New writing projects on the horizon

I have been writing daily letters to a dear friend of mine, who is away at her first year of college. Today I wrote my last letter to her telling her about my new writing project that I plan to begin tomorrow which is the first day of National Novel Writing Month, better known on the web as NaNoWriMo. So I thought I would share my ambitions with all of you as well.

I am literally days away from publishing my first novel on Amazon which will be available through the Kindle. The book is called "A Haunting at Mackinac" and it has been professionally edited so I'm hoping it fairs a little better than other books that are similarly published. But all that aside, the book is about a girl who is psychic. She is riding the wave of the "spiritualists" of the twenties when table tapping was a common parlor activity for people who wanted some excitement in their lives. However, this girl is the real deal. She can not only read other people's thoughts but she can also talk with spirits. She also tends to open up these gifts in other people around her.

When she arrives at Mackinac Island she awakens a sleeping evil spirit which begins to haunt the Island. The very fact that she is there is what triggers this to happen. But once it does, she has to figure out why it is happening and how to rid the Island of this evil entity. She makes some friends who help her along the way by doing research for her and protecting her in various ways both physically and spiritually. One of these helpers is a 100+ year-old Ojibway Medicine Man by the name of Kineekuhowa. Kineekuhowa helps her discover who the evil spirit is and gives her the means by which she can destroy it.

For Nanowrimo this year I intend to write a book that I have been wanting to write for a few years now. I got the idea while I was working at Polk. It started while I was compiling info for the city directory and I came across the name "Blackburn." I thought about what kind of fictional character someone named Blackburn would have to be and soon I had the main character for a book. Then I transported this character into an idea to write a fictional version of an incident that happened on Mackinac Island during and after the war of 1812 which was fought, in part, on the Island. In the years that passed since I have fleshed out the story several times and now it is fully realized inside my head and awaiting the time it will take to write it down. So now is my opportunity! Starting tonight at Midnight, I will be writing it!

Kineekuhowa is a minor character in this book too. During the War of 1812 legend has it that Kineekuhowa's mother went into premature labor giving birth to him in the same hour that the redcoats took the fort on the Island. In fact this is not so. Kineekuhowa was a boy of about ten years of age when the fort was taken. He had been sent down to the town with a message by his father who was a soldier at the fort, a tracker by the name of Gitchi Mug-wa, or Great Bear. The message was that the Ojibwa people needed to leave the Island at once, because the red coats were battering the bluffs. All the Native American people's got in their canoes and went to the mainland. It wasn't long before the American soldiers joined them.

I am nearly finished with a book called "Tessa's Travels" (for more about this book see my Blog of the same name, linked to the right). In this book, Tessa meets up with the descendants of Kineekuhowa who adopt her into their tribe. When they tell her about Kineekuhowa it is because the Windigo (evil spirit) who is after Tessa in this book is also expected of killing Kineekuhowa in the early sixties. It is said that Kineekuhowa died the same week as John F. Kennedy, and that he died under unusual circumstances. He did not die of natural causes like a man of 150 years probably should. It is said that he might have had the blood of the Bird People in him. I will talk more about the Bird People later as I develop these two stories.

So for a Character that started out in my first novel as a minor after-thought, Kineekuhowa has developed into a full-fledged icon of my writing. I would love for someone to come up with a drawing of Kineekuhowa for the release of my novel. He is about 112 years old when this story takes place, and he is described as looking a lot like the actor Floyd Red Crow Westerman who played Ten Bears in Dances with Wolves. He has white hair that is braided in a thin braid that hangs down the middle of his back past his waist and is tied with a piece of leather. In the book his great-grandson makes him a medicine headdress out of a carved piece of a hollow log worn as a crown and has embedded dear antlers. To announce his coming he sends Alina a Mandala made with a rabbit skin, and decorated with Buffalo wool and bird feathers. These are all elements I would like on my cover art.

I will try working something up on Paintshop Pro. I am told that cover art is very important for book sales.

I'll write more on my progress toward this goal later. Meanwhile I have one novel that I want to try to finish as best I can tonight before Midnight and then after midnight a new novel!

I got my work cut out for me!

Cindy K.-K.