Hey man, go light on William Faulkner's mother. She's getting old. If you had teachers who told you to embrace mistakes, you must have grown up in a different United States of America educational system than I did. AND if you had teachers who told you to embrace your mistakes you must have felt like you'd won a free trip to Disneyland! (I, Charles, am that good good friend who will turn on you in a minute.)
Using the paranormal in any way is an interesting and slightly dangerous path to walk. It's easy to fall into cliches or go to a place that's unbelievable. It has to be exactly consistent to be good, and some great "twist" about how it works is always good. I tried it to a small degree in The Sledding Hill. I had to do an amazing amount of editing on that very short book because I couldn't get it in my head what the dead narrator would know and not know and how he would articulate it. He was still fourteen and I needed his teenage voice, but he had also escaped out into the universe where, I assume (and therefore incorporate) that he would know more. When you're writing such a book you're appreciative of good editing. I'm doing it again in a different way with this new novel and like you, am having fun, yet creating much chaos in my cranium.
Again, go light on Mrs. Faulkner. She carries the burdon of birthing an author who is at the same time very famous and unreadable.
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