Peggy: The origins of SKY JUMPERS

Sky Jumpers began in an airplane in 2009. My family and I were flying home from Disney World, on a day when most of the country was covered in clouds. I sat by the window, staring out at the clouds below us, and imagining how much fun it would be to jump out of the airplane and have the clouds catch me. To slow my fall. (Just for the record: clouds will not slow your fall. I recommend you not trying this just to be sure.) The thoughts of what that would be like if it were possible were so exhilarating, that I couldn’t shake them.

(Now you're really wanting to test the clouds-slowing-your-fall theory, aren't you?)

And since clouds can’t actually catch you (sigh), I started thinking about what properties of air could change that would make it more dense feeling, and to give it enough substance that it would be able to slow the fall of a person jumping into it. And then once that dense air— the deadly Bomb’s Breath— came into existence, I had to figure out what happened to our world that would’ve caused something as big as that to happen to our environment. The answer was bombs large enough to destroy almost everything, without destroying the land itself. The “green” bombs of WWIII came to be.

From there, I had to pick a location for my story to take place. I have always lived in a valley teeming with life and surrounded by towering mountains.

Beautiful, no? I'm kind of in love with my mountains.

They are such a massive force in themselves, and have always made me feel protected. Safe. For my book, I wanted it to take place somewhere open and desolate, since it mirrored how the population of the world was— sparse. So I chose Nebraska. An area that’s as flat and open as I could imagine. But for the Bomb’s Breath to be both an asset and a danger, as well as a strong source of conflict, my characters and the town they lived in needed to be at a higher elevation so they could reach it.

So I thought, what could be a more fascinating and ironic place for a town to thrive, than in one of the giant craters left behind by the very bombs that wiped out most of the population?

The diameter of the crater is ten miles wide from mountaintop to mountaintop, so plenty big enough to house an entire town. And just like the valley I’ve grown up in, the crater that the town of White Rock lives in is teeming with life, and those mountains surrounding them, along with the Bomb’s Breath that covers the crater, gives them a level of protection unparalleled for hundreds and hundreds of miles.

And of course, if they’re somewhere that feels so safe, something has to come along to threaten that safety. And it helps if the only way to counter that threat is by going through something invisible and extremely deadly— the Bomb’s Breath.

Sky Jumpers releases in less than six weeks. I am so excited for readers to be able to experience this world that feels so very real in my head, and that I love so much.

If you would like to learn more about Sky Jumpers (and check out some of the extras), go to peggyeddleman.com.

Peggy: Of Plot Promises and Michael Jackson

I had a FABULOUS sixth grade teacher. But there was one thing, though, that he didn’t get that writers HAVE to get.

You can't have unfulfilled plot promises.

My teacher made our class a deal. If we met certain goals– really, really hard goals the whole class would have to work for— THE Michael Jackson would come to our class. In all of his sequined glove wearing, king of pop being, video music making glory. We thought about how many hundreds of thousands of dollars it would cost to get him to go anywhere, and wondered how our someone on a teacher’s salary would be able to afford it. Then we wondered if maybe Michael Jackson was doing it as some sort of charity. An encourage-the-youth kind of thing.

But really, we doubted he'd come. So we kept asking, “Is he really going to come here?”

He’d say, “Yep, he'll come.”

“The Michael Jackson. Promise?”

“I promise.”

We loved our teacher. He was the type who wouldn’t lie. Still, though, logic led most of us to believe there was a 99% chance that he wouldn’t come. The fact that there was a 1% chance made us work really hard. We met our goal and our teacher announced the day The King of Pop would grace us with his presence. On that day this came to class:

Yep. That’s a POSTER. If our teacher had been a book, we would’ve slammed him shut and hucked him across the room and never picked up the sequel because we no longer trusted the author.

And sometimes, you don't even realize you're making a plot promise! You may mention something irrelevant, but if you place too much importance on it, the reader is going to expect that plot thread to be followed through. How many times have you gotten to the end of a book, and as you're thinking about it after, you think, "Hey! The author never told us what happened with [fill in the blank]! Why did the author even mention it if they weren't going anywhere with it?"

As a writer, making your reader think that the plot is about to go in a certain direction and then NEVER GOING THERE is a bad idea. Even if you want the reader to think the plot is going in a different direction than it actually is. But what about Red Herrings? Sometimes I want the reader to think the plot is going in a different direction! Red herrings can be tricky, but a good rule of thumb is, if the direction your reader thinks you are going is cooler / more exciting / more interesting than where your plot is actually going, you might want to head back to the drawing board. Because no one wants their book hucked across the room.

On a scale of 1-10, when you're reading, how much do unfulfilled plot promises bother you?
.

The Conversation Hearts We Really Want

Ahh, Valentine's Day. The holiday cool enough to breed candy hearts capable of carrying on an entire conversation.

I don't know about you, but when I was a kid, valentines always came in those little white envelopes. Which was pretty handy, because you could tell darn near instantly if they contained conversation hearts (which, let's face it, made you about 100 times more likely to care about the contents of the envelope).

The night before Valentines, my siblings and I would sit around in our living room, writing our classmates names on the envelopes, and choosing VERY CAREFULLY which hearts to put in the envelopes. Because that kid that always bugged you at recess? You did NOT want to accidentally put a "True Love" heart in his envelope! After giving them to all our classmates,we made more to take around to neighborhood kids, friends, and secret crushes. We'd run them up to their door, knock, and run. And then we'd rush to our own door to see if we could catch anyone ding-dong-ditching us. I'm not the only one, right?

And then we'd look very carefully at the conversation hearts in the envelopes, because as you know, they say loads. I mean those things are like fortune cookies! Whatever they say is bound to come true.

To bring back childhood wonder and excitement at getting a really good conversation heart, I custom made some for you and your writing heart. 

If someone ding-dong-ditched a valentine on your doorstep tonight, what does your writer-self hope it says?

Have a wonderful Valentine's Day, everyone!

Peggy: I've Got a Theory-- The Claustrophobic Muse

This here is Muse. He likes to live in your brain and talk a lot. Yeah, I know he looks different than you're used to seeing him-- USUALLY he looks like your characters, but that’s because he changes to match the situation. Kind of like a chameleon, only better. Although he can take on the guise of anyone or anything, this is his actual form.

And while he may be adaptable, he’s also extremely claustrophobic.

Muse goes to bed every night in his little room. His bare little room with empty white walls, a white bed, white linens, and even a white night stand. Boring, yes? That’s why he frequently wants to talk to you ALL NIGHT LONG.

When you call to Muse the next day, his door magically opens, and everything is sunshine and lollipops.

When you don’t.... a lock appears on his door. Did I mention that he’s claustrophobic? A lock tends to make him twitchy.

Leave Muse in a second day, and another locked room appears between him and freedom, sunshine, and lollipops. That feeling of being extra trapped makes him frantic.

A third day, a third locked room, and Muse is going so insane, he starts bouncing off the walls.

A fourth, and Muse tries to beat the doors down, desperate for escape.

On the fifth day, all the craziness overcomes Muse, and he passes out. Even if you call to him with promises of coming out to play, he can no longer come out on his own.

You have to go in after him and lemme tell you: those doors... those locks... they aren’t easy getting past. You have to beat and beat and beat on them one at a time until it breaks down, then you have to step over the splinters and do the same thing to the next door. Door after door until you can finally free him, bring him into the sunshine, and nurse him back to health.

An ignored Muse is a hard-to-revive Muse.

And that, my friends, is why it is good advice to write every day.