A Great Storm Rising
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Prologue “Have you always known?” “That I’m a lesbian? Yeah. Pretty much. Well, I really figured it out when I was twelve and kissed a boy at summer camp.” Evvy takes my hand, but then she doesn’t. She hands me a paddle and we are in a canoe with a yellow sail and a pink tiller. She’s guiding the boat, and we’ve caught the wind in the middle of the river. The river carries us where we want to go. The sky is as blue as a dream. Until a storm rises up. Like a cornered tiger, it roars and swallows our little boat and we’re clinging to the sides and cold water is splashing, filling the boat, and all around me, everything is sinking. And I am swimming. Looking for the surface, but everywhere I swim, I sink deeper into the water. Evvy! I’m paralyzed. I turn my head and look for her. I want more than I have ever wanted anything in my whole life to say yes to her, to tell her I love her, to mean every inch of it, and to promise I won’t hurt her with my endless lies and swirling confusion. But, then, wow! Look! It’s my dog, Arpeggio! Swimming to me. Hi, Arpeggio! My words bubble up. Sea turtles float by, yellow ones with pink tails, lumbering in their hefty shells, but so graceful. Evvy, look! And I point. And then it’s dolphins – green with white bellies. They float upward, out of the water, and I follow them, breaking through the surface of the water, gasping for air.
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About the Book
Teddy Carson and her kid brother, Adrian, grew up in the shadow of their dad’s mental illness. Doctors labeled him schizophrenic. Or narcissistic. Or maybe bipolar. Their dad denies all of it, claiming the doctors know nothing and that he has superpowers that can guide the winds and the rains. Lately, their dad has been doing better: staying on his meds, getting up with the sun. So when Teddy wakes up to an empty house and a note—“Took Adrian to school. Love, Dad.”—she revels in her freedom. She can walk her dog in peace and make her own lunch for school. And when her English teacher rails against Prospero’s mighty storm in Shakespeare’s The Tempest, she laughs. It’s just a play, after all. When Adrian and their dad don’t show up that day or the next, she is at a loss. She recruits her new love, Evvy Martinez, to help her find them both. But Prospero’s magic is on every page she turns, and this isn’t a play. In Crystal Falls, Massachusetts, almost anything is possible.
About the Author
Marty Kingsbury is a poet, essayist, playwright, and novelist. Her work has been published in numerous anthologies, and her plays have been produced internationally. For the last twelve years, she has led a Boston-based theater company whose mission is to mentor local artists and speak to a diverse audience. She is also the author of Rescuing Oricito.