Crafting Characters and Sagas in the Vibrant Month of May

Embark with me on a transformative journey where the lush landscape of personal growth becomes our playground. As the vibrant month of May ushers in new life, I unveil the intricacies of 'The Devil that Haunts Me,' a tale that's matured into a compelling trilogy. With each page turned and character fleshed out, I delve into the essence of storytelling, exposing the core truths that anchor my fiction from rewriting my children's novel 'Mrs. Franchy's Evil Ring and the Six Months that Changed Everything' an astounding ten times, to meticulously crafting character dossiers, I am committed to honing narratives that resonate with authenticity and depth.

This episode also transports you to the sun-kissed shores of the Dominican Republic, where the 'Unde The Flamboyant Tree' awaits. Witness Isabella's poignant reconnection to her roots through a sentient tree that whispers her family's saga. Together, we navigate the interplay of history, family, and self-discovery that dances across the genres, shaping a story as rich as the soil from which it springs. As the curtains draw close, I extend a heartwarming thank you for your fellowship in this storytelling expedition. I am eager to hear your thoughts and reconvene next Wednesday for another chapter in our collective narrative.

Enter a world of fear, resilience, and generational trauma in "The Devil That Haunts Me". Follow Isabella and Julitza as they confront their demons in a tale of suspense, mystery, and the supernatural.

Explore the first seven chapters here

Transcript

Speaker 1: 0:00

Oh, we could, we could fly. Welcome to this new season of the have a Cup of Johani podcast. So I want to title this new season that I'm embarking on with I'm Growing, so this is going to be the season of growth and that's what I'm going to share with you throughout the season. So I thank you for coming over here and sitting with me, and I hope you enjoy. Hello everyone, are y'all excited about May? Well, I am, because, guess what? This is the month where I am just gonna divulge everything about the devil that haunts me, but that's not even the title anymore.

Speaker 1: 0:54

I have so much to tell you, so much to tell you. So, without giving too much away, are you, are you ready to delve into the shadows, to kind of like peek behind the curtain? Who knows, you may see a Diablo Cajuelo, you may see a tree, you may see the ghost of La Doña. You never know. You never know what you may see. Are you ready? Yes, you are, you are, you are. Let's get it All right. So how can I put this? So, you heard me talk about this and if you have listened to the podcast, you have heard the teaser per se of the Devil that Haunts Me Now don't be frightened, all pun intended, that story is still coming out.

Speaker 1: 2:11

But I need to explain, like, how this one book turned into a series, a trilogy, and how I had to kind of pull back from the devil that haunts me and dig deeper into the character of the mother. So every story starts with a spark, okay, and if you're a fellow writer, an author, you understand this bit. If not, let me pull back the curtain for you. For me particularly, every story starts with a little nugget. I always say all my stories have things about me in there. Some of them very small things, others a lot of things, but for all of them have something about me in there, because that's like my truth and that's the basis of what I write in fiction. I have to have some sort of truth and then I embellish from there and I go from there. But I am a reader that loves character-driven stories and because that's what I love to read, I naturally write those things as well. So I have to get to know my characters before I embark on a story. And the thing with me, this is the best way that I can explain it.

Speaker 1: 3:44

I am a writer who rewrites a lot, so I'm not one that can do a whole draft and then go back. I rewrite constantly. Y'all have read Mrs Franchisee Boehring and the Six Months that Changed Everything, which is my children's novel, middle grade novel that is out. I published it in 2023. You may not know this, but that book was rewritten 10 times fully, from the beginning to the end.

Speaker 1: 4:23

Because the thing with me is I usually don't have an outline and if I do, it's very vague and very open and I tend to just not follow it Because, once again, my stories are character-driven stories. So it's kind of hard for me to write while embodying this character and sticking to a certain format. It's almost like having the things on the side of the bowling alley, you know, and then, like I'm that ball that hits every side, I will never go straight down that you know, that bowling alley Never, never. That's just, it's not how I write. I just I go into other, into other tangents, into other directions. So so that's why I tend to rewrite a lot, because I can get to like the middle of the story or sometimes towards the end.

