I'm not sure if this is where I want to post this but I am looking for a beta for my first novel "A Ghost of You". If anyone's interested please let me know. Will trade with others in the same boat.
A GHOST OF YOU: SYNOPSIS
Mothers and daughters. Some fight, some are the best of friends and some like seventeen year old, HIV-positive Ithaca Porter, seems to be better off without one. Given the task of writing an autobiography for her senior English class, Ithaca explores the past, her past and the people in it.
The narration begins in January of 1987 when Ithaca’s mother is fifteen and runs away from her hometown of Ashby, Nebraska. Arriving cold and hungry in St. Louis, she camps out at the library where she meets the kind librarian who takes her in. After staying with the librarian for a few weeks, Stacey slips away and goes to the Greyhound bus station to take the next bus to New York City, where her dreams of stardom can come true. Rescued from a group of drunks by Max Porter, a nineteen-year-old former foster kid, the two form an alliance and go to New York together.
New York City is nothing like what Stacey thought it would be. It’s dark and dingy. Not the land of shiny buildings and dreams come true. The pair stay in shelters and barely scrape by. Max, a talented guitar player plays on street corners for change. One cold afternoon in November, Max encroaches on a magicians spot in Washington Square Park. He befriends him and the magician known as Tricky, invites Max and Stacey to come stay with him and his partner Jett, a fashion designer, in their Alphabet City loft. Max, Jett and Tricky become the best of friends while Stacey feels like the odd one out.
In the spring of 1988, Stacey obtains a new job working at a dance club where for the first time she feels like she belongs. While working at the club Stacey starts taking cocaine. The boys, wanting nothing to do with an addict kicks Stacey out and don’t see her again until March 22nd, 1991, when she shows up at their door strung out on drugs, and pregnant. Early the next morning, Ithaca is born and Max signs her birth certificate so the baby won’t have to go into foster care while Stacey is in jail.
When Ithaca is three Stacey comes back looking for her child. Max, Tricky and Jett are weary of having the recovering addict around Ithaca. Their fears are realized when they trust Stacey to care for Ithaca for a few hours and Stacey leaves the little girl alone at Tompkins Square Park. Ithaca is found by two NYPD detectives and is brought back to her family. The detectives, Albert and Arcadia, become good friends with Max and become members of the ever growing family. It is discovered that Halloween that Stacey’s lifestyle harmed her child more than they could have realized. Ithaca is diagnosed with HIV.
Instead of bemoaning their situation, Max, Tricky and Jett, with the help of Tricky and Jett’s mothers, give Ithaca the best childhood they can. They send six year old Ithaca to a summer camp for children with life-threatening illnesses. At camp Ithaca makes a new friend. Ada Stewart, a six-year-old from Philadelphia is also HIV-positive. The two girls bond over their shared illness as each has never met someone their own age with their disease. They conspire to get Ithaca’s single father Max and Ada’s single mother Lauren, to fall in love.
Breaking up the narration of the past, Ithaca’s everyday life is shown. She has conquered many of the odds that befall children born with HIV. She is thriving and falling in love. Fitz Hamilton, an ER nurse and fellow HIV sufferer bond over their love of music and independent bands. Ithaca’s main conflict is her unstable relationship with her mother Stacey. All of Ithaca’s life, Stacey has been letting her down. The pair cannot have a conversation without it ending in a shouting match and tears. For the longest time Ithaca blames Stacey for her life being the way it is.
Years later, Ithaca’s grandparents, Tricky’s mother and father, take the whole extended family to Orlando, Florida for the first major vacation any of them have ever had. While on vacation Ada and Ithaca plan to throw an impromptu wedding for Tricky and Jett who later in the year will be celebrating twenty years together. Also on that trip Max and Lauren became engaged. Ada and Lauren move in with Ithaca and her family.
A turning point in Ithaca and Stacey’s relationship occurred on the worst day in modern American history, September 11th, 2001. Stacey came to Ithaca and Ada’s school and took them back to the television studio she worked at. In May of 2002, Ada began to deteriorate. Ithaca, Max and Lauren were devastated when Ada died. Much of Ithaca faded away and she buried all her good feelings about her friend.
Most of the time Ithaca deals with her illness and it doesn’t bother her. But one evening while baby-sitting for Albert and Arcadia’s four year old twins, she cuts her arm while one of her charges slip on the stairs and breaks her leg. Ithaca berates herself and her disease for not being able to help the little girl when she needed her the most. It takes Ithaca several weeks before she is confident enough to watch her friends’ children on her own.
Ithaca and her father Max travel to Philadelphia to spend the Thanksgiving holiday with Lauren. While there, Max and Lauren finally give in to their emotions and marry. Lauren moves back to New York. Fitz is offered a job with a friend of his to run a clinic and group home in San Francisco. Ithaca tells Fitz to take the job and that she will join him when she finishes school.
As Ithaca prepares to leave for California her family continues to grow. Her godfathers Tricky and Jett adopt a little girl. Lauren reveals she and Max are having a baby. For her graduation gift Ithaca’s grandmother gives her a classic car from her late husband’s collection. Driving off in the sunset, Ithaca and Fitz start their new life in California. On her drive away from New York Ithaca thinks back on all the choices that the people in her life made and muses that no matter where she goes, there is always a road home. Back to the familiar faces of her past.
