My beautiful Cassandra

I have an announcement to make. It's one of those words that until you've said them aloud is like dreaming. Like a fantasy because it's so dreamy that you have the urge to pinch yourself while you secretly pray not to wake up from this dream. I pinched myself and the dream was still there so it's not a dream but a dreamy reality.

So here it goes.

I did it!

I finished my fourth book! Yes, this is real. The day before yesterday I wrote the beloved words: "The End." And then I sat there watching the last sentences, trying to accept that after months of writing, after countless days of struggling to find the time to write it, I finally did it. I wrote it. The first draft is now completed, waiting to get my teeth in it and ripped it apart so it can be as awesome as I can make it.

Well, it's gonna wait for a while because you do know what must to be done after writing that first heart-aching draft, right? I must ignore it. Actually it's like the dough when making pizza. We all know that the dough must be left alone to rest for a while, don't we? That's what I'll do with my manuscript.

But today it's all about it.

This project was a dark one. It's really dark. There was this character that came to me, angry and troubled, demanding to tell me her story. So I sat back and listened to her. At first she was confused, so confused that I had to follow her crazy recounting between future and present. And despite that I was listening, she didn't bother to tell me her name until I wrote 30.000 words! Do you believe it? Cassandra is her name. I will never forget.

So there is Cassandra, a troubled woman who had grown up in foster homes since her family had brutally murdered when she was young. And she was the core witness. Since then she has been drifting. Her life is a fight between addictions and things are getting far worse when she starts wondering about the night of the murders. Things are not as they appeared to be and there is a high possibility that the murderer is not the murderer. If that's the case then who murdered her family and most of all, is the killer still on the loose? Can she remember the things she has forgotten?

Writing this book was far more complicated than I expected. It was not only about the facts and the murders, but Cassandra was a multidimensional character. It was very interesting to get to know her and writing about her life overwhelmed me with so many contradictory feelings.

Cheers to Cassandra and the beautiful, dark journey that came to an end.