G.S. Norwood--Everyday Magic

DEBORAH CROMBIE: Here on Jungle Red Writers we have few bigger thrills than introducing a friend to our readers. So it is my great pleasure today to bring you G.S. Norwood--or, as our regular readers know her, Gigi Norwood! Gigi and I have not only been writing buddies for many a year, we share a love of urban fantasy as well as mystery. And although she writes in both genres, DEEP ELLUM PAWN hits all my favorite urban fantasy notes. Here's Gigi to introduce you to Ms. Eddy Weekes and a bit of magic.

GIGI NORWOOD: I believe in magic.  Not the David Copperfield, big stage illusion kind.  Not the Harry Potter wave-a-wand-and-say-the-right-words kind.  I believe in the natural kind that arises from the energy shared by people who gather around a common belief.

You’ve probably felt that energy yourself, humming through a crowd of grandparents, parents, grand and great-grandchildren at the start of last movie in the Star Wars triple trilogy.  If you gasped along with the little ones as the snowflakes began to fall at the end of the first act of The Nutcracker, you have felt it.  It’s the energy that whispers amazing things are possible, and Tinkerbell will survive, if only we believe.

To write urban fantasy, as I do, you have to believe that kind of life-force energy hums just under the surface of even the grittiest city.  You have to peel back the layers of concrete and asphalt right down to the dirt, then call on the folklore and fairy tales, old songs and old wives’ tales that have grown up around a place. You weave in history and legend until the story has one foot in reality, and one foot in fantasy.

My novelette, Deep Ellum Pawn, began with that mix of practicality and possibility.  I had an old Charlie Daniels song stuck in my mind.  The Devil Went Down to Georgia is catchy, but I couldn’t help but wonder why anyone would want a fiddle made of gold.  Gold is a dense metal, heavy to hold, and not very resonant.  A golden fiddle—particularly one from the Devil himself—would likely sound less than musical.  So, what do you do with it?  Melt it down? Take it to a pawn shop?

The moment that thought popped into my mind a character followed.  That’s how I met Ms. Eddy Weekes, owner of Deep Ellum Pawn.  It’s a dusty pawn shop in one of Dallas’ oldest neighborhoods, but there’s more going on behind the façade than anyone might suspect.

The story flowed quickly, and I began to wonder if I’d made it up, or if some force beyond my imagination was prompting me to write it all down the way it “really” happened.  Every time I paused to research a new plot point, I found not only the answer I was looking for, but reams of additional information that made the whole idea even richer and deeper.

For example, hellhounds make an appearance in the story.  And why not?  The dance halls and street corners of Deep Ellum gave many American blues legends an early career boost.  The district is only a few short blocks away from the building where bluesman Robert Johnson recorded his song, Hellhound on My Trail.  Johnson himself gave me my first clue about how to manage hellhounds when his lyrics mentioned hotfoot powder—a folk charm used to harden the threshold of a home against supernatural invaders.  A bit further down the hellhound trail I learned that to look one in the eye three times means death.  Great stuff for an urban fantasist.

When different ideas, drawn from history, folklore, and my own imagination, all fall together to make a coherent and entertaining whole, that feels like magic to me.

So what about you, Reds and Readers?  Have you ever had a project come together “as if by magic”?  Have you felt the energy that moves through a crowd to make magic seem real?  Do you believe?

 

Deep Ellum Pawn cover art © 2019 by Chaz Kemp

Amazon Kindle Edition Link: https://amzn.to/36Z8GNT

Dance of the Snowflakes credited to the Royal Ballet

Author photo: Marcy Weiske Jordan

G. S. Norwood is the younger of two sisters behind the independent publishing company, Weird Sisters Publishing.  She has spent the past thirty-seven years getting paid to put words on paper, including work as a reporter, feature writer, and composer of program and liner notes for the Dallas Winds.  Deep Ellum Pawn is her first published fiction.