Introducing: Timing is Everything
an original young adult novel, to be published serially, right here on Substack!
Hello dear readers,
Today I’m excited to share about something new coming to Young at Heart. As many of you know, I’ve been actively writing fiction and pursuing publication for several years now. I’ve written four complete manuscripts and a handful of partial/in-progress stories, all young adult and middle grade age category projects. I love to write stories almost as much as I love to read them.
There is a growing community of fiction writers on Substack. After a lot of consideration and research, I’ve decided to embark on a fun new project of sharing one of my novels with readers in a serialized format.
I wrote the original version of this YA contemporary novel back in 2017 and I’ll now be updating, revising, and rewriting parts of the story as I publish it here.
I’m sharing the prologue and first chapter next week as a preview and then the rest will be shared weekly on Tuesdays, a chapter at a time, for paid subscribers. A paid subscription is $5 per month (or the discounted rate of $36/year), and in the future I hope to offer other bonus content for paid subscribers as well, such as potentially more long-form articles, library content, book lists, and book clubs.
My free newsletter, That’s Noteworthy, will continue to be free. (It’s currently published bi-weekly, meaning every other week/fortnightly, not twice a week. It’s super weird that that one word can mean both things! But it may go back to weekly at some point.)
The chapters of Timing is Everything will be emailed automatically to paid subscribers each week (or can be read in the Substack app), and I will also keep a page with an index of chapters of Timing is Everything here on Young at Heart, along with links to previous chapters for easy navigation.
I thank you in advanced for considering becoming a paid subscriber and for reading along with Timing is Everything. I’m really excited about sharing my work with readers in this way.
So, what’s it about?
Timing is Everything is a YA story featuring senior year milestones, friendship & family themes, romance, music, 90s nostalgia, and… time travel. Yep, time travel. It’s perfect for fans of Throwback by Maurene Goo, Better Than the Movies & The Do-Over by Lynn Painter, books by Morgan Matson and Jenna Evans Welch, and the movie About Time.
When seventeen-year old Mae Walker finds a box of old 90s mixtapes and a long-forgotten cassette player, she also discovers an unlikely way to travel back in time. By accessing her mom’s memories through the songs they’re tied to, Mae is suddenly able to unravel the complicated story that her mom, who had Mae at eighteen, has been so reluctant to tell. And while watching scenes from her young parents’ high school history and love story unfold before her eyes, Mae finally gets some glimpses of the dad she never really knew.
With her best friend across the ocean for the school year, Mae finds an unexpected friend in classmate Javi Gutierrez, a boy who’s dealing with some family drama of his own. As Mae explores her mom’s past, she is shocked when the mixtape memories show her the truths that her mom has kept hidden, and along the way, she finds herself inexplicably linked to Javi, in more ways— and times— than one.
Share with a Teen
For those of you who do decide to subscribe and read along, I’m happy to offer a 2-for-1 subscription if you’d like to gift one to a teenage child/relative/friend that you think would enjoy reading.
If that’s you, just reply/email me and send me the email address, age, and general relation to you of this young person, I will add them to the paid subscription list for free along with your paid subscription. (Though it’s not at all graphic, there are some mature themes addressed in this story, so feel free to ask me specifics in an email if you’re curious.)
Thank you so much for considering supporting my writing in this way.
xo,
Nicole
Table of Contents for Timing is Everything
Prologue/Chapter 1: In Which Mae Searches For a Hat and Gets More Than She Bargained For
Chapter 2: In Which Mae Ponders School Rivals and First Kisses
Chapter 4: In Which a List is Tucked Away, and Mae Sees the Moment it All Began
Chapter 5: In Which a Secret is Revealed and Travel to Cuba is Considered
Chapter 6: In Which Mae Sees an Unexpected Side of Javi involving… Pink Unicorns
Chapter 7: In Which Mae Experiences a Bittersweet Interlude, in both the Past and the Present
Chapter 8: In Which, For One Moment, Mae Reconsiders the Meaning of the Word "Friend"
Chapter 9: In Which Mae Swoons a Bit Over Folded Paper Notes
Chapter 10: In Which Mae Finds Herself With Way More Questions Than Answers
Chapter 11: In Which Golf and Baseball Cause Mae's Feelings to Swing Unintentionally Off-Course
Chapter 12: In Which Mae Gets a B, and Things Spiral From There
Chapter 13: In Which Mae Starts Off Spring Break Watching Her Mom Go Off the Rails
Chapter 14: In Which Mae Can’t Believe What She’s Seeing (and That Says a Lot These Days)
Chapter 15: In Which Javi Ponders What He Thought Was the Hypothetical
Chapter 16: In Which Mae Feels More Mixed Up Than a 90s Cassette Tape
Chapter 17: In Which Mae Has Some Fun but Also… Tastes Regret
Chapter 18: In Which Javi Comes Home
Chapter 19: In Which Mae Shies Away From Confrontation
Chapter 20: In Which Javi Treats Mae to Enchiladas, Time Travel, and a Driving Lesson
Chapter 21: In Which Mae Feels the Sweet Relief of Small Confessions and Big Decisions
Chapter 22: In Which Mae is Well-Taken-Care-Of at an Inconvenient Time, and an Old Favorite Suddenly Hits Different
Chapter 23: In Which Hands are Held
Chapter 24: In Which Javi Lets Out a Breath (That He Indeed Knew He Was Holding)
Chapter 25: In Which Mae Says… Sort of?… to the Dress
Chapter 26: In Which Mae’s Prom Preparations include Sewing, Skanking, and the Smashing Pumpkins
Chapter 27: In Which an Organizing Spree Has Unintended Consequences
Chapter 28: In Which Prom is Basically… Perfect
Chapter 29: In Which Mae Discovers Yet Another Complication in the Past
Chapter 30: In Which the Past Slams Into Mae’s Present
Chapter 31: In Which Mae Finally Gets to Hear the Story
Chapter 32: In Which a Couple of Grand Gestures are Made
Chapter 33: In Which Mae Gets a Birthday Gift
Chapter 34: In Which Javi Breaks His Silence (Finally!)
Chapter 35: In Which Mae & Javi Have a Moment Under the Twinkle Lights + Epilogue
Thanks so much for reading!