An update.

I'm working on two books right now. One is called The Messenger (working title for now), and it's an NA romance set in a future where women's rights have regressed. The other is YA, because the main character is sixteen, and a dystopia, because the world sucks, but I'm not sure it fits neatly into those categories. Some pretty bad stuff happens to the heroine so it might not be suitable for YA, and she also doesn't do anything to make the world a better place, like all dystopia heroines seem to do. So I don't know. It has a title too, but I'm worried it might be spoilery, so unless I change my mind about it, I'll keep it to myself for now.

Anyway, I hadn't been able to make the YA work at ALL, so I stopped working on it for a while. Then last night I had a dream (kind of a scary one) that inspired me. I hope it's the breakthrough I need. Here's the new opening I came up with thanks to freaky parts of my mind that don't often see the light of day:

When I was thirteen, my brother sold me to a man. It was just the two of us. We needed the money.

After a week I returned home with cuts all over my aching body, and we never spoke of that time.

For three years the memories haunted me, vague and disturbing. I could never tell what was real and what my subconscious had created in dreams. I might have seen living corpses, ambling around in tattered clothes. There might have been faces coming up out of the dirt. A snake slithering through the wet, black earth. And one man orchestrating some sick experiment, his voice low and soothing, like honey.

I thought it a mercy I couldn’t remember that man’s face.

Good? Bad? Intriguing? Thoughts and opinions are welcome and appreciated!