About a year ago, I had just finished another book about an impossibly sexy angel guy and his weak (and clueless) human soul-mate. Now, I’m not saying I didn’t enjoy the book, but it made me think; what if the roles were reversed. What would happen if there was a strong kick-ass and sexy female angel and her weak and plain human lover boy. And to really twist it up, what if she was the bad guy? Or supposed to be the bad guy?
To get my novels straight in my head, I sometimes write short stories about them to work out voice, character traits, tone, etc. Well, that’s what I did here (minus lover boy), and I blew through this story so fast I barely breathed. I immediately fell in love with my feisty DARK ANGEL, Lucy, and her jerk of a brother, Damon.
In a moment of blind passion for the story (and recklessness) I scoured the internet for magazines that would love Lucy. I found Sucker Literary Magazine, who were conveniently (I thought) looking for dark, edgy YA. But the deadline for submission was in a couple days . . .Do I? Or Don’t I?
I thought, Hey Lucy’s a teen, she’s dark, she’s edgy. She’s the daughter of the devil . . .how could that NOT fit what they’re looking for? So I slapped my name on it and submitted it. I immediately regretted it. I barely spell checked it. But my writerly self-doubt (and chronic self-depreciation) kept me calm because this was the first thing I’d ever submitted. Anywhere. No way they would accept it . . . Well, they did. And, that’s when the real fun began.
The moral of the story is Hannah and Molly are goddesses of editing, as well as crazy for taking on my first draft. But they believed in the story, and so do I.
Which brings us here, ready to share Lucy’s bad attitude and moral dilemma with the world.
—Allie Brennan, author of Dark Angel.
Related articles
- The Story Behind The Story: Claudia Snow Classon’s Angels and Serendipity (suckerliterarymagazine.wordpress.com)
- The Story Behind The Story: Kelly Samuels’ Do You Remember Fred
- Press Release: SUCKER 2
Sucker Literary 