How about some Zombie Tag?

So one time we were camping in our backyard, and Graham said, “What do you think happens when you die?”

We used to do that sometimes. Lug our sleeping bags out and pitch our tent and lie there, pretending we had a campfire. We couldn't do it too much because Graham would always start wheezing from lying in the grass all night, but I loved it, and I was always pushing him to do it more often, which made Mom mad.

It was really late, but so loud from the frogs and the cicadas.

I said, “I don’t…think about stuff like that.”

“Everyone thinks about stuff like that.”

“Yeah, okay, but I don’t think you’re supposed to discuss it, you know? You’re supposed to think about it quietly to yourself.”

“Talking to you is like talking to myself.”

I hoped he didn’t see me smile at that, because it didn’t sound like a compliment, even though it felt like one. I think it was too dark for him to see, anyway.

He rolled over, and the grass crunched under him while he coughed. I stretched out. I was thinking about how good a s'more would taste right then.

He said, “Okay, so you die, and just…things keep happening without you?”

“Yeah.”

“That doesn't make sense.”

“Um...I think most people agree on that one.”

“But, like, how? Like...” He was quiet here for a long time. “Like I was just coughing, and then I stopped coughing, and everything was the same as it was before I started.”

“Yeah.”

“But coughing isn't dying. How can dying just be a thing?” He shook his head. “I don’t know, Wil. I don’t know. I don’t think things will go on without me.”

I laughed. “I can’t believe how self-centered you are.”

“It’s the curse of being the person the world revolves around. A blessing and a curse.”

“You're a drip.”

He said, “But seriously. No one can say for sure that the world keeps going after they die. Because how would you know? Maybe you're the one who the world can't exist without. I mean, there has to be someone, right? One person dies and the universe is like, that's it, straw that broke the camel's back, I'm done, peace, there's no point in doing this anymore if people are going to keep keeling over on me.”

“That’s so stupid.” I rolled over on the grass and looked at him. “Billions of people have already died, and here we are.”

“But it only takes one person.”

“And that person’s going to be you?”

“Hey, you don’t know me.” He laughed. His breathing was getting noisy.

I said, “Of course I know you. That’s the point.”

“Yeah.” His breath caught, and he coughed some more. “You’re pretty lucky to know me, let’s be honest.” He was wheezing pretty badly by then.

Stalling

I am sick and look DISGUSTING. (name that movie in the comments)

HERE'S AN EXCERPT. this is the first page of my WIP.


I only invented Zombie Tag three weeks ago, and we’ve already lost seven spatulas. For awhile, I stole my Mom’s, but now she’s out. I make my friends bring them now. Once our mothers find out where all their spatulas are going, they’re going to be so mad. They’re going to team up and form some kind of army against us, I swear. But we’d be totally prepared. Mothers can never be as scary as zombies.

I guess we could play Zombie Tag without the spatulas, but that doesn’t sound like nearly as much fun.

Today is Anthony’s birthday, so we should be sleeping over at his house. The problem is, Anthony has an awful house for Zombie Tag. His place is like a museum. There’s all this great stuff, but you can’t touch any of it. And there’s nowhere to sit.

But because it’s his birthday, we let him be Zombie God. That means he’s the one who writes the words on the post-it notes--BARRICADE, BARRICADE, BARRICADE, BARRICADE, ZOMBIE. It’s pitch black, so he’s using his cell phone. The air conditioning is on too high because my dad is always hot. It’s coldest here in the basement. We’re all jumping up and down and shivering while Anthony folds and shuffles the post-it notes.

Eben comes thumping down the stairs. “Dude, shut up,” I say. “My parents are sleeping.”

“All the lights are off,” he says. He’s panting from running through the entire house. He volunteered to do it. He should man up and stop acting like he just ran a marathon or something.

Anthony clears his throat dramatically. “Okay,“ he says, holding the post-it notes above his head.

“No trading, no showing, no sharing.” He passes them out. We peek at them and stuff the evidence into our pockets.

I can’t believe it. I’m Zombie. In our millions of games of Zombie Tag, this is my first time being the zombie. It’s like it’s my birthday.

But no one would know from my face. I am the world’s coolest cucumber right now.

“Okay, eyes closed,” our Zombie God orders. We snap our eyes closed, and I slowly open mine to make sure the other guys aren’t peeking. They have their fingers stuffed into their ears, just like they’re supposed to. I feel kind of proud that they’re following my rules so well. It’s not every guy who has a bunch of friends who really understand how sacred a thing like Zombie Tag is, you know?

Time to fulfill my first duty as Zombie. I walk away from the circle as quietly as I can. I put all my weight on my heels before I lean onto each toe. When I was a kid, my brother told me that hunters used to walk like this so they didn’t get eaten by tigers. I totally believed him and put it in early settlers history paper a few weeks ago, and Ms. Hoole gave me a C and wrote THERE ARE NO TIGERS IN THE UNITED STATES. And that wasn’t even the point. I hate when teachers don’t pay attention.

So I keep my tiger-sneak walk up until I’m well out of the circle, then I run to the table and pick up the dinosaur. It’s this plastic coin bank my dad got be as a souvenir when he went to Russia a few months ago. He was checking up how they’re doing on the development of Time-Based Travel. I think they’re beating us, because Dad was really depressed when he got home, and he had this whole stack of papers to work through and all these reports to file. I asked him if he was a spy, and he said “Quiet, Wil,” and gave me this bank. And, it’s like, I’m not six, Dad, but at least it comes in useful for Zombie Tag.

It’s our Key. The other guys need to find the Key, or else they’re stuck in the house forever, and I’ll eat their brains.

Teaser Tuesday

just kidding about that big post. It needs a little longer to cook. So let's celebrate post 100 with the first bit of INVINCIBLE SUMMER, shall we?

This is pre-notes from editor, so God knows if this will bear any resemblance to the first page in the real thing. But here's what it looks like now.


---


Gideon keeps falling down.

He and Claudia slipped outside to the beach before anyone else was ready. They’re greasy and gritty with sand and sea water now—no point in dragging them back inside. None of us feel like making the effort. My mother, who’s a little too old and way too pregnant to run around outside and parent them hands-on like she used to, drifts to the deck to watch them, one hand on her stomach, one on the railing.

My dad looks at Noah and me lingering by the windows. We’re moaning every time we see a particularly good wave roll by and looking at each other—maybe we should go out? Maybe we can? No.

Outside, Claudia is laughing. She always says she’s way too old to play with Gideon. But she still does, at least when we’re here. Here no one is too old. Except Mom and Dad. Claudia and Gideon are the two youngest, so they get shoved together and there is no way to avoid it, even though Claudia’s eleven and Gideon’s barely six.

Dad says, “Aren’t you two going out?”

We can’t. Despite the sand clinging to our feet from the walk from the car and the soaked-in sunscreen smell of this carpet, Noah and I know that it isn’t quite summer. Not yet. Summer can’t start at night, first of all, and it definitely can’t start before we see the SUV roll up outside the Hathaway’s beach house. And until it comes, we’ll wait here. That’s tradition, and Noah and I do not kill tradition.

Noah is eighteen, four years my senior, as long as you’re not talking about emotional age. His nose hooks at the end, just covering where his spiky mustache is coming in. His hand taps a beat on my shoulder.

You Humans Are Driving Me Insane

Guys

If you have a manuscript to query

QUERY THAT SHIT.

Do you think an agent's going to come down your chimney and offer you representation?

SEND THE GODDAMN LETTERS.

The Publishing Process, or Why You're Always Afraid of Someone

I found Absolute Write when I was a 15 year old n00b. I had a few novels under my belt, most, but actually not all, of which were completely awful. I also had a lot of big ideas about publishing being some kind of corporate scheme, and agents were all part of some big capitalist machine of iron and steel and crushed dreams. To be honest, I didn't know a damn thing about agents except that I didn't want one and I was going to kick my little feet and cross my arms and tell everyone in the world I didn't want them.

So then I stumbled across Absolute Write, which is honestly the mecca of publishing information for a lost soul such as myself. And I went in there with my big ideas and my even bigger mouth and I got gently, but efficiently, slapped down to real life.

And these writers, who were bigger and older and more experienced and a hell of a lot wiser than I was? They scared the shit out of me. They'd been around the block, and they had shit like writing spaces and writing processes and writing schedules and writing pants or whatever, and all of it was stuff I'd never thought about and definitely never considered having, because I wasn't a real writer. I was the crazy little kid who wanted to get published before she was 18.

But luckily I was a crazy kid who listened, because I started querying, and goddamn was that the scariest thing ever. Forget being scared of writers, now there were agents. And agents were just the scariest fucking thing in the world, tweeting at each other and drinking coffee and taking phone calls and throwing around words like "slush" and "acquisitions" and "apartment." They were frickin adults, for God's sake. And here I was sending them emails and expecting them to waste their time on me.

I know people go through a lot of feeling when they get rejections, but does anyone else just feel embarassed? I think I'm over it now--now, if anyone rejects me, they're clearly heartless robots who don't understand my passion and prowess over the quill of amazing or whatever--but it used to be that every time someone sent me a rejection, I'd just want to email back I'M SORRY WHAT WAS I THINKING SO SORRY I MADE YOU READ THAT. Because I had it in my head that for some reason I wasn't worthy of agents' time. That they were up there on their Mount Olympus and I was down here in high school.

But I got an agent.

And then all of a sudden agents were my buddies and I could tweet at them and ha ha ha aren't we witty and oh my God, editors, oh my God.

And now it's holy shit, book reviewers.

This goddamn thing never ends, and it's awesome.

hola

Sorry for abandoning you guys over the holidays. Hope you had a lovely time.

Sorry also for those of you who have emailed me and are still waiting for a response. I will write back, I promise.

I've starting working on a new project--not a book--and I'm having a good time with it. You can follow me on twitter if you want to track my crashing-and-burning process, because essentially I don't know what the fuck I'm doing.

Anyone have anything exciting happening in the New Year? I have a book going out on submission in a few weeks (hopefully!) I'm psyched.

Massive Playlist for the WIP

Working on something new. You'll get a query teaser later, but first you get the huge playlist...

Monster Hospital--Metric
All That's Known--Spring Awakening
Rent--Rent
Boston--Augustana
How the Heart Approaches What it Yearns--Paul Simon
Octopus's Garden--The Beatles
Bleed Like Me--Garbage
I'm Just a Kid--Simple Plan
Never Be Ready--Mat Kearney
This is Why--Say Anything
Where I Belong--Motion City Soundtrack
Life Support--Rent
Walk Away--Kelly Clarkson
This Is Not an Exit--Saves The Day
Quiet As a Mouse--Margot and the Nuclear So and So's
Tic--Loch Lomond
Can't Break Her Fall--Mat Kearney
An Insult To The Dead--Say Anything
Talking in Code--Margot and the Nuclear So and So's
Waiting On The World to Change--John Mayer
Sons and Daughters--The Decemberists
Everyone I Know--Mat Kearney
Falling Awake--Gary Jules
Walter Reed--Michael Penn
Let's Not Shit Ourselves (To Love and Be Loved)--Bright Eyes
You've Got To Hide Your Love Away--The Beatles
Virgin Mountain--Loch Lomond
I Don't Want to Die (In the Hospital)--Conor Oberst
For No One--The Beatles
Say What You Will--Damhnait Doyle
See The World--Gomez
Same Old Stuff--The Feeling
Train Under Water--Bright Eyes


Listening to this now, trying to figure out WTF actually happens in this book.

Time Turned Fragile

This is the song that inspired BREAK. A nice little song from Jonah to Jesse.

Clicky (audio only):



Tiny hands, recycled cans, the metal bands I could not stand
The time you cried and threw your crayons across the floor
These are the things I think about when I'm alone without you
I wonder about your wherabouts and hope like hell you're happy where you are

You used to say that you're just fine, but I still wonder all the time.

Hockey games, medical claims, police reports, terrible grades
J, I'm so proud of all the things that you have done
These are the things I think about when I'm alone without you
I wonder about your wherabouts and hope like hell you're happy where you are

I'm all right.
I'm all right.
I can see through everything you say, and all the lessons I never learned.

You used to say that you're just fine, but I still wonder all the time.

Do you still believe in the stories told to you by my friends and I
When you were four years old?
How it got so cold, our words just froze
We had to wait until summer to find out what was said
One of the best times that we had.

I know I say that I'm just fine, but I hope you wonder from time to time.

I was nervous from the start that the muscles might tear us apart--Are muscles tearing us apart?
From the words that carve our lives, to the words that take us by surprise--I was never taken by surprise.
From the sounds that disappear, to the changes we begin to fear--I can hear you clearly.
One day I'll fail to breathe, and all you'll have are memories--All we are are memories.

--Motion City Soundtrack

Oh HEY Break!

You can now get Break from B&N.com, Amazon.com, and a few brick and mortar stores. More will start stocking it as the 25th draws nearer...

Right now, BREAK is the 42nd bestseller in the category: Bestsellers > Books > Children's Books > Science, Nature & How It Works > Health > Diseases > Fiction

I KNOW

42ND

GUYS

I AM SO FRICKIN' FAMOUS

keep on truckin'

words left: 4,000

days left: 11

12 days