1. A magical pair of shoes takes a heartfelt journey through time in an inimitable saga of a princess and her fight for sovereignty.
2. Two women, wounded by troubled childhoods, piece together discordant memories of family fables and poetic lies that have spiraled out of control.
3. Fi-Nicky, sent to an internment camp for a crime he did not commit, emerges as an unlikely leader of a grimalkin city of renegades in the Outer Sphere of life.
SECOND ASSIGNMENT: -
In 200 words or less, sketch the antagonist or antagonistic force in your story. Keep in mind their goals, their background, and the ways they react to the world about them.
STORY 1
This fanciful tale of a magical pair of shoes follows the footsteps of a princess stolen through time.
Scoundrels. In an intricate scheme, a band of thieves devise a plot to smuggle a precious heirloom from the queen of Soleville. Wending their way through the paradisiacal gardens of her palace grounds, they encounter the princess. Catching her off guard, they ensnare her in a trap and carry her off to a faraway land.
Marauders. Holding her in bondage, along with countless others snatched across the borders of familiarity, she is sold into slavery. Stripped of her possessions, save the clothing on her back and the shoes on her feet, her life is now governed by an ethos that is based upon the words and incantations of the Old Text.
With nothing more than her wits, she must draw upon inner strengthen to face powerful forces of evil and combat her way home.
STORY 2
This coming-of-age story explores the seesaw relationship between two girls as their upwardly mobile parents strive for success.
Fueled by ambition, Harlem Harper and Monica Sterling, first cousins, are determined to rise above social inequities at a time of political unrest. Raising their children amongst the shrill tones and chaotic beats of city life, they do their best to provide the structure needed to reach the pinnacle of success, but things go awry when expectations grow extreme, striking chords of resentment while pushing the threshold of tolerance beyond reasonable limits.
With stakes high, the adults are committed to maintaining their image of successful marriages, high achieving children, and upstanding accomplishments within the community. Under a code of silence, they insist that each child conform to a dutiful role that preserves the dignity of the family, but the children are unable to keep up the façade and fumble along the way, jeopardizing their reputations. Rebounding from these mistakes isn't easy, but they manage to fine tune their performance and restore the sound distinction of their legacy.
Under the spell of perfection, scattered memories rise to the crest when the children grow up, and as poignant truths of the past start to unravel, the foundation of everything the cousins revere begins to crumble, threatening to send each member of their raucous tribe tumbling off their mantle of power.
STORY 3
This furry tale tells the story of Fi-Nicky, a timid, but talented, moggy exiled from his colorful village and sentenced to the stark region of the Outer Sphere, leaving behind a sick mother and a life of dreams and purpose in this fanciful story of honor, justice, and redemption.
Bumpuss, an ill-tempered neighborhood bully, the Council of Whiskers, a defiled governing board, and The Order, an iniquitous decree that sets forth laws and edicts of the feline district, unite forces. With the overarching goal of subduing creativity and artistic expression, it rules with an iron paw, subduing individuality and establishing a world of programmed conformity.
Town residents, oppressed by the Council of Whiskers, rebel. Through organized protest, they rally against the corrupt authority, but the rulership strikes back, enacting harsh intimidation practices, stiff penalties, and lengthy incarcerations for insurrection.
The residents' revolt, strengthening their numbers, but this time the Council of Whiskers brings out the big guns with a new, chemically infused drug known as CatatonX, an addictive form of catnip designed to lull the senses, subdue neurological functions, and bring the citizens under complete and ultimate control.
THIRD ASSIGNMENT: -
Create a breakout title.
1. Emerald Slippers: The Sole Chronicles of an Unknown American Princess
2. Cradle Cousins: Black Lullabies and Blue Lyrics - Rhythms of a Family on the Edge
3. Scatland
FOURTH ASSIGNMENT: -
Develop two smart comparables for your novel. This is a good opportunity to immerse yourself in your chosen genre. Who compares to you? And why?
STORY 1
Roots (1976) by Alex Haley
The Wonderful Wizard of Oz (1903) by L. Frank Baum
Mulan: Five Versions of a Classic Chinese Legend with Related Texts (2010) Edited and Translated by Shiamin Kwa and Wilt L. Idema
Emerald Slippers: The Sole Chronicles of an Unknown American Princess draws inspiration from Roots, the story on an 18th century African captured as an adolescent and sold into slavery, the Wonderful Wizard of Oz, the iconic story of Dorothy, her ruby red slippers, and her search for home, and Mulan, the story of a young maiden who begins life in her cultural village where she becomes skilled in the martial arts and must rely on her early training and guidance from the ancestors to overcome adversity, meet her true-life destiny, and restore honor to her family.
Exploring thematic aspects of each of these stories, Emerald Slippers weaves a modern-day tale into an enchanting saga of a princess warrior abducted from her kingdom and transported a long way from home. Shielded by a unique family heirloom, a magical pair of Emerald Slippers, the story preserves themes of cultural identity, family honor, and fulfillment of destiny.
