Project Lotus
Release date: November 1, 2022
(Click her for Amazon ebook)
Fire was the catalyst of shared trauma.
A kiss brought about unknown passion.
The stage was proof of promise.
Fear & uncertainty drove her to run. Vegas made the other chase a dream What will become of their friendship?
The next move is anyone’s guess.
A local celebrity in the arts community of Quesinberry, Lolly Scarberry shines as one of the main acts at the Lotus Theatre. Always one to wear her heart on her sleeve, Lolly earns the affections of others quickly, loving openly and treating everyone with considerable care—even the town’s resident outsider MackLynn Brooks.
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A college transplant, Mack has thought about skipping town every day since graduation, but after years hanging around, it allowed her an accidental meeting with Lolly, and solidified her planting in the town she hates. Typically not one to divulge her feelings, Mack’s emotional state takes a severe shack up as a result of surviving the awful events at the Valle Mill.
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A few months later, after a rollercoaster night out with a recovered Lolly, Mack unleashes her pent up emotions, driving her into a passionate kiss that leaves her confused. Lolly on the other hand finds herself at little odds with experiencing something new with her friend. In a bold move, Lolly proves her choice to Mack with a mesmerizing return performance. Still unsure about her feelings, Mack finally leaves town to clear her head just as Lolly gets a dream offer that leads her to the dazzling lights of Vegas.
PRAISE FOR PROJECT LOTUS
"An endearing journey of self-discovery. Refreshing take on a friends-to-lovers relationship—an adult coming of age novel. Sensorial, highly visual renderings of place/setting, as is the case in all of Bastian’s novels, are also dynamic characters. Also endearingly observed is how platonic friendship’s “call-to-action” dynamics incite growth. All told, Bastian delivers a carefully measured arc, with just the right emotional pacing and layering of dramatic action, especially for a story about personal growth and coming to terms with ones psycho-social-sexual awakening. Lovely and magical."
~Russell Ricard, author of The Truth About Goodbye
Fun Fact
The backdrop of Quesinberry is based on the concept of Garrison Keillor's fictional town Lake Wobegon, in that it does not have a defined location, as well as the small Bed & Breakfast river community of Lanesboro, MN.
Elementverse Tie-In
Keeping in the world scheme of the Element Odysseys, Project Lotus finds its modern-day tie in through Hobson Hill, which is connected to The Breedling and the City in the Garden. While the significance it much smaller, it does pay a beautiful off book memorial.
From Lyme to Lotus Dancer
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During 2019, I had a severe case of Lyme disease and completely effect the creative force of my brain. Fighting my way through it, I could only manage small sparks of storytelling as I took to Twitter documenting my darkness using the emptiness of an empty theatre and a dancer unable to performance. After seven months of stagnation, I started gaining creative momentum at the end of the year finishing the final draft of my yet unpublished Hobson Hill.
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At the beginning of the 2020, feeling good, I started work on a sequel, but then the world shutdown & I lost motivation.
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In April my friend Nikki Kipp & I started a writing exercise, but we only did a few pages.
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In June, amidst the heightened emotions and having a hard time coping with the anger and sadness everywhere, the characters Mack and Lolly started talking to me and wanted to continue their story. I asked Nikki for her blessing & with it, I spent the rest of the summer outside penning what I called #ProjectLotus.
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At the end of Aug, the skeleton draft was complete, the ending missing, plus some 30,000 words. Spent the next few weeks transposing the ink to type and edited as I went filling in more story until it was time to discover the end of Act 2 and ultimately the end.
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I struggled for nearly a month trying to find a fitting ending for Mack and Lolly's story. Leave it to the villain to get in the last word, thanks Dillard. For NaNoWriMo it was my goal to finish with a viable 1st Draft. Ahead of schedule, I finished with 84,000+wrds and in December worked through an additional full draft.
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**TY to my writing friends, BTSARMY moots, and my fam for so much encouragement! And sincere thanks Nikki Kipp for letting me continue, it has been a true comfort.**
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