THE WONDER OF PITCHWARS

The last two months being a PitchWars mentee have been amazing! My excellent mentor @CopernicusNerd, aka Tom Torre, was so encouraging. He helped me fine tune my novel and showed me things I never realized about my own writing. Below are the books and movies that he saw within my novel that were inspirational to me and I didn't even know it!

Alice in Wonderland, by Lewis Carroll

This was my favorite book when I was 10. I reread my father’s copy from 1941 so much the binding broke and pages were smudged with butter. (You know, the tea party—bread and butterfly? It made me so hungry!) 

In my novel, a boy finds himself in an off-kilter dream world where people rarely make sense.

Peter Pan, by J.M. Barrie  

Honestly, I never read the book, but I was very familiar with the Disney movie. One of my childhood cassette tapes (have you ever heard of those?) had the You Can Fly song, which I can still sing to you word for word.

My main character can’t fly, but he does have the ability to catch a lie.

Time Bandits

This is where things get a little strange…

When I was 12, I started having flashbacks of what I thought were old dreams…a boy traveling in a desert with a bunch of little men, God’s face in a closet, a burned lump that made parents disappear. It was rather disturbing until I told a friend. Then she said, “Oh, I’ve seen that movie.”

I soon found out my older sister took me to see it in the theater when I was only 5 years old! It probably doesn’t compare to some of the scary things little kids watch today, but it’s weird to think about the impact it had on me. Some of those memories inspired some of the scenes in my book, and I didn’t even realize it!

The Goonies 

Think back to the days before you had a VCR. No idea what that is? Never mind.

When I was little, I didn’t have a way to re-watch movies in my home, but I did have a tape recorder (an ancient device that would record sound only). So when The Goonies came on TV one night, I recorded the audio. I had a pretty vivid imagination, so every time I listened to it, I could picture everything that was happening.

No wonder a bunch of goofy kids on a ship ended up in my story!

Inception

The previous films and books I experienced as a child, but this one came out just a few years ago. I only saw it once, but it left an impression. My book centers around a boy who moves between dreams and reality.

Some people say to write what you know, so in a way, I guess I did!