STORY 2.
For Colored Girls Who Have Considered Suicide When the Rainbow is Enuf (1975) by Ntozake Shange
The Friends (1974) by Rosa Guy
Cradle Cousins: Black Lullabies and Blue Lyrics is inspired by the colorful cadences and lyrical choreopoems of Ntozake Shange’s novel, For Colored Girls Who Have Considered Suicide When the Rainbow is Enuf. The story opens in the fictional setting of Wombsville, a community filled with urban harmonies, vibrant characters, and dialectal inflections delivered through song and spoken word. This evocative drama explores the unbreakable bond of two children and their dysfunctional families. Within their lives, relationships are tested and compromised through a lens of colorism and class consciousness, as explored in Rosa Guy’s novel, The Friends.
STORY 3
The Lion King (1994) Screenplay by Irene Mecchi, Jonathan Roberts, and Linda Woolverton
Old Possum’s Book of Practical Cats (1939) by TS Elliott
Scatland, drawing inspiration from The Lion King and Old Possum’s Book of Practical Cats, delves into the nature and psychology of Fi-Nicky, a young moggy exiled from the dreamy landscape of Oneiro Harbor and remanded to the Outer Sphere, where he is starved of inspiration and must somehow find a way to nourish his soul to save himself from demise and his shantytown from destruction.
FIFTH ASSIGNMENT: -
Write your own hook line (logline) with conflict and core wound.
1. Emerald Slippers: The Sole Chronicles of an Unknown American Princess
A magical heirloom, stolen with an abducted princess, trails a lost generation of travelers in their long journey home.
2. Cradle Cousin: Black Lullabies and Blue Lyrics - Rhythms of a Family on the Edge.
Two lifelong companions, tormented by jarring childhood memories, are forced to revisit buried secrets, bruised egos, and mournful ballads in a family on the brink of success …(or disaster).
3. Scatland
Fi-Nicky, banished to the Outer Sphere, a condemned community on the outskirts of the city emerges from exile to save his shantytown from destruction and restore it to its prior glory.
SIXTH ASSIGNMENT: -
Sketch out the conditions for the inner conflict your protagonist will have. Why will they feel in turmoil? Conflicted? Anxious? Sketch out one hypothetical scenario in the story wherein this would be the case--consider the trigger and the reaction.
Next, likewise sketch a hypothetical scenario for the “secondary conflict” involving the social environment. Will this involve family? Friends? Associates? What is the nature of it?
1. Emerald Slippers: The Sole Chronicles of an Unknown American Princess
Emerald Slippers: The Sole Chronicles of an Unknown American Princess is an enchanted tale of a magical pair of shoes that travel across time and follow the saga of a young royal. The story unfolds in the civilization of Ngome Ya Kiatu, a mystical city in the mountains of Mlima Wa Mbinguni where Solena, a princess warrior is captured from her homeland and sold into slavery.
With only the clothes on her back and a simple pair of shoes, she is left bereft and vulnerable in an unknown land. The gravity of her circumstances strikes the cord of her heartstrings. While she has demonstrated great physical prowess in the past, the life she has been transported to is nothing close to anything she has ever experienced, and she is no longer confident in her ability to protect herself. Held in bondage, she goes through a stage of deep inner conflict resulting from the choices she has at her disposal. Her natural instincts tell her to fight, but dare she try to defend herself from the wrath of the slaveowners and brutal lash of the whip?
Contemplation of resistance and uprising versus compliance and self-preservation are key inner conflicts that continually play out during her period of captivity. Central to this struggle is her feeling of loss of family and country. She passes through the stages of grief and undergoes a long period of healing, along the way experiencing shock and denial, pain and guilt, anger and bargaining, depression, the upward turn, reconstruction and working through, and acceptance and hope.
While these steps serve as the impetus for change and character growth, as demonstrated over the course of her journey in an unfamiliar land, they are constantly battling and shifting within her as she migrates along the path of an unsettling world.
Secondary, to these conflicts, are the challenges that emerge from the social environment as she passes down the unfamiliar customs and traditions of her birthland. It is through these interactions that curiosities are raised among the plantation owners, slave women, and the lustful men that become intrigued with her performance. As the power of the magical slippers transforms her environment, it also brings unwelcome attention, sparking envy and suspicion in newly forged relationships that are crucial for her survival and search for home.
2. Cradle Cousins: Black Lullabies and Blue Lyrics - Rhythms of a Family on the Edge
Cradle Cousins: Black Lullabies and Blue Lyrics, Rhythms of a Family on the Edge is a coming-of-age novel that explores the seesaw relationship between two girls as their upwardly mobile parents strive for success amid a period of political unrest and strident protests. Sparrow Sterling, brainy, shy, and timid, adores her favorite cousin and best friend, Laire Harper, a privileged teenager who seems to have it all. Not only is she beautiful, popular, and sociable, but she also has wonderful parents—something Sparrow craves.