A GHOST OF YOU: SYNOPSIS
Mothers and daughters. Some fight, some are the best of friends and some like seventeen year old, HIV-positive Ithaca Porter, seems to be better off without one. Given the task of writing an autobiography for her senior English class, Ithaca explores the past, her past and the people in it.
The narration begins in January of 1987 when Ithaca’s mother is fifteen and runs away from her hometown of Ashby, Nebraska. Arriving cold and hungry in St. Louis, she camps out at the library where she meets the kind librarian who takes her in. After staying with the librarian for a few weeks, Stacey slips away and goes to the Greyhound bus station to take the next bus to New York City, where her dreams of stardom can come true. Rescued from a group of drunks by Max Porter, a nineteen-year-old former foster kid, the two form an alliance and go to New York together.
New York City is nothing like what Stacey thought it would be. It’s dark and dingy. Not the land of shiny buildings and dreams come true. The pair stay in shelters and barely scrape by. Max, a talented guitar player plays on street corners for change. One cold afternoon in November, Max encroaches on a magicians spot in Washington Square Park. He befriends him and the magician known as Tricky, invites Max and Stacey to come stay with him and his partner Jett, a fashion designer, in their Alphabet City loft. Max, Jett and Tricky become the best of friends while Stacey feels like the odd one out.
In the spring of 1988, Stacey obtains a new job working at a dance club where for the first time she feels like she belongs. While working at the club Stacey starts taking cocaine. The boys, wanting nothing to do with an addict kicks Stacey out and don’t see her again until March 22nd, 1991, when she shows up at their door strung out on drugs, and pregnant. Early the next morning, Ithaca is born and Max signs her birth certificate so the baby won’t have to go into foster care while Stacey is in jail.
When Ithaca is three Stacey comes back looking for her child. Max, Tricky and Jett are weary of having the recovering addict around Ithaca. Their fears are realized when they trust Stacey to care for Ithaca for a few hours and Stacey leaves the little girl alone at Tompkins Square Park. Ithaca is found by two NYPD detectives and is brought back to her family. The detectives, Albert and Arcadia, become good friends with Max and become members of the ever growing family. It is discovered that Halloween that Stacey’s lifestyle harmed her child more than they could have realized. Ithaca is diagnosed with HIV.
Instead of bemoaning their situation, Max, Tricky and Jett, with the help of Tricky and Jett’s mothers, give Ithaca the best childhood they can. They send six year old Ithaca to a summer camp for children with life-threatening illnesses. At camp Ithaca makes a new friend. Ada Stewart, a six-year-old from Philadelphia is also HIV-positive. The two girls bond over their shared illness as each has never met someone their own age with their disease. They conspire to get Ithaca’s single father Max and Ada’s single mother Lauren, to fall in love.
Breaking up the narration of the past, Ithaca’s everyday life is shown. She has conquered many of the odds that befall children born with HIV. She is thriving and falling in love. Fitz Hamilton, an ER nurse and fellow HIV sufferer bond over their love of music and independent bands. Ithaca’s main conflict is her unstable relationship with her mother Stacey. All of Ithaca’s life, Stacey has been letting her down. The pair cannot have a conversation without it ending in a shouting match and tears. For the longest time Ithaca blames Stacey for her life being the way it is.
Years later, Ithaca’s grandparents, Tricky’s mother and father, take the whole extended family to Orlando, Florida for the first major vacation any of them have ever had. While on vacation Ada and Ithaca plan to throw an impromptu wedding for Tricky and Jett who later in the year will be celebrating twenty years together. Also on that trip Max and Lauren became engaged. Ada and Lauren move in with Ithaca and her family.
A turning point in Ithaca and Stacey’s relationship occurred on the worst day in modern American history, September 11th, 2001. Stacey came to Ithaca and Ada’s school and took them back to the television studio she worked at. In May of 2002, Ada began to deteriorate. Ithaca, Max and Lauren were devastated when Ada died. Much of Ithaca faded away and she buried all her good feelings about her friend.
Most of the time Ithaca deals with her illness and it doesn’t bother her. But one evening while baby-sitting for Albert and Arcadia’s four year old twins, she cuts her arm while one of her charges slip on the stairs and breaks her leg. Ithaca berates herself and her disease for not being able to help the little girl when she needed her the most. It takes Ithaca several weeks before she is confident enough to watch her friends’ children on her own.
Ithaca and her father Max travel to Philadelphia to spend the Thanksgiving holiday with Lauren. While there, Max and Lauren finally give in to their emotions and marry. Lauren moves back to New York. Fitz is offered a job with a friend of his to run a clinic and group home in San Francisco. Ithaca tells Fitz to take the job and that she will join him when she finishes school.
As Ithaca prepares to leave for California her family continues to grow. Her godfathers Tricky and Jett adopt a little girl. Lauren reveals she and Max are having a baby. For her graduation gift Ithaca’s grandmother gives her a classic car from her late husband’s collection. Driving off in the sunset, Ithaca and Fitz start their new life in California. On her drive away from New York Ithaca thinks back on all the choices that the people in her life made and muses that no matter where she goes, there is always a road home. Back to the familiar faces of her past.
Last edited:
