Another excerpt from another new book "The Storyteller"

*I don't really know where in the book this is all happening, but I wrote it and this is it. I feel like the protagonist is one of my best characters yet, she's just so real. It's kind of personal because she's a lot like me in ways, so...yeah...this is it:*


Dear Diary,

So, I've never written a diary before, but my English teacher says it builds character and I need to write entries at least weekly in you. Which basically means that I write in this book or get failed. I think I'll choose the former.

So. Um. Basics about me, I guess. There are three things I love most in the world: Writing, Dancing, and Acting. And they were written in the order of most loved. I know, it's weird that I love writing so much, and yet have never written in a diary. It's just that I normally see the world from my character's lives, and not through my own. So I've only felt the urge to write down what they see and feel, instead of what I do. But that's off-topic. I'll just let you know what I love most about the three things I wrote above.

There’s nothing quite like the feel of a pen or pencil in my hand, the sound of the scribble of lead on crisp paper, and just watching words flow out from my mind and on to that blank canvas. It’s almost like art. You take colors and a paintbrush, and paint the image in your head for all to see. But instead of images, there are words. It fascinates me to no end to have the worlds in my head come to life on the paper. To see the characters who are like my children interact with each other for all to see. But it’s frustrating when I can’t find the words to describe what is truly perfect to me. Because sometimes, there are no words that can truly fit the people and places I create in my mind. And I want so badly to share it with everyone. But nobody can ever see what I see.

Dancing has always been very important to me. It’s much more than a workout and exercise to me. It’s my escape from my life, my time where I can just forget everything that bothers me, hurts me, and stresses me out. So I dance, and I forget. It's a kind of therapy for all of my troubles in life. I use my pent-up anger to add emotion to my movements, my suppressed energy to keep me moving, and just let my mind go blank as I try to concentrate on the task at hand.

Acting isn’t one of my priorities in life, and it’s not half as important to me as writing or dancing, but I still enjoy it. It’s just another way to express my erratic personality. So I'm not gonna write more about it.

When I think about it, all of my favorite activities are a form of storytelling. Writing is the most traditional and usual way to tell a story. With dancing, you express the story through your body movements and facial expressions. Acting is another more traditional manner of telling a story. I guess that just makes me a storyteller. If only I had a good story to tell. I know my stories are interesting to me- when I first write them at least. My over-active imagination creates thousands of storylines and ideas daily. It’s like it haunts me, driving me to the point of insanity than slowly dragging me back again, just so I can write down the words running through my head. Because that’s what it’s like. All somebody has to do is say one word, and I make a sentence out of it, then I make the background of the sentence, then the character who says it, then I have to make a character who responds, then the background of that character, then what they look like, and before I know it, I have the beginning of a story. And my heart breaks to know that I won’t write it.

Wow, it feels so strange to be telling this story. Not that I don't like writing stories or anything. But I'm so used to seeing the world through other people's eyes, telling the story from the way they see and feel it. Now, for the first time in my life, I'm writing things the way I see it. Now, I'm seeing the world through my own eyes. Now, people are reading about me, and not about a character I created. Now, I'm the storyteller not of somebody else's life, but of my own.