The two girls, born on the same date at the same hospital, are as close as sisters, but at the season of their thirteenth summer, things begin to change. The colors of their lives start to fade and the harmonious melodies that once filled their days of youth reduces to silence.
Competition swirls, and as Sparrow finds herself continually overshadowed by her exuberant cousin, resentment builds. Laire, the unspoken favorite, is charismatic and sweet, yet she also has a side to her that is entitled and manipulative. Able to turn on the charm, she gains the advantage in most situations and manages to have the best of everything, so when Sparrow, who often gets the short end of the stick, discovers a secret that will rock her cousin’s picture-perfect world, a sneaky plot is hatched. Amid her plan for attack, the lives of the adults begin to ruin.
Sparrow, watching events spiral out of control, experiences a deep sense of inner conflict, vacillating between being secretly happy about her cousin’s misfortunes and guilty that she has been the one to set the pendulum in motion. Simultaneously, she also wrestles with family loyalties and betrayal of secrets, conflicts that further amplify when a life altering truth is finally revealed, causing each member to come to grips with the magnitude of what it means to bear the weight of forbidden knowledge and the price that come along with it, a discovery that will push one member over the crest of sanity.
3. Scatland
Scatland is a furry tale about a young moggy named Fi-Nicky, a brilliant artist with a timid nature that made him a target for bullies. Believing himself inferior, he frequently doubted his abilities and consumed himself, daily, in perfecting his craft.
In the open outdoors, he created inspiration. Oneiro Harbor, an enclave of dreams, is where he spent most of his days. Paint can in hand, he sprayed along a community wall. Starting with a dark outline of letters, he filled in the hollow spaces with bright, vibrant colors. Standing back, he read:
"It's your get up that shows your pedigree.”
The message, of large block letters, glistened boldly in the sun.
Admiring his handiwork, Fi-Nicky didn't notice the approach of Bumpuss, a cateran who disdained competition. Sneaking up behind him to examine the work, he grimaced at the quality and with furrowed brows began to taunt.
“I’m about to lay paws on you,” he said.
Fi-Nicky, the smaller of the two, turned round to face the shadow of a cat whose eyes were dark and mean.
“I didn’t do anything,” he said, his voice quivering with fright.
“But you did,” Bumpuss retorted. “And now you have to pay.”
He leaned forward and flinched, causing Fi-Nicky to startle. The can of paint dropped and rolled onto the ground. From behind, the crisp voice of a Leaper shouted.
“Leave him alone,” it said. “He won’t stand up for himself, but I will.”
The Leapers were well-known for interfering with The Order, ways of the Outer Sphere that were dictated by The Council of Whiskers.
Bumpuss stopped in his tracks and turned round to face Tabius, a mangy, unfettered chap who looked as though he could handle a scrape or two.
“Stay out of it,” Bumpuss warned.
“I will not allow bullying on my grounds,” Tabius responded. “In case you’ve forgotten…”
He pounced. Without a moment’s delay, the two become a tangle of knots.
Bumpuss appeared to have gotten the worst end of the scuffle. He lay on the ground with the old chap, Tabius, seated upon his chest.
Fi-Nicky found his way out of the fracas and galloped home. His furry legs couldn’t carry him there fast enough.
* * *
Nganga had been summoned to a tent, in the corner of which laid a frail feline who was curled into a ball on top of an old cushion that had been placed inside a wicker basket.
“I have been told that I am dying,” the feline said. Her voice was frail and thin.
“Retrovirus?” Nganga asked.
The feline shook her head sadly.
“The only thing I ask for is help with Fi-Nicky. He is a good child and will need someone to look after him, well after I am gone.”
“What’s going on mother?” a timid voice rang from the doorway of the room.
Fi-Nicky had been standing there listening. No one had heard him enter. In an awkward silence, Nganga turned to depart.
“I will leave you two to talk,” he said.
Behind him, the eyes of a frightened mother and Fi-Nicky, the child she loved beyond measure, met across the room.
Meanwhile, Bumpuss was sore and bitter. Stopping to lick his wounds, he urged himself to proceed with a formal report. Lifting his chin and pulling up his chest, he forced himself to get a grip. Tail, tucked between his legs, he straightened it. A respectable appearance is what he was going for, but his muscles ached. He limped along until reaching The Council of Whiskers. There, he informed his band of allies about the latest encounter.
Commissioning a board meeting, The Council agreed that the colony of artists would have to be regulated. Reaching consensus, they outlined a new set of laws to restrict their activities, but that wasn’t all. They now placed further sanctions on the residents. Given the most recent infractions, Fi-Nicky was to be made an example. The decree was set and recorded in The Order. He was to be banished to the Outer Sphere, a cold, mechanical world where life was measured and controlled without regard for individual expression.