Speaker 1: 5:28

With Mrs Franchisee Waring, if I ever show it, I have like so many different versions of that book from beginning to end it was Isla, isla Delgado being very, very obnoxious to the point where she was not likable at all. And I remember like most of my classmates were like this sounds like Ramona, the naughty character Ramona. But my classmates were like, but she doesn't have like any redeemable qualities. I was like, oh my God, I don't want that, I don't want my main character to be hated, right, it's not one of those books. So I rewrote it then and then it just it wasn't jiving, so I rewrote it many times after that. So the version that I published is like the 10th version of that book.

Speaker 1: 6:28

Now, fast forward to me writing the Devil that Haunts Me and I am thinking this is the story of Julitsa. Julitsa is the daughter right that has been let down by her mom and has been neglected by her mom, and she hurts herself in a way that she cannot come back from that. And the story takes on this gothic kind of horror, kind of like smart horror, where we have a lot of symbolism there, of a lot of symbolism there. But then I get to the middle of the devil that haunts me and I realized that that story is actually about Isabella, about the mother, and I had to stop that, stop what I was writing. So I had, I want to say 30,000 words into that one. I stopped it.

Speaker 1: 7:29

I went and did one of my vague outlines. Feel bad about rewriting something. I do an outline and that's kind of like my way of making myself feel better for having to rewrite something. And then, like I kind of like lie to myself a little bit when I do that because I'm like, okay, johnny, see, now you have an outline, so now you have kind of like a direction to go into, knowing full well I have most likely will not follow it, but still, you know, I do that to make myself feel better and then just to continue to write.

Speaker 1: 8:07

Now, after doing that, I go and start from the beginning, folks, but this time I focus solely on the mom, on Isabella. But before I start, I do like a whole character sheet on Isabella because, like I said, it's a character-driven story. I love to read them, I love to write them. So I went in and wrote like a whole thing about her, down to when her birthday is. I had. So this is I'm going to write a blog post about using AI and stuff like that. So I use AI to help me determine Isabella's astrological sign and all the side characters' astrological signs and birthdays, based on what age I wanted them to be on when the book begins, because I just like I wanted to like understand that sign a little bit better. So that way I kind of understand what the characters will show, as well as the shadow aspects of that sign, so that way I can understand what they may show when they are at their worst. So I use ChatGPT for that. I basically input in there the character, who the character was.

Speaker 1: 9:30

I use the template on Scrivener that I have. So I use Scrivener to write my books and when you go into Scrivener, Scrivener already has a format for your characters. It has the role in the story, it has their goals or physical description. I'm a little vague when it comes to physical descriptions. To be honest with you. I'm more about describing them internally and describing their personality in the book. Or sometimes I have the character compare themselves to another character, but usually that comparison has to do with their internal things, their personality. A character may say, oh, she's so much more organized than me, you know. So I use that comparison so that way the reader understands how two characters are different and can understand one character just based off of that internal monologue that they have. But, like I said, usually physical description I'm not too big on that.

Speaker 1: 10:31

I tend to describe the character's personality, internal, their mannerism, their fears, their obsessions and things like that, their personality, and that's part of it here. So I also have their occupation, their habits and mannerism, their background. I really go in tangent on these characters about kind of like the things that made them who they are Like. Where did that come out of In their childhood, in their past, right? So I've been going through therapy for quite a long time and that has really helped me to understand how I am the person that I am now. Based on my past. And remember I told you in my books I have things that are real about me and things that I've experienced. And it's the same for my characters. All my characters have a little bit of me in them, a trait in there, and that's what helps me write them and that's what helps me to put them in a story, because I can hold on to that, that realness, that truth in there, and I'm able to write better and write fluently.

Speaker 1: 11:48

Then I also have for my character sheets their internal conflicts, you know their external conflicts as well. These are things that I learned from my MFA program how to differentiate between the two and how to show that in the story right and then any other notes that I have. But, like I said, chat helped me to add the astrological sign and the shadow side of that sign and how they reflect that astrology sign in their personality. So those three things right there just help me to really hone in on who this person is. For example, isabella is a Libra and it says here, libras are known for their desire for harmony and balance, which aligns with Isabella's effort to maintain peace within her family, despite the internal and external turmoil that you will know about. They're also characterized by a strong sense of justice, fairness, which mirrors kind of like her, her conflict that she has right, and this is the trauma that Isabella brings to the book, to the story right, because her sign as a Libra, she wants to have a sense of justice and fairness. So can you imagine when this is disrupted in her life, like everything clashes, everything just comes down on her and that creates for tension, for conflict. That you will see in the book. So you see, so the spark of creation for this new book that came out of.

