Read a Deleted Scene From Déjà View

I love this meme.

Note: This post was published earlier on the Character Madness and Musings blog. You can read it there at the link below, or simply continue reading below the link:

Character Madness and Musings Blog

One point my beta readers kept making about my new novel, Déjà View, was that it was “taking too long to get to the good stuff.” In Simpsons parlance, they wondered, “When are they going to get to the fireworks factory?” In a way, you could say this novel has a split personality. The first half is a fairly standard, coming-of-age story (it’s also the most autobiographical thing I’ve ever written), while the second part is what I affectionately refer to as the “crazy half.” That’s when my protagonist, Bobby Dalton, starts seeing his so-called “déjà view” visions, and his whole world gets turned upside down. As much as I loved the “normal half” of my book, I could see my beta readers had a point. Also, side note, if one person tells you something about your book, you can ignore it. If two or more people make the exact same point, you better make some changes.

By far, the largest cut I made was excising an entire chapter (not presented here in this blog), but I made other cuts as well, such as the following excerpt. One rule I had was that if something mentioned in the “normal half” of my book didn’t come up again in the “crazy half,” I would cut it. By design, I wanted the goings-on in the first half to comment on what’s to come in the second half, and vice-versa; the second half reflects back on what transpired in the first half.

In the following deleted scene, taken from Chapter Eleven: How I Spent My Summer Vacation, Bobby reminisces about the time he ran into a “rival gang” in his neighborhood, which is based on a similar incident from my childhood; even the gang’s name is the same as the one from real life. (I warned you the first half of this book is extremely autobiographical.) I wanted to show the reader that there were other groups of kids in the world of my novel that hung out, but they never appear again in the book, so, based on my self-imposed rule, I deep-sixed the scene. Besides, there’s already a cameo from the Wild Boars, the motorbike-riding gang from my debut novel Danger Peak, in an earlier chapter, so that ticked off that box. You could say this violated my rule, since the Wild Boars only appear very briefly (one sentence!), but in this specific case, I made an exception. Hey, there’s nothing wrong with a little self-promotion of your other books!

Note that the excerpt taken from this chapter is in first-person perspective, because it reads as one of Bobby’s diary entries to set it apart from the rest of the novel, which is in third-person perspective:

We continued our Monster Club and actually ran into a different club while riding our bikes. They were hanging around outside the fence of one of their member’s homes and seemed to be “guarding their territory.” They set up a line of wooden crates to block our path and wouldn’t let us pass unless we paid a “toll.” Max warned them not to mess with us because we were monsters. Joe hid his face in shame as Max explained we got the idea from the movie The Monster Squad. They called themselves the Bulldogs.

“Why are you guys called that?” Joe asked. “’Cause that’s what your Moms look like?” The Bulldogs looked like they wanted to jump us.

“It’s a lot better than stealing a movie title for your club name!” the tallest one shouted back. We guessed that he was their leader.

“Are you kidding me?” Max asked. “They stole it from us!” I gave Max a concerned glance, and in return, he gave me a knowing wink.

“Let’s get outta here!” Joe ordered and pedaled away, breaking through the blockade the Bulldogs had set up.

“Hey!” Max protested, following close behind. “I’m the leader here!”

“Since when?” I asked and also pedaled as fast as I could. For a moment, it looked like the Bulldogs might give chase, but there was no way they could catch up to our bikes on foot, so they gave up. The leader called us a coward, and I have to admit, it stung a little, but what choice did we have? From then on, we stayed clear of that block and never saw them again.

MTP

P.S.: Next week’s blog: A Christmas Oldie but Goodie

P.P.S.: Déjà View is now available on Amazon and Barnes & Noble:

AmazonBarnes & Noble