Fi-Nicky was exiled at once. In the Outer Sphere, he was contained in an interment camp where he was starved of inspiration. Dispirited, he tried his best to remain calm and compliant with the hope that he would be sent back home soon, but the days stretch into months and the months stretched into years, and as he becomes older, maturity set in. Looking at himself in the reflection of a mirror, he was no longer the same. The progression of seasons had altered him. It was change that was marked, that day. by a letter from home. Delivered to him by a guardsman, he opened it and read, and thus he experienced a secondary conflict.
It was his mother. She had not long to live. Enduring the decree of exile was heartbreaking enough, but when Fi-Nicky received word that his mother had only a short number of days, he was devastated. In a separate paragraph, it was also written that the entire shantytown had been infiltrated with CatanonX, a government drug to dull the senses of the residents.
The situation looked bleak, not good at all. With the people no longer able to advocate for themselves, the village was being demolished with a brand-new development being built for the Council of Whiskers. Fi-Nicky, incensed by the waggery of it all, felt a shift inside himself. His courage began to rise. Within a short period of time, he reached a decision. He was going to leave. Escape. With the goal of returning home to visit his mother one last time, Fi-Nicky was ready to face the town bully and rebuild Oneiro Harbor.
FINAL ASSIGNMENT: -
Emerald Slippers: The Sole Chronicles of an Unknown American Princess
Mlima Wa Mbinguni was a moorland so tall it was said that to have it climbed it one would see the gates of paradise. Hence, it was called Heavenly Mountain. At its foot was an expansive ocean with giant waves that crashed against the phalanges of jagged rock at the sole of its foundation. Surrounding it were the seven isles of Nguzo Saba: Umoja (Unity), Kujichagulia (Self-determination), Ujima (Collective Work and Responsibility), Ujamaa (Cooperative Economics), Nia (Purpose), Kuumba (Creativity), and Imani (Faith).
Overlooking the isles was a stronghold built high upon a bluff of stone that served as the mantle place of the people of the sole. Enclosed, within its quarters, was a garden that ebbed and flowed in precise symmetry along with four quadrants smartly divided by lengthy canals and springs of water that were interspersed along an abundant acreage of exotic trees and foliage meticulously arranged in an even pattern of distribution. At its center was a castle, Ngome Ya Kiatu, an oddly shaped bastion that had stood proud and firm for five generations in the dynasty of Soleville. It was here that Solena stumbled and fell.
Cradle Cousins: Black Lullabies and Blue Lyrics - Rhythms of a Family on the Edge
Wombsville, a small hamlet on the West Side of Manhattan, was an enclave where Sistahs in all colors, shapes, and sizes reigned supreme. It was the birthplace of rhythm and the heart space of blues, a vibrant neighborhood on the edge of greatness. Located along the perimeter of the city, it was outlined on the town map as an inverted triangle, overlaid with outstretched arms and fimbriae. Affectionally dubbed as a haven for women, the neighborhood, once frequented by horses and buggies, now showcased an array of prewar brownstones, subsidized co-ops, and a Federal housing project. It was a lively community on the precipice of change.
The story unfolds along Fallopian Street where Black angels, carved into a wrought iron fence, was the last of what remained of a citadel that had been erected to protect enslaved Africans who fled the Antebellum South and found refuge in the welcome embrace of a community where hope and fertility was celebrated as a place of new beginnings.
Visitors were invited to enter through a gate described as an original construction of old-world workmanship. At its center was an aperture, a hollow space with the shape of a large, flat head, ringed neck, and tubular body with small arms that stuck out from its sides. Made to resemble the form of a woman, it was referred to as an Akua’ba, a symbol of fruitfulness, designed to unlock with an iron key. When opened, the door swung back to reveal a cobble stone path that carried with it a song, as its hinges spring forth a melody of chords that set the tone for love, harmony, and sisterly embrace through an archetype that had been carefully chosen as a trope of divine ordination. So, begins the story.
Scatland
Learn. Oneiro Harbor, a shantytown of dwellings along a boating pier, was a purlieu for scribblers. A scraggly group, they expressed themselves through the fine art of graffito. Occupying their days with Scratchery, a unique form of spray tags, handwritten scrawls, and a colorful arrangement of wall paintings, they spent their days decorating along a block of brick and mortar.
For the most part, the residents were vagrants purposed with survival. Living out of makeshift tents and homes of eclectic textiles, they referred to this place as home. A long stretch of the imagination, it served as a refuge to those in the outer sphere of life.
Caboodle. Lined up along the street were brittle boxes of cardboard. Its corrugated packaging repelled the scent of rotting fish. It wasn’t entirely effective, of course, but modestly helpful, nonetheless. The shelter, a series of connected square and rectangular cubicles, served as a barrier that extended well into the air. Across the street, from that row of crooked crags, a cadre of warehouses stood, firmly, at attention. It was there that a creature peeked from the frame of a window overlooking the slush of contaminated river water where two toughs were squaring off, or so it seemed.
