Kevin D. Hendricks

Downtown Dandelions

The debut novel by Kevin D. Hendricks, written during one month in 2004 and published as a literary demo.

Dandelions Don’t Deserve To Alone
A quiet college student, Sedgewick kept to himself but saw so much going on around him. He lives with his grandmother and rides the city bus to lass and his job stocking shelves at a grocery store. He has a history of pain and loss, which quickly comes to the forefront when he meets Allison, a pretty girl with a much more immediate loss. Together they have to confront death and love.

Downtown Dandelions is available as a self-published, print-on-demand book in two formats or as a digital download. The download is offered at no charge as a free preview, however if you decide to read the book in the digital format, please make an appropriate donation to the author (approximately $4 from the purchase of each print copy goes to the author). Giving in-depth feedback or spreading the word about the novel will be considered acceptable donations.

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The Process
I’ve always wanted to write a book and this is my very first attempt, a novel titled Downtown Dandelions. I wrote this novel in the space of 20 days in November 2004, thanks to the creative boiler that is National Novel Writing Month. They challenge you to write a 50,000-word novel in 30 days. It’s a brutal deadline, but it’s something you can get your head around. The idea is that among all the crap you’ll inevitably generate, there may be a few diamonds in the rough. Hopefully that’s what you’ll find here (the diamonds, not the crap—or at least not too much crap). Chris Baty’s No Plot? No Problem! was especially helpful.

In the weeks following I gave the novel a very rough editing and minor proofing, hoping to catch the worst of the typos and inconsistencies (though I’m sure I’ve missed many). I polished a few rough scenes, but otherwise left the story alone. Some day I hope to return to this novel and give it a proper re-write.

I initially self-published the raw, barely edited form of this book at two online print-on-demand publishing sites, Cafepress and Lulu. Anne Lamott (and I believe Hemmingway before her) has said that publication is shit, and I believe her, though it doesn’t lessen my yearning to see my story in published form. These original bound volumes were a mere boost to the ego and a bit of self-indulgence. But sometimes that’s what you need—something to hold in your hands and remind you that it really happened.

Surprisingly, a few relatives, friends and strangers expressed interest in getting their own copy of the book, so I opted to make it available.

Disclaimer
It should be obvious, but I find it necessary to explain that while many things in this story are connected to my life in some way, this is fiction. I made it up. Mom, that means you.

For those concerned about content, I feel the need to warn you that this novel would effectively be rated PG-13 (though the ‘f-word’ does appear a half-dozen times, which might push it into an R rating, though the language would be the only reason for such a rating).

Thanks
I wrote this book for myself, but there’s incredible satisfaction in sharing it with others. I hope you enjoy it.