Although I don’t have schizophrenia myself, many of the themes in the novel are inspired by my lifelong struggle with serious illness (and my frustration with the number of people who have been certain they knew just what it would take to “cure” me!).Ĭomplete at 42,000 words, WHERE THE WATERMELONS GROW won third place in middle grade division of the First Chapter contest at the LDStorymakers 2015 conference.
If the honey works, Della might have a chance to finally let go of her own guilt-spurred by the deep-down knowledge that it was Della’s birth that brought the schizophrenia on in the first place-and learn to truly love her mama, sickness and all.Ī SNICKER OF MAGIC meets THE THING ABOUT JELLYFISH in this Southern-flavored magical realism, which is a standalone with the potential for at least one companion novel. But when Mama’s delusions turn dangerous and an ambulance takes her away to the mental hospital an hour north, Della must work up the courage to seek help from the town’s resident eccentric, who claims to have a jar of magical honey that will help solve Della’s problems… even if it’s a solution that has more to do with healing Della’s heart than healing Mama’s brain.
Panicked, Della resolves to do anything in her power to fix Mama’s broken brain. But Mama’s on a new medication, and things have been better-until the night Della comes into the kitchen to find Mama obsessively cutting the seeds out of a watermelon, convinced they’ll get into her kids’ tummies and make them sick. Twelve-year-old Della Kelly vividly remembers the last time her schizophrenic mama had a break with reality that put her into the mental hospital for three long months. This great query connected her with her agent, Elizabeth Harding at Curtis Brown, Ltd. With that in mind, I’m pleased to share today’s successful query from Cindy Baldwin. Some people have the talent of being able to summarize their book in a few sentences, but for those who don’t I wanted to provide a resource where writers could learn what works, and what doesn’t, in a query. In fact, I’ve heard more than a few authors say writing their query took them almost as long as drafting their book! Not only the actual process of sending out the letters/emails, but formulating the query itself. If you ask any writer about the process of connecting with their agent (or publisher), the majority will say the most difficult part was querying.
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