New York Pitch and Algonkian Pre-event Assignments - 2022
in New York Write to Pitch 2023 and 2024
Posted
FIRST ASSIGNMENT: -
MOTHER CARACAL’S STORIES OF THE WOMB
[A TRILOGY]
"Whoever heard of such a thing?
You're about to find out!"
Mother Caracal.
Story statements.
1. A magical pair of shoes takes a heartfelt journey through time in an inimitable saga of a princess and her fight for sovereignty.
2. Two women, wounded by troubled childhoods, piece together discordant memories of family fables and poetic lies that have spiraled out of control.
3. Fi-Nicky, sent to an internment camp for a crime he did not commit, emerges as an unlikely leader of a grimalkin city of renegades in the Outer Sphere of life.
SECOND ASSIGNMENT: -
In 200 words or less, sketch the antagonist or antagonistic force in your story. Keep in mind their goals, their background, and the ways they react to the world about them.
STORY 1
This fanciful tale of a magical pair of shoes follows the footsteps of a princess stolen through time.
Scoundrels. In an intricate scheme, a band of thieves devise a plot to smuggle a precious heirloom from the queen of Soleville. Wending their way through the paradisiacal gardens of her palace grounds, they encounter the princess. Catching her off guard, they ensnare her in a trap and carry her off to a faraway land.
Marauders. Holding her in bondage, along with countless others snatched across the borders of familiarity, she is sold into slavery. Stripped of her possessions, save the clothing on her back and the shoes on her feet, her life is now governed by an ethos that is based upon the words and incantations of the Old Text.
With nothing more than her wits, she must draw upon inner strengthen to face powerful forces of evil and combat her way home.
STORY 2
This coming-of-age story explores the seesaw relationship between two girls as their upwardly mobile parents strive for success.
Fueled by ambition, Harlem Harper and Monica Sterling, first cousins, are determined to rise above social inequities at a time of political unrest. Raising their children amongst the shrill tones and chaotic beats of city life, they do their best to provide the structure needed to reach the pinnacle of success, but things go awry when expectations grow extreme, striking chords of resentment while pushing the threshold of tolerance beyond reasonable limits.
With stakes high, the adults are committed to maintaining their image of successful marriages, high achieving children, and upstanding accomplishments within the community. Under a code of silence, they insist that each child conform to a dutiful role that preserves the dignity of the family, but the children are unable to keep up the façade and fumble along the way, jeopardizing their reputations. Rebounding from these mistakes isn't easy, but they manage to fine tune their performance and restore the sound distinction of their legacy.
Under the spell of perfection, scattered memories rise to the crest when the children grow up, and as poignant truths of the past start to unravel, the foundation of everything the cousins revere begins to crumble, threatening to send each member of their raucous tribe tumbling off their mantle of power.
STORY 3
This furry tale tells the story of Fi-Nicky, a timid, but talented, moggy exiled from his colorful village and sentenced to the stark region of the Outer Sphere, leaving behind a sick mother and a life of dreams and purpose in this fanciful story of honor, justice, and redemption.
Bumpuss, an ill-tempered neighborhood bully, the Council of Whiskers, a defiled governing board, and The Order, an iniquitous decree that sets forth laws and edicts of the feline district, unite forces. With the overarching goal of subduing creativity and artistic expression, it rules with an iron paw, subduing individuality and establishing a world of programmed conformity.
Town residents, oppressed by the Council of Whiskers, rebel. Through organized protest, they rally against the corrupt authority, but the rulership strikes back, enacting harsh intimidation practices, stiff penalties, and lengthy incarcerations for insurrection.
The residents' revolt, strengthening their numbers, but this time the Council of Whiskers brings out the big guns with a new, chemically infused drug known as CatatonX, an addictive form of catnip designed to lull the senses, subdue neurological functions, and bring the citizens under complete and ultimate control.
THIRD ASSIGNMENT: -
Create a breakout title.
1. Emerald Slippers: The Sole Chronicles of an Unknown American Princess
2. Cradle Cousins: Black Lullabies and Blue Lyrics - Rhythms of a Family on the Edge
3. Scatland
FOURTH ASSIGNMENT: -
Develop two smart comparables for your novel. This is a good opportunity to immerse yourself in your chosen genre. Who compares to you? And why?
STORY 1
Emerald Slippers: The Sole Chronicles of an Unknown American Princess draws inspiration from Roots, the story on an 18th century African captured as an adolescent and sold into slavery, the Wonderful Wizard of Oz, the iconic story of Dorothy, her ruby red slippers, and her search for home, and Mulan, the story of a young maiden who begins life in her cultural village where she becomes skilled in the martial arts and must rely on her early training and guidance from the ancestors to overcome adversity, meet her true-life destiny, and restore honor to her family.
