Writing in the Lowcountry
The hauntingly beautiful areas of the Lowcountry of South Carolina are forever spilling from my pen. I have included blurbs about my completed manuscripts and some of the things I've written in this section of my website. In addition, I have included some links to my favorite writing organizations.
Vicki's Manuscripts:
CAROLINA TIME***--Charlene Timmons is overbooked! All her time is used up for her career plans to become the first female contractor in Summerbrook, South Carolina. But when her intentions clash with Aiken Hughes' designs to provide homes for the poor, her plans blow up in her face! And then her beloved grandmother dies. All she has now is time on her hands. (Southern Inspirational Romance--Contemporary) STATUS: Represented by Scott Eagan of the Greyhaus Literary Agency (Available)
BIKER SUNDAY***--Motorcycles are machines of death! April Church tries desperately to hide her fears and preconceptions about bikers, but the cautious Southern belle is ensnared and must work on a motorcycle rally to help save a little boy's life. Until Bullworth Clayton, a ruggedly handsome biker who has lost his faith, challenges everything in her safe little world. Bull's could-care-less attitude is smashed when he takes the prissy woman for a ride on his Harley. Everything crashes down around them when April's secret collaboration with the enigmatic man is exposed to her uber-conservative friends, family and co-workers in Palmetto Towne, South Carolina! (Southern Inspirational Romance--Contemporary) STATUS: Represented by Scott Eagan of the Greyhaus Literary Agency (Available)
NEW HOPE SWAMP--Hanna Rudder chains herself to her uncle's little country butcher shop and to New Hope Swamp, but when Furman Rutledge, a Charleston antiques dealer, sees her honest heart, her work ethic, and her amazing abilities with numbers and finances, he pulls her away and hooks her up in the financial world of Charleston. But when Hanna deals with the elite Charlestonians and ruins a few of their fortunes, she retreats back to the edge of the swamp where old cypress trees grow slowly and nobody judges her. (Southern Inspirational Romance--Contemporary) STATUS: (Available)
GARDENIA--Secrets, scandals and forbidden romance--in addition to cotton and old oaks- -grow freely on the plantations around Charleston, South Carolina, and the surrounding Lowcountry lands. When a beautiful outsider marries the heir to the Praleau land and fortune, treachery surfaces. The rivalry between two brothers shackles Ashlynn Praleau and she unknowingly struggles against 200 years of undisclosed family history. Her dreams to become a writer are held hostage to the Lowcountry secrets, and she learns what it means to become a pawn in the Praleau legacy. (Southern Gothic Women's Fiction--Contemporary) STATUS: (Available)
***BIKER SUNDAY was previously SOLD to Triskelion Publishing (and they had the option for CAROLINA TIME); however, due to business issues, my agent asked for and received my rights back for both books. Triskelion Publishing treated me well while I was with them, and I wish them and the authors with them success in the future. If you're looking for some great reads, check out their website!
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Poetry:
Charleston Gold
I am entertained by Charleston nights,
Symphonies, play and shows.
I am hypnotized by Charleston tides,
And the way warm Gulf Stream breezes blow.
I am awed by Charleston's architecture,
Piazza, wrought iron, old brick.
I am familiar with its dialect;
It's soft and sweet and thick.
I am beaconed by the bells that ring
In old St. Phillip's tower.
I am stalled along the way by scents
Of gardenia and magnolia flowers.
And when night falls and jazz bands call
To downtown I must go.
And when downtown
The gold I've found
Lies at the end of Rainbow Row.
No Time
Grayed and aged beyond my acceptance,
She rocked on her repair-needy porch and watched the waves of traffic in town.
I drove by and barely waved to the woman whose life gave mine by my mother's.
I gave pathetic excuses for my neglectful abuses as I passed her tiny world.
Again and again, and again I passed.
I had no time between erratic errands I imagined important at the time.
Deliveries and doctors, T-ball and tennis, shopping and supper,
And summer and winter, and spring and fall kept me busy.
I had no time to listen to ten-times-told tales and how her aged body ached and ailed.
I had no time to listen to chitchat I had heard as a child--no time to exchange a kiss or a smile.
The porch is now repaired, and pansies replace the rocker.
And I have learned late that it was really she who had no time.
Childish Things: A Sonnet
They line the yards, the walks, the fields and streets
with scattered thought and fallen purpose. There
They fell from greatness. Kings and cowboys beat
Them, used them, left them, fallen; no one cares.
Some once were bright and shined and sparkled red
As gifts of plastic, steel on Christmas day.
With thoughts and dreams of kingdoms, their minds sped
With promising pleasure of future play.
Now all the princes feed with stern mothers.
And nap time will follow as clouds, the rain.
And in the afternoon dreams they conquer
The villain and save the princess again.
Soon they will run out with new dreams and noise
And reclaim what others see as mere toys.
My Charleston
Historic tales and Southern belles
Line the streets so old.
Dialects from a distant land
Paint Southern accents gold.
Years and years of breeding wars
Carve finely chiseled faces
With pedigrees that span the tides
To European places.
Charleston's such a savvy place,
Yet reeks of tired, old money.
It's known and loved by God's elect
As the land of rice and honey.
Read Me
I am a poem.
I say volumes in very small spaces;
I am a tome written on the head of a pin.
I reveal and conceal my intentions.
I am a poem.
I confess my inner soul;
I hide my face;
I dance the Charleston with