Guest Post by Charmeljun Gallardo, the author of the Ready For The World series
About The Book Series
Ready For The World: Driver’s Education
Ready For The World: Driver’s Education follows the story of Brandon Delacruz, a fifteen-year-old Filipino American teenager trying to make his way through life during the late 1980s. What Brandon wants out of life is simple: a cool car, a chance to be one of the cool kids at school, and most of all, a cool girlfriend. But instead, all he has are his loving family and his lifelong friends, Josh and Ally, to help him get through the minefield of high school life.
As he looks for ways to get the car and status, Brandon fails to realize that the girl he’s been searching for has been there all along. But before he and Ally can explore a new relationship, a tragedy occurs that changes their lives. And now Brandon will have to find a way to balance his deep friendship with the excitement, trepidation, and complexity that young love brings...all while trying to keep his grades up.
Ready For The World: Superstar
Things couldn’t be better for Brandon Delacruz. After a long and winding road, he finally has the girl of his dreams. To top it all off, he’s discovered his destiny. He’s going to write the next great novel. Not bad for someone who a few months shy of his sixteenth birthday.
But after a tumultuous start to the year, he finds himself stuck between two girls. On one side is Ally, his best friend since kindergarten who’s suddenly become more of a mystery. And on the other side is Rachel, a brilliant and strong-willed girl that isn’t afraid to speak her mind. As he sorts his feelings out, he’ll find that the world isn’t like the one he’s writing about in his book. Real-life is messy and perplexing, especially in high school.
And Brandon will learn that life can offer true beauty and grace...and heartbreak.
Purchase Links
Ready For The World: Driver’s Education
Ready For The World: Superstar
Guest Post of Author
~Author's Writing Process~
I was still in high school when I first came up with the idea of writing a book. It began as a personal journal before I put it in narrative form. At first, the stories were like wish fulfillment. I changed events here and there to have things be better for my lead character. He was never at fault and like Mary Poppins, practically perfect in every way. In other words, he was boring. But again, I was young. I was as green as a blade of grass and my stories were just as thin.
It was when I got to college when everything changed. I knew how to write, but didn’t know about the craft. Writing is more than descriptions, plot, and setting. It was about how all of those things work together to create a theme and atmosphere. And most importantly, a writer needs to have the audience see, hear, and feel what the characters do so that it resonates with them.
And because of that, I nearly quit.
I would read what my fellow students wrote and saw how well they crafted their stories. Their stories were immersive and nuanced, full of interesting characters, and colored with vivid descriptions. And mine didn’t feel much different than my high school stories: amateurish, unsophisticated, and dull.
I came to see my professor that I didn’t have what it took to be a writer. I was going to find another major or move back home. She said she would honor my request, but not before I tried again. And then she told me to “let go.”
It didn’t matter what the other students were writing or what kind of world they’d built. It only matters what my story was. She would be there to help me craft it. She said that everyone had a story and it didn’t matter what it was about. But I had to be the one to tell mine.
I struggled through it, but as tough as they were, my college days were invaluable to me. I made a lot of mistakes but was encouraged to make them. The best thing in the world to me was getting my drafts back with my professor’s red marks everywhere. Writing is rewriting. And rewriting. And rewriting...
I came back to these nearly twenty years after I first wrote it. I cringed at all the clichés and the stilted dialogue, but I thought the bones for a good story was there. I wanted to make sure that the music, movies, sports, celebrities, and fashion that I referenced were within the time periods in the book. The same went for the slang and language. I know that a web search for 80’s slang will bring up “gag me with a spoon” or “tubular.” But that’s not how my friends and I talked. It was important to me that the characters used the slang we used then and just as important to not include the slang I use now.
And lastly, I wanted my characters to be smart and witty, but fallible. They are too old to be thought of as children but too young to be fully judged as adults. Teenagers are curious, emotional, and impulsive. And they’re also capable of incredible acts of charity, beauty, and creation. But that’s what being a teenager is. That’s the time to succeed and fail, reach highs and lows, love and lose, and do it all over again.
And hopefully, as adults, that’s a lesson we’ll keep going with us.
About the Author
Charmeljun Gallardo is a former Radiologist and author. His first book is Ready for the World young adult book series. He graduated from San Francisco State University with a Creative Writing degree in 1996. He is a writer, photography enthusiast, sports fan, movie geek, stroke survivor, and an adventurous foodie. He lives in San Diego, California with his wife and son.
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