I love a good serial

Back in high school, we read Dickens, who is famous for his serial stories. I just cannot get enough of the concept. In our high school paper, a friend and I wrote one about I think a pepperoni pizza. We would have a small installment in each paper. When I was writing for NaNoWrimo, I generally share as I'm going along. And that's what I've decided to do again this year as I start writing my next novel. Completely unedited, just whatever ends up in the word processor at the end of the week. And today was my first day sitting down to write and I thought it fitting to share with you what's the start of a new story.

Hopefully, you will notice some similarities between Krystyana's story and Christian's story in Pilgrim's Progress. I can't guarantee consistent writing, but when I have something to share I will on Mondays.

Krystyana had been coming to this library every week since she could remember. Her mother would bring her as a young girl, as a teen should would find escape in the quiet shelves of non-fiction, even as an adult it was where she felt most comfortable. She cherished the first time she was able to bring each of her children with her. The library was where she was most herself. It didn’t make any sense to her then when she found this book that made her question everything she had ever known about herself.

She didn’t know how she had never seen it before, the cover looked well worn and the pages as if they had been read several times through. She had been through every book on every shelf and here was a new one. It didn’t have the checkout card that told her it belonged to the library, so someone must have left it here. She wasn’t sure if she should take it with her but a not fell out as she thumbed through. Picking it up, she read the clear script that said “This book is yours, Krystyana. I have been waiting for you to be ready to read these words for a long time. Now that the time has come, I trust that you will know what to do with this treasure.”

She looked around to see if anyone was watching her but it was just the regulars, browsing the internet, flipping through this week’s magazines, and having conversations with the librarian. She shoved the note back into the pages and carefully slid the book into her bag. It felt as if she had discovered some great prize her in the midst of all these stories she had come to know and love. She knew with just the few words she had read that this book was somehow different.

When she finally got home, after the kids were asleep and her husband had gone out to have a drink and talk with his friends, she lit a candle, turned on her reading lamp and tucked in to the book from the library. She was an avid reader, able to gulp works of fiction in just one sitting, but this, this book required her to take small bites but each one filled her mind with more and more thoughts about her life.