The Body Farm (I must share again being it's Halloween)

Body Farm


My second manuscript turned out to be a middle grade novel called Murder on Sprinkle Lake. When I first started writing this, I thought it was going to be a YA novel and had an older audience in mind. In that story there is a murder; a character is hit on the head with a heavy object. I wanted to know what the result of the hit would be like as far as blood and stuff goes. I also had questions about the condition the body would be in if found several hours later. My questions took me to the University of Tennessee where my cousin works in the Forensic Anthropology Dpt. She gave me a very interesting tour (including a room filled with boxes of skeletons all neatly organized). She told me that she could tell an awful lot just by looking at the bones. She used to assist in autopsies and explained about that. Basically, I found out that the character in my story would have been a bloody mess. When the tour inside the college was over, she took us (my husband and two of my adult children were with me) to the Body Farm. Yup the very Body Farm Patricia Cornwell went to when she was writing her book, Body Farm. If you haven't read it, you should. I happen to like her writing in general--keeps you on the edge of your seat. Anyway, the Body Farm is as creepy as it sounds. Interesting though. My cousin is doing research on what sorts of animals munch on the bodies. She wasn't the only one doing research, the FBI had a garbage can with a body in it. They were studying the decomposition rate with the lid closed being they find a lot of bodies in garbage cans I guess. Most of the bodies were pretty decomposed. I guess a gossip magazine got in there once and took pics of the bodies and put them on the internet. Nearly closed the place down. So--now the bodies are covered until they are pretty far along in decomposition. In the end I didn't use much of what I learned that day. It is tucked away in my head, however, and may come out in another story. Maybe the one I'm writing now, who knows? My current writing is for a YA audience. An agent at a conference in Ohio told me that if my protagonist is less that twelve years of age, it is a middle grade novel. This time my protagonist is sixteen.

Posted by Lola at 1:31 PM 0 comments

Saturday, August 29, 2009

Creepy Halloween Poem

                                                                                                                            

The Poor Dead Witch Watches Bats Fly


She was just a head and couldn’t move

Those cursed bats could groove and groove.

“It wasn’t fair!” she cried.

How her head was chopped and then she died.

To watch bats swing and sway

Was oh so irritating on

Halloween Day .

It was just too much,

she had to plan

she had to touch.

Spell Book!                                                         

Come to me!

Let’s mix a recipe!

“Bosh Bosh Bish Bish”

Let’s make a magic dish,

squash a bat and find my body.

Then sing and dance

And have a pawty

  

This Trick or Treater liked me even when I was just a green head stuck in a bush.



Well  as you can see my spellbook came to me and I got my body back.  The couple on my right were ready for a pawty!





Some of my fans.  They enjoyed my cackle from the bush.



A wonderful Halloween Night!

A Castle In Kentucky