Speaker 1: 13:38

The Devil that Haunts Me was really the character Isabella. Once I kind of understood her very well after writing 30,000 words under the Devil that Haunts Me, then I had to stop that, go back right, delve into her character sheet more, adding the astrological signs, the shadow signs of that, how that is involved in a person's personality, right. And once I understood that, then, looking at it with that new knowledge that I had, I understood that I couldn't write the Devil that Haunts Me no longer. I had to pause that because now this book demanded a new name, because now this book falls better or falls in the center of magical realism and intersects with women's fiction. And because of that the Devil that Haunts Me was not a title that would go with that Right. So I changed the title to Under the Flamboyant Tree for Isabella's story, because Isabella has to go back home to the Dominican Republic in order to understand how her past affected her present and how her past affected her being able to be present for her daughter, julissa. But I wouldn't have been able to understand any of this unless I had written those 30,000 words under the devil that haunts me, and unless I would, I wouldn't have asked chat for the astrological signs and all of this. So that way I am very comfortable where I am with it.

Speaker 1: 15:49

I am way past act two. Usually act two is very intimidating to me, but right now I am way beyond that and this is a story now that I look forward to every morning when I wake up at four of writing, and usually once I start writing I go towards the thousand words range. Almost every morning I go past that. If not, I go 700 or 800 words. If not, I go 700 or 800 words.

Speaker 1: 16:35

But I am telling you once I cracked open that character of Isabella Prescott, who used to be named Bianca. But she does this transformation when she immig. She just wants to forget her past so badly. She wants to be a good immigrant, she wants to be Americanized, she wants to be baptized in the American soil, to be one of the natural born Americans here and se afera tanto a eso, you know, and that curating this new life, that she kind of leaves her daughter behind. And that's the crux of this story here and it's almost like when the thing with her daughter happens, it stops Isabella's entire life because now she needs to re-examine herself and now she will need to unearth everything that she ran away from.

Speaker 1: 17:29

And here is where the tree comes into play. Because when she goes back to the Dominican Republic, because when she goes back to the Dominican Republic, it is the tree that speaks to her through dreams and memories. And I have this tree almost like a sentient character in the story, kind of like Mrs French's evil ring in the house. The tree has that kind of like that same characterization here. But it goes deeper than that. The tree has roots. These roots have reached through. Generations of these women have seen the hardship, the tears that these women have shed of them, the mom, the daughter, the grandmother, all of them have sat underneath the shade of the flamboyant tree and have divulged their fears, their loves, their everything. And in the tree's roots are all these memories. So when Isabella goes back and she finds herself underneath the shade of the tree, she ends up understanding this. But you know, as a Libra right, she also has a bit of stubbornness to her. So she doesn't really understand this and she doesn't welcome it at first. And it takes a lot for this woman to welcome that and welcome the help of her neighbor Clara. It's just all these conflicts in the story and just the reaction of Isabella through her personality.

Speaker 1: 21:23

It makes it such an enjoyable thing to write for me. I just I am having a lot of fun, more fun than with my other books. I don't know what that means. I have had various moments of crying as I just go through this story with Isabella and go through the opening of her memory and just the understanding of where she went wrong and how some things she could never get right, she could never go back and fix, and those were like some tough lines to write. The best way that I can describe it is when I feel those things as I write it. While it is sad and I do have to take a pause, I have another side of me that is happy that those feelings are there, because I know if I am feeling it as I'm writing it, most likely the person that reads it will feel it as well. And I am feeling all the feels with Isabella for sure, and I can't wait for you all to read it. I really I cannot wait, I cannot. It is yeah, yeah, yeah. And what can I say? Sometimes a story just grows out of its initial box, right, and I think that's what happened here.

Speaker 1: 23:01

It began as a single narrative. It was just like oh, okay, I'm just going to write about Julissa and how her mom treated her like shit, right, and how this happened, and there's going to be a gothic horror, blah, blah, blah, and it just, I don't know. It's like the canva just became too small to hold all that in and I needed to expand into, kind of like this broader tale that just demanded to be told. And, like I said, it doesn't mean that I'm not writing the Devil that Haunts Me, I am still writing that one. But I just needed to write Isabella's story first, because I felt as if I needed to understand her and her story before I can embark on her daughter's story, julitsa, which is going to be more horror, gothic, ya, going into MA. But I just needed to understand why Julitsa felt the way that she did, and I could only have done that by going and writing her mom's story. So that's why the sequence is going to be the sequence that it is, which is mom's story first, right, then the daughter's story and then, lastly, is going to be the big one, which is going to be La Doña's, the grandmother's story. And I say this is a big one one because I haven't written no words in it Like I've done. Julissa.

Speaker 1: 24:38

Julissa's story has a lot of words that I'm going to keep, so I have a lot of meat there that I can still use. I'm still going to rewrite it, but I still have some words in there use. I'm still going to rewrite it, but I still have some words in there. When it comes to La Doña's story, though, I have seen glimpses through Isabela's story as she gets under the tree and then she sees some of the things that her mom has lived through, and I understand that when I write the grandmother's story, it will be a historical fiction that goes back to the island during the Trujillo era, which was a very dark side of the island, to have lived under Trujillo, and we're going to see La Doña kind of starting to live her life but being so constricted because of the societal norms that are imposed on her that she will not be able to love the person that she loves and will be forced to marry her husband, who becomes the devil, the grandfather, in Julitsa's book. So you're going to see all these chains linking these characters and linking the books as you read them, but looking back at it in the sequence.

Speaker 1: 26:06

I'm like this makes sense, right. It's like the mother and the maiden and then the crone. I couldn't have done it any better than that and I'm just happy for happy accidents and a lot of rewritings, and a lot of rewritings. And even if I can't finish it by this year, please stick with me. Be patient with me.

Speaker 1: 26:36

I am going to draft all these three books and then get them through the editing process, right, which is pretty hectic in its own way, and get them through a cover artist so that way they can have. This is where it's going to be intricate, right? And if y'all have suggestions of any cover artists, please let me know because, as you heard me say, all three books, while they're under a series of I'm titling the series the devil that that Haunts them they will fall under different genres. They all fall under the same theme of redemption, of self-discovery, of family drama, but they all fall under different genres. One is women's fiction, the other one is gothic horror and then the other one is historical fiction, you see, so the covers have to kind of like, attest to the genre, but I want them to be cohesive at the same time, because they're all part of a series, so that's going to be a little tricky.

Speaker 1: 27:44

I'll for sure need to make sure that I have a cover artist that can do this for me, because I am very creative when it comes to words, but when it comes to like artistry, that's where I fall flat on. So I will always, always, always, always pay somebody else to do that for me, because it's just like I cannot. It would look like, yeah, like a kindergartner without no talent, but nevertheless, I hope you enjoyed this rambling here about my upcoming book, which I'm really excited about, and be in the lookout for all of them the Devil that Haunts Me Under the Flamboyant Tree and the yet untitled La Doña's Story. Once I know more and I start drafting that, I want y'all to get in these comments or send me an email, joa at haveacupofjoanicom, and let me know, because I will be like scratching my brain for a title for La Doña's book, and sometimes titles come to me as soon as I start drafting the first page. Sometimes it takes forever, so I don't know where I will fall when it comes to this. I'm trying not to think about it too much because I do want to focus on the flamboyantry and then on the next book. I just like to keep my brain focused on what I'm writing, but when I get there, be aware if I haven't gotten a title by that time, I'm going to need some help. So be on the lookout for that. All right?

Speaker 1: 29:27

So next week we're going to dive into the women of these books. So you heard me talk about Isabella. I'm going to tell you a little bit more about her, then I'm going to read you the character sheet for Julissa and I'm going to read you the character sheet for La Doña, so that way you could get to know these ladies and be on the lookout for their stories when they come out. Anywho, thank you for joining me today on the have a Couple Johnny podcast, and come back, because the month of May you're gonna hear me chat about my love writing and the books that I'm writing currently, which all fall under the Devil that Haunts them series, and I want you to follow this, I want you to be aware, I want you to cheer me on as I embark on writing and publishing these books, and thank you so much for listening and see you next Wednesday.

Speaker 1: 30:26

Bye, and thank you so much for listening and see you next Wednesday Bye. Thank you so much for listening. I want to hear from you. Leave me a comment, do a rating if you can on the podcast, share it with somebody you love, but, most importantly, come back. See you next time. Bye.