Thursday Thirteen #6

Thirteen Things about Bubba and Bean

1. Bubba and Bean is a novel I've been working on, off and on, for a lot of years…I'm embarrassed to say how many exactly, however, I am determined to finish it this year. The beginning is based on a true-life event. Yes, mine. But that is only at the beginning. Once I introduced the characters to each other they just took over and made it their own.

2. The story is about a fifteen-year-old tomboy transplanted from desert, western life in Arizona, to steamy, southern life Savannah, Georgia at the end of her Jr. High school year in 1956.

3. The only girlfriend she's made in the last month of her new school has abandoned her for the summer by running off to be with her daddy's new family in Atlanta.

4. Beanelda Jane hates her name and prefers to be called Bean. It rather fits her tall, slender, freckled frame at the time.

5. She is a tree lover, a wind lover, an all of nature lover. She would rather hang out in a tree all day, happily swaying in the breeze, than go shopping, flirting with boys, or whatever normal girls her age like to do.

6. Bubba is a tall, good looking, stocky sort of fellow, born and raised in the south with all it's southern nuances, who spends every summer with his aunt and uncle across the street from the house Bean just moved into.

7. Agreed, most southern boys carry the name Bubba. But this Bubba has a reason. His real name is Seymour Percival after his father, and he hates it.

8. Bubba and Bean's story starts with a blind movie date, arranged by Bean's mother and Bubba's aunt.

9. What starts off as a polite, do this for my mom/aunt, date, turns into a change in attitude, personality, and self-identity for Bean, and a long needed friend and confidant for Bubba.

10. Bubba is dealing with a terminally ill momma, a despondent, distracted daddy when he meets Bean.

11. Through their summer friendship, and blossoming first love, Bubba is able to overcome his fear of heights and make some hard life choices after the sudden, tragic death of both his parents.

12. Bean has discovered that there is a girl under her tough, tomboy skin after all. She embraces her feelings as her feminine side takes over. She tries on some of the southern belle sweetness that she once found revolting, and likes it.

13. The summer does not turn out the way Bean hopes, however, as Bubba decides on a future without her…temporarily…maybe…don't know yet. The characters haven't revealed the end of the story to me yet. I'm on chapter twenty, 58,000 words so far, hoping for at least 90,000. I need to buckle down and get this thing finished. I'm getting tired of dreaming about them. Not really, I rather like them. It's just that I'm easily distracted these days. I'm finding out that trying to be a normal, daytime person, isn't working for me. (Sorry that's a poor excuse and I know it.)