Darlene

           Darlene (word count 94,000, literary, upmarket, women’s fiction) is about a brilliant coder who is unable to move beyond the tiny town in Arkansas she was raised in. Plus-sized, brainy, and straightforward, Darlene does not fit the bill of what an acceptable woman looks like in her community. Immobilized due to her unwillingness to confront archaic systems of inequity, Darlene finds herself alone and misunderstood. One night, while coding a female heroine during a raging storm, Darlene is infused with the power to impact the weather. With her newfound empowerment, Darlene is asked to once again step-up and support the leadership of her friends to take down small-town racism and corruption that her family is directly involved in. Whimsical, funky, and self-deprecating, the characters in this book will draw in women of all ages in a plot that is fast paced, combining the bitter sweetness of domestic drama, with modern problems, humor, and splashes of sci-fi and mystical realism.

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          Millennial and Gen-Z readers are hungry to see the internal conflicts that society is creating for them reflected in what they read. This novel accomplishes that with a fantastical plot led by complex female characters. People drawn to best sellers such as The Girls from Corona del Mar, or The Vanishing Half will find a familiar world in Darlene, with a fantastical

 twist.  

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          I am writing a story born out of the great need to address the roles we each play in inadvertently contributing to systems of injustice. Much of this book came from research into the town in Arkansas half of my family hailed from, and coming to terms with the violent racism they were, at best, complacent in. Darlene is a contemplation on how those roots have impacted me, and how it could have further blinded me had my family never left that place. This book begs white women to consider how their special place in the patriarchy benefits them, blinds them, and in the long run hurts them and historically excluded people by keeping them in perceived powerlessness.

           

           If this sounds like the project for you, or you know someone who would be the right fit, please reach out. I am always looking for connections.