Exploring thematic aspects of each of these stories, Emerald Slippers weaves a modern-day tale into an enchanting saga of a princess warrior abducted from her kingdom and transported a long way from home. Shielded by a unique family heirloom, a magical pair of Emerald Slippers, the story preserves themes of cultural identity, family honor, and fulfillment of destiny.
STORY 2.
Cradle Cousins: Black Lullabies and Blue Lyrics is inspired by the colorful cadences and lyrical choreopoems of Ntozake Shange’s novel, For Colored Girls Who Have Considered Suicide When the Rainbow is Enuf. The story opens in the fictional setting of Wombsville, a community filled with urban harmonies, vibrant characters, and dialectal inflections delivered through song and spoken word. This evocative drama explores the unbreakable bond of two children and their dysfunctional families. Within their lives, relationships are tested and compromised through a lens of colorism and class consciousness, as explored in Rosa Guy’s novel, The Friends.
STORY 3
Scatland, drawing inspiration from The Lion King and Old Possum’s Book of Practical Cats, delves into the nature and psychology of Fi-Nicky, a young moggy exiled from the dreamy landscape of Oneiro Harbor and remanded to the Outer Sphere, where he is starved of inspiration and must somehow find a way to nourish his soul to save himself from demise and his shantytown from destruction.
FIFTH ASSIGNMENT: -
Write your own hook line (logline) with conflict and core wound.
1. Emerald Slippers: The Sole Chronicles of an Unknown American Princess
A magical heirloom, stolen with an abducted princess, trails a lost generation of travelers in their long journey home.
2. Cradle Cousin: Black Lullabies and Blue Lyrics - Rhythms of a Family on the Edge.
Two lifelong companions, tormented by jarring childhood memories, are forced to revisit buried secrets, bruised egos, and mournful ballads in a family on the brink of success …(or disaster).
3. Scatland
Fi-Nicky, banished to the Outer Sphere, a condemned community on the outskirts of the city emerges from exile to save his shantytown from destruction and restore it to its prior glory.
SIXTH ASSIGNMENT: -
Sketch out the conditions for the inner conflict your protagonist will have. Why will they feel in turmoil? Conflicted? Anxious? Sketch out one hypothetical scenario in the story wherein this would be the case--consider the trigger and the reaction.
Next, likewise sketch a hypothetical scenario for the “secondary conflict” involving the social environment. Will this involve family? Friends? Associates? What is the nature of it?
1. Emerald Slippers: The Sole Chronicles of an Unknown American Princess
Emerald Slippers: The Sole Chronicles of an Unknown American Princess is an enchanted tale of a magical pair of shoes that travel across time and follow the saga of a young royal. The story unfolds in the civilization of Ngome Ya Kiatu, a mystical city in the mountains of Mlima Wa Mbinguni where Solena, a princess warrior is captured from her homeland and sold into slavery.
With only the clothes on her back and a simple pair of shoes, she is left bereft and vulnerable in an unknown land. The gravity of her circumstances strikes the cord of her heartstrings. While she has demonstrated great physical prowess in the past, the life she has been transported to is nothing close to anything she has ever experienced, and she is no longer confident in her ability to protect herself. Held in bondage, she goes through a stage of deep inner conflict resulting from the choices she has at her disposal. Her natural instincts tell her to fight, but dare she try to defend herself from the wrath of the slaveowners and brutal lash of the whip?
Contemplation of resistance and uprising versus compliance and self-preservation are key inner conflicts that continually play out during her period of captivity. Central to this struggle is her feeling of loss of family and country. She passes through the stages of grief and undergoes a long period of healing, along the way experiencing shock and denial, pain and guilt, anger and bargaining, depression, the upward turn, reconstruction and working through, and acceptance and hope.
While these steps serve as the impetus for change and character growth, as demonstrated over the course of her journey in an unfamiliar land, they are constantly battling and shifting within her as she migrates along the path of an unsettling world.
Secondary, to these conflicts, are the challenges that emerge from the social environment as she passes down the unfamiliar customs and traditions of her birthland. It is through these interactions that curiosities are raised among the plantation owners, slave women, and the lustful men that become intrigued with her performance. As the power of the magical slippers transforms her environment, it also brings unwelcome attention, sparking envy and suspicion in newly forged relationships that are crucial for her survival and search for home.
2. Cradle Cousins: Black Lullabies and Blue Lyrics - Rhythms of a Family on the Edge
Cradle Cousins: Black Lullabies and Blue Lyrics, Rhythms of a Family on the Edge is a coming-of-age novel that explores the seesaw relationship between two girls as their upwardly mobile parents strive for success amid a period of political unrest and strident protests. Sparrow Sterling, brainy, shy, and timid, adores her favorite cousin and best friend, Laire Harper, a privileged teenager who seems to have it all. Not only is she beautiful, popular, and sociable, but she also has wonderful parents—something Sparrow craves.
