father's shadow must bridge the divide in a crumbling coal town between the old-timers and the hippies, and save any chance he has of his new love's future there.
Antagonist
The antagonists in this story are Sam, Andy and Mickey -- three of the old-timer coal men who have spent their entire lives in the town before the hippies moved in and tried to take it over. They are angry and distraught at the idea of their land being turned into a ridiculous ski town, and they don't mind going to lengths to prove it, after all they've had a hard life -- they've had friends and family members die in the mine, their children are being sent home from Vietnam in body bags. They don't care if the hippies don't like them, that's the last of their worries.
Breakout Title
GRAND TRAVERSE
ASHES AND WILDFLOWERS
WHERE THE MOUNTAINS BURN
Comps
GILDED MOUNTAIN by Kate Manning - explores love and identity in Colorado mining towns with a strong sense of place and historical transformation
THE WOMEN by Kristin Hannah - I realize this one falls into the category of a far-too-popular author, but the focus on what's happening back home and what the world turned into while the Vietnam War raged is similar, and I thought that it was interesting that she recently published this and mentioned that it felt like the right time for it commercially (really only comping the second half of the book).
Hook line
A restless young man fleeing his father's shadow seeks belonging in a Colorado coal town on the brink of collapse, but when he falls for the daughter of a miner, who herself is torn between loyalty and change, both must confront a community boiling with resentment -- or lose their change at love and a future together.
Conflict: Two More Levels
Billy will feel fear when threatened with violence by Sam and Roy. He has lived a relatively "safe" life, living at home even through college and then taking a managerial role right out of college with his father's company. He will be anxious in how he can respond and maintain the respect of his new peers -- a group assembled from all over the country, some who have been to war and some who have fought like hell to avoid it. The general feeling being that everyone around him is tougher and has more life experience than him. His reaction becomes too defensive, too enflamed, trying to be like everyone around him, before settling into his more natural analytic, peace-keeping way.
When he receives a letter from his brother at war, Billy hides away, unable to deal with it. He lets the letter lie on the kitchen table until Stacey has to open it for him, his only tactic at dealing with his own family being avoidance.
Setting
The town is based on 1970s Crested Butte, with kaleidoscope-colored houses nestled in the shadow of a great mesa, the valley small and wedged between a mountain range. The house that they live in is A-framed and bright purple, the bar they hang out in is beer-stained and filled with morose newspaper clippings of mine closures. The main street is half closed, the shops boarded, but those that are open have enough personality to make whole, with their bright fresh paint that the old-timers can't stand. The mountain itself is peppered with evergreens so fresh you can smell them before you reach the base, the sunset so strong and powerful as to stop everyone in their place when it drifts slowly, then quickly over the mountain, casting it purple and blue and finally bright red.
ALL THAT WE HAVE (This is my latest novel, I've gone ahead and done the assignments for both, as I would like to refine this one as well)
Story Statement
A woman saves her neighbor from killing herself and now must reunite her with the daughter she gave up for adoption years ago.
Antagonist
While Fia can at times play an antagonistic role, the real antagonist in this story is Claudia's internal struggle against who she thinks she is versus who she has fought to become, and her fear of confrontation and of losing the people she loves if she shows up as her true self and asks for help, with external pressures such as Fia, her husband, her co-worker, and her unfulfilling job fueling that conflict.
Breakout Title
ALL THAT WE HAVE
A PERFECT MOTHER WOULD
ANOTHER MOTHER'S DAUGHTER
Comps
A blend between (and I realize both of these are too popular) THE WEDDING PEOPLE by Alison Espach, with its sharp, funny commentary on the things that make life worth living and THREE DAYS IN JUNE by Anne Taylor, a story exploring the complex dynamics of family, past relationships, the pressures of motherhood, judgement, and what it means to be "good enough".
Hook line
When a new mother obsessed with perfection witnesses a stranger preparing to jump from a nearby terrace, her desperate need to save the woman spirals into obsession -- until a secret buried in her own family threatens to destroy the flawless life she's fought to build.
Conflict: Two More Levels
Claudia will feel torn between wanting to help Fia (the woman she saved) in her quest to find the daughter she put up for adoption -- on one hand, she can't imagine being separated from her daughter, the pain that this woman must have felt cutting her to her core, but on the other hand, there is a cruel part of her that feels that maybe Fia deserves it, abandoning her daughter that way. She is forced to confront the way that she views motherhood, and when Fia firsts asks her she says no, and she means it. The part of her that defends everything she has done to try to be the perfect mother wins out, and she can feel how cruel it is. It is not until later that she agrees to help, after she has sorted it out in her own mind.
Claudia cannot seem to communicate clearly with her husband, of her needs in this new world of motherhood and of how she thinks he should respond. She finds herself hiding parts of herself, omitting decisions and thoughts so as to keep the peace, something she had never done before.
Setting
The central conflict of this novel takes place in the grandeur of an Upper West Side apartment, the terrace large and wide and tree-filled, the French doors leading out to it window-paned from floor to ceiling. Claudia is taken aback by the beauty of it all, compared to her small but cozy apartment across the street. She find Fia's daughter in a rich young West Village street lined with brownstones, she walks through an orange and red framed autumnal Central Park, she works at a television studio that stands on the first floor of Broadway, its fishbowl-like windows gathering drops of rain as passersby’s walk quickly in the dark, the puddles around their feet so visible that she can almost hear the padding against the pavement as she sits and waits for the great light to burst on set and drown it all out.
