The Golden Band (High School Edition)

I knew the original incarnation of The Golden Band had problems. (Cricket could summon whatever she wanted? She could fly? And what was the point of her brother?) I stopped at Chapter Seven because I could not, in good faith, continue writing a story with such fundamental problems.

In the summer before Eighth Grade, I took it upon myself to completely rewrite the beginning of the novel, so that I could go on until I came to the end. It was 1988. I was twelve years old now, and so much wiser.

I worked on this version of the Golden Band through Eighth Grade and all through High School. This time, I stopped at the climax, the penultimate Chapter. By the time I got to this point, I could not, in good faith, finish the story...because I knew it wasn't good enough. Cricket needed to be an adult, and I just didn't know enough about the adult world to write that realistically.

I do not regret this move. I am, of course, sorry that the novel doesn't contain a denoument, but the main crux of the story does come to a conclusion.

But I completely understand why I did it. 

Part of me would like to give Cricket now the proper ending she should have then...but I feel like in order to do that I would have to completely rewrite this novel once more--one final time-- before that could happen.

Let's see how we feel when we get there, shall we?

Alethea Kontis

Northern Virginia

June 25, 2013