My agent and I are preparing to send off the proposal for my newest novel, Joy & Carnage. So that I have something to show, I photoshopped this picture for my MySpace and Blogspot. On the former, it doesn't display so well, but here it is for you to see. The girl is Mercedes, and though I wasn't able to put a scar across her face as she has in the story, I'm fairly happy with this rendition.

A modified version of the proposal goes something like this:

More than a year before the tragedy at Columbine, there was Shadow Valley. Three teenagers, driven to the extreme by the painful jabs of their peers, conspire to murder their entire school in one day.

Mercedes was one of the most popular girls in school. Attractive. Smart. Loyal to her best friend, Becca. All of that changes one rainy night, when a crazy stunt leaves her disfigured and her best friend, dead. Tossed from her elite circle of friends, she’s adopted by Eli and Damien, a pair of misfits who devise the terrible plan. It takes only one cruel prank, at her expense, for Mercedes to decide to join them. Ultimately, their plan fails because Eli, their mastermind, betrays them.

Ten years pass and the three students receive invitations to the Shadow Valley High School reunion. Damien and Mercedes have been planning for this night for almost a decade. With thousands of dollars at their disposal, and a burning desire for vengeance, the two believe that nothing can stop them. The only person who stands a chance at dissolving the danger is the original ringleader, Pastor Eli Shepherd. Can a poor, haunted, and troubled man of God, stop two determined monsters?

Joy & Carnage is a forked tale—two stories, told in chapters that alternate between 1998 and 2008. It follows the movements of Eli, Damien, and Mercedes during the week preceding each attack. The unique layout of this story highlights how each tale parallels the other. The preparation for one attack is followed by preparations for the other. Torment is followed by torment and escalation, by escalation. The two stories fuse together in Chapter 18, which begins with the header “1998 & 2008” and features a chapter that can be fit into either timeline. The climax and turning point of both stories occur in this chapter, and are settled in two very different ways as the twin storylines diverge onto their original tracks.

Over the course of 93,000 words, the reader is introduced to Mercedes, a broken girl whose hollowed heart becomes filled with poison and thorns. They meet Eli who, though once a hellion himself, now stands as Mercedes’ only chance for redemption—if she can forgive his earlier betrayal. And readers will watch as Damien, who appears and disappears like a phantom, acts as the diabolical tempter of both. Their emotions, motivations, and conflicts are laid bare for the audience to feel. No one will deny understanding the characters’ longing for vengeance, but Joy & Carnage reveals a better way.

This is me not complaining. I just burnt up an entire weekend preparing a fiction proposal for my literary agent, Dave Robie. But you know what? I'm not complaining a bit. My novel, Cold, has been finished for a long time and I'm on my second agent. Thankfully, on the second time around, I was picked up by a great guy that is positive about my work and, more importantly, returns my e-mails in a timely manner.

Some of you that know me know how long I've been pushing to get my manuscript seen. I know, because a couple of you have been bugging me to see it for about the same length of time.

Anyway, what this means is this: my manuscript now has a proposal that can be send to the aquisition editors of various publishing houses. Once that's done, I'll be waiting for a thumbs-up from one of them. I've got a few favorites, but I know my agent will find the best ones. Hopefully, he'll be able to make something out of the chicken scratch I call a proposal (I don't know how I made formatted text into chicken scratch, but I did) and we'll get this thing I call a would-be career moving.

To all of you, thanks for hanging in there with me.