The two girls, born on the same date at the same hospital, are as close as sisters, but at the season of their thirteenth summer, things begin to change. The colors of their lives start to fade and the harmonious melodies that once filled their days of youth reduces to silence.
Competition swirls, and as Sparrow finds herself continually overshadowed by her exuberant cousin, resentment builds. Laire, the unspoken favorite, is charismatic and sweet, yet she also has a side to her that is entitled and manipulative. Able to turn on the charm, she gains the advantage in most situations and manages to have the best of everything, so when Sparrow, who often gets the short end of the stick, discovers a secret that will rock her cousin’s picture-perfect world, a sneaky plot is hatched. Amid her plan for attack, the lives of the adults begin to ruin.
Sparrow, watching events spiral out of control, experiences a deep sense of inner conflict, vacillating between being secretly happy about her cousin’s misfortunes and guilty that she has been the one to set the pendulum in motion. Simultaneously, she also wrestles with family loyalties and betrayal of secrets, conflicts that further amplify when a life altering truth is finally revealed, causing each member to come to grips with the magnitude of what it means to bear the weight of forbidden knowledge and the price that come along with it, a discovery that will push one member over the crest of sanity.
3. Scatland
Scatland is a furry tale about a young moggy named Fi-Nicky, a brilliant artist with a timid nature that made him a target for bullies. Believing himself inferior, he frequently doubted his abilities and consumed himself, daily, in perfecting his craft.
In the open outdoors, he created inspiration. Oneiro Harbor, an enclave of dreams, is where he spent most of his days. Paint can in hand, he sprayed along a community wall. Starting with a dark outline of letters, he filled in the hollow spaces with bright, vibrant colors. Standing back, he read:
"It's your get up that shows your pedigree.”
The message, of large block letters, glistened boldly in the sun.
Admiring his handiwork, Fi-Nicky didn't notice the approach of Bumpuss, a cateran who disdained competition. Sneaking up behind him to examine the work, he grimaced at the quality and with furrowed brows began to taunt.
“I’m about to lay paws on you,” he said.
Fi-Nicky, the smaller of the two, turned round to face the shadow of a cat whose eyes were dark and mean.
“I didn’t do anything,” he said, his voice quivering with fright.
“But you did,” Bumpuss retorted. “And now you have to pay.”
He leaned forward and flinched, causing Fi-Nicky to startle. The can of paint dropped and rolled onto the ground. From behind, the crisp voice of a Leaper shouted.
“Leave him alone,” it said. “He won’t stand up for himself, but I will.”
The Leapers were well-known for interfering with The Order, ways of the Outer Sphere that were dictated by The Council of Whiskers.
Bumpuss stopped in his tracks and turned round to face Tabius, a mangy, unfettered chap who looked as though he could handle a scrape or two.
“Stay out of it,” Bumpuss warned.
“I will not allow bullying on my grounds,” Tabius responded. “In case you’ve forgotten…”
He pounced. Without a moment’s delay, the two become a tangle of knots.
Bumpuss appeared to have gotten the worst end of the scuffle. He lay on the ground with the old chap, Tabius, seated upon his chest.
Fi-Nicky found his way out of the fracas and galloped home. His furry legs couldn’t carry him there fast enough.
* * *
Nganga had been summoned to a tent, in the corner of which laid a frail feline who was curled into a ball on top of an old cushion that had been placed inside a wicker basket.
“I have been told that I am dying,” the feline said. Her voice was frail and thin.
“Retrovirus?” Nganga asked.
The feline shook her head sadly.
“The only thing I ask for is help with Fi-Nicky. He is a good child and will need someone to look after him, well after I am gone.”
“What’s going on mother?” a timid voice rang from the doorway of the room.
Fi-Nicky had been standing there listening. No one had heard him enter. In an awkward silence, Nganga turned to depart.
“I will leave you two to talk,” he said.
Behind him, the eyes of a frightened mother and Fi-Nicky, the child she loved beyond measure, met across the room.
Meanwhile, Bumpuss was sore and bitter. Stopping to lick his wounds, he urged himself to proceed with a formal report. Lifting his chin and pulling up his chest, he forced himself to get a grip. Tail, tucked between his legs, he straightened it. A respectable appearance is what he was going for, but his muscles ached. He limped along until reaching The Council of Whiskers. There, he informed his band of allies about the latest encounter.
Commissioning a board meeting, The Council agreed that the colony of artists would have to be regulated. Reaching consensus, they outlined a new set of laws to restrict their activities, but that wasn’t all. They now placed further sanctions on the residents. Given the most recent infractions, Fi-Nicky was to be made an example. The decree was set and recorded in The Order. He was to be banished to the Outer Sphere, a cold, mechanical world where life was measured and controlled without regard for individual expression.
Fi-Nicky was exiled at once. In the Outer Sphere, he was contained in an interment camp where he was starved of inspiration. Dispirited, he tried his best to remain calm and compliant with the hope that he would be sent back home soon, but the days stretch into months and the months stretched into years, and as he becomes older, maturity set in. Looking at himself in the reflection of a mirror, he was no longer the same. The progression of seasons had altered him. It was change that was marked, that day. by a letter from home. Delivered to him by a guardsman, he opened it and read, and thus he experienced a secondary conflict.
It was his mother. She had not long to live. Enduring the decree of exile was heartbreaking enough, but when Fi-Nicky received word that his mother had only a short number of days, he was devastated. In a separate paragraph, it was also written that the entire shantytown had been infiltrated with CatanonX, a government drug to dull the senses of the residents.
The situation looked bleak, not good at all. With the people no longer able to advocate for themselves, the village was being demolished with a brand-new development being built for the Council of Whiskers. Fi-Nicky, incensed by the waggery of it all, felt a shift inside himself. His courage began to rise. Within a short period of time, he reached a decision. He was going to leave. Escape. With the goal of returning home to visit his mother one last time, Fi-Nicky was ready to face the town bully and rebuild Oneiro Harbor.
FINAL ASSIGNMENT: -
Emerald Slippers: The Sole Chronicles of an Unknown American Princess
Mlima Wa Mbinguni was a moorland so tall it was said that to have it climbed it one would see the gates of paradise. Hence, it was called Heavenly Mountain. At its foot was an expansive ocean with giant waves that crashed against the phalanges of jagged rock at the sole of its foundation. Surrounding it were the seven isles of Nguzo Saba: Umoja (Unity), Kujichagulia (Self-determination), Ujima (Collective Work and Responsibility), Ujamaa (Cooperative Economics), Nia (Purpose), Kuumba (Creativity), and Imani (Faith).
Overlooking the isles was a stronghold built high upon a bluff of stone that served as the mantle place of the people of the sole. Enclosed, within its quarters, was a garden that ebbed and flowed in precise symmetry along with four quadrants smartly divided by lengthy canals and springs of water that were interspersed along an abundant acreage of exotic trees and foliage meticulously arranged in an even pattern of distribution. At its center was a castle, Ngome Ya Kiatu, an oddly shaped bastion that had stood proud and firm for five generations in the dynasty of Soleville. It was here that Solena stumbled and fell.
Cradle Cousins: Black Lullabies and Blue Lyrics - Rhythms of a Family on the Edge
Wombsville, a small hamlet on the West Side of Manhattan, was an enclave where Sistahs in all colors, shapes, and sizes reigned supreme. It was the birthplace of rhythm and the heart space of blues, a vibrant neighborhood on the edge of greatness. Located along the perimeter of the city, it was outlined on the town map as an inverted triangle, overlaid with outstretched arms and fimbriae. Affectionally dubbed as a haven for women, the neighborhood, once frequented by horses and buggies, now showcased an array of prewar brownstones, subsidized co-ops, and a Federal housing project. It was a lively community on the precipice of change.
The story unfolds along Fallopian Street where Black angels, carved into a wrought iron fence, was the last of what remained of a citadel that had been erected to protect enslaved Africans who fled the Antebellum South and found refuge in the welcome embrace of a community where hope and fertility was celebrated as a place of new beginnings.
Visitors were invited to enter through a gate described as an original construction of old-world workmanship. At its center was an aperture, a hollow space with the shape of a large, flat head, ringed neck, and tubular body with small arms that stuck out from its sides. Made to resemble the form of a woman, it was referred to as an Akua’ba, a symbol of fruitfulness, designed to unlock with an iron key. When opened, the door swung back to reveal a cobble stone path that carried with it a song, as its hinges spring forth a melody of chords that set the tone for love, harmony, and sisterly embrace through an archetype that had been carefully chosen as a trope of divine ordination. So, begins the story.
Scatland
Learn. Oneiro Harbor, a shantytown of dwellings along a boating pier, was a purlieu for scribblers. A scraggly group, they expressed themselves through the fine art of graffito. Occupying their days with Scratchery, a unique form of spray tags, handwritten scrawls, and a colorful arrangement of wall paintings, they spent their days decorating along a block of brick and mortar.
For the most part, the residents were vagrants purposed with survival. Living out of makeshift tents and homes of eclectic textiles, they referred to this place as home. A long stretch of the imagination, it served as a refuge to those in the outer sphere of life.
Caboodle. Lined up along the street were brittle boxes of cardboard. Its corrugated packaging repelled the scent of rotting fish. It wasn’t entirely effective, of course, but modestly helpful, nonetheless. The shelter, a series of connected square and rectangular cubicles, served as a barrier that extended well into the air. Across the street, from that row of crooked crags, a cadre of warehouses stood, firmly, at attention. It was there that a creature peeked from the frame of a window overlooking the slush of contaminated river water where two toughs were squaring off, or so it seemed.