The Signs We Missed
by Lena S. May
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GENRE: LGBTQIA+ Contempoerary Fiction
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BLURB:
Thrown out by his mother, 17-year-old Luke
hopes to overcome his narcotic addiction and depression by changing his
surroundings. At his new school, he quickly becomes friends with Sean, but
finding that his developing feelings aren’t returned, Luke retreats into old
habits. Determined to hide his self-injurious behavior and an advancing eating
disorder, he soon risks much more than a broken heart.
When Sean meets Luke, the last thing on his mind is
falling in love with a boy. Grappling with his own conflicting emotions and
trying to keep them from his suspicious girlfriend, he brushes off Luke’s
strange behavior. But when Luke suddenly cuts him off, Sean is forced to
confront the truth and take action to save his best friend.
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Excerpt One:
It's my fault.
I'm not sure how yet, but it's what the white blank hospital room walls keep hammering into my head as the pungent, antiseptic smell makes my eyes water when all I'm trying to do is keep my composure.
My fault.
It's what they're all trying to say – the half-dead, bled-out body of the boy lying in the bed beside me, his fingers slowly losing their grip on mine, the over-worked and under-paid nurse already rushing down the corridor, the non-specialist assistant doctor, paying half his attention to the arrhythmically beeping monitor, the other half to fumbling his phone to mute.
And then there's my brother, leaning against the wall in the corner, his crystal blue eyes asking not what I've done but when I'd planned on telling him that I was gay – which I'm really not. When I don't react, he looks down to the face resting on the pillow next to my elbow, and I do, too: empty whiteness staring back. I'm beginning to think it's burning into my retina, sucking every last speck of color out of the sky as I finally raise my glance to the window. I can't let myself get lost in the void that is now his face if I want to clear my head, but there isn't a single cloud drifting by to take hold of my attention, not a single leaf left in the trees, no bird, not even a gust of wind. It's just me and my trembling heart and my racing thoughts, and yet, my loneliness is nothing in the face of what I now know he has been going through.
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GUEST POST
Topic: Please describe your writing journey for this book
When I first started
writing stories about the characters who are now the protagonists of The
Signs We Missed, I was fifteen or maybe sixteen years old. That is also
where most of the topics come from, as I was going through some of the things that
Luke struggles with at that time – namely an eating disorder and depression. I
mainly wrote short stories as what was probably my way of coping, and as I got
better, I put them on the back-burner. The back-burner, in that case, is a
folder full of handwritten sheets that I have kept next to my bed ever since
(it’s a miracle I never misplaced it; I have moved five times since then, and I
have misplaced basically everything else).
A few years later, I made another attempt at turning those stories into a
novel. The vision was the same as it was another two years or so later: to
write a book that fifteen-year-old Me would have picked up and thought, “Hey,
this is me. Somebody somewhere has been going through the same shit I am –
maybe I’m not as alone in the world as I feel right now.”
I didn’t get very far then, though. At that point, I had uni courses to attend,
jobs to work, and bills to pay. Back-burner again it was.
But deep down, writing and publishing this novel was the biggest dream I ever
had. Sometimes, I remembered this:
I had moved into the place I lived in at the time a day before New Year’s Eve,
and we had somehow figured it’d be a great idea to invite all our friends to a
party the day right after moving in (the place was exactly as chaotic as you
picture it, but nobody cared). Shortly after midnight, almost all the guests
were down on the streets busy with fireworks, but I am kind of scared of
getting in the vicinity of that stuff, so I was standing on the balcony, a
glass of sparkling wine in my hand, watching colors explode in the sky – and
you get that weird kind of nostalgic, kind of everything-is-possible feeling
then, right? It’s a whole new year, after all. New place as well. So silently,
to myself, I made a promise. I never told anyone what exactly that promise was,
but whenever I remembered that moment after abandoning my novel attempt, I felt
a little guilty. But mostly, I felt excited, like a part of me knew that
promise would be kept.
Two years later, something happened in Wuhan, and suddenly, there were no uni
courses to attend, I had to teach my tutoring classes from home, and I wrote
the first ever complete draft of The Signs We Missed within two or three
months.
So has the promise been kept?
Not yet. But I think I have kept my end of the bargain.
AUTHOR Bio and Links:
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Lena S. May is a Germany-based author and student. Living with her dog, she enjoys long walks, ideally followed by a cup of tea and an equally long reading session. After graduating university with a degree in English and American and German Studies, she is working towards her Master of Education to become a secondary school teacher. With her writing, Lena hopes to raise more awareness for mental health and the importance of looking out for one another and oneself. Her debut novel will be published in August 2022.
Twitter https://twitter.com/Lena_S_May
Instagram https://www.instagram.com/Lena_S_May/
Amazon https://www.amazon.com/Signs-We-Missed-Lena-May-ebook/dp/B09YVLCNKQ/
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GIVEAWAY :
Lena
S. May will be awarding a $10 Amazon or Barnes and Noble GC to a randomly drawn
winner via rafflecopter during the tour.
Thank you for sharing the excerpt.
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