Why Into the Blind?

It took me a long time to write this story, over ten years. And I absolutely don’t remember how I came up with it. I only remember I went to my husband and asked him if I should write a ghost story or a story about a girl who could channel feelings into other people. My dear husband said, “The ghost thing. Definitely.” So, of course, I went and started the feeling-channeling one.

It was untitled, of course, back then, and it was for middle-schoolers, and it had elements of science fiction to it. Since Harry Potter was a huge thing at the time (it’s still huge, I know, but it was huger then), I shoved my characters into a school, sort of like Hogwarts, only instead of magic, my kids had paranormal abilities. The school was egg-shaped and had neither doors nor windows. The kids left it through a crack in the wall and went on to have many glorious adventures.

It was a sloppy, but cheerful draft.

Then came rewriting.

Many years of rewriting.

And somehow the book morphed into a story for older kids and adults. It became gloomier. I dropped the science fiction bits. I lost the school. My protagonist, a short blind girl with long white hair, became more dangerous, more broken, and her relationship with her boyfriend, a guy who doesn’t like that she’s more powerful than he, became…I hope…more realistic: she both loves and resents him. My husband suggested a title–Into the Blind–and I went with it. I’m sure he’s finally secretly satisfied that I took his advice. At least about something.