Folks, sometimes life throws you enough curve balls to question your sanity.  This here is one of them.

I haven’t really talked about a novel-in-progress called Lagniappe. If you remember, I took a trip to Saint Louis, MO last year to research part of it.   This story is about a 15 year-old black girl in Shreveport 1943 named Lola Mae. Miss Lola did something she wasn’t supposed to, what not black girl and white boy are supposed to do. Because of it, her life took a different direction literally and figuratively that made her into someone worth knowing.

Right now, the story is in a series of scenes and I’m working with a technique my grad school advisor Micheline Marcom once told me — write toward the heat. So that’s what I did.

Apparently it worked because I sent those scenes to The Writer’s Hotel in NYC and they loved them! So much so that they offered me a spot in their program. The problem is…it’s $2,500 and I don’t have the money for it.

But this is my dream. Long time readers of this blog know how long I’ve been chasing this, how close I’ve come. Here’s a shot and I’ve got to do everything in my power to take it.

I’ve started a gofundme.com site so that my friends can help me get to NYC. I’ve got the plane ticket covered and I’m working on accommodations, I just need the fee.

Dear reader, will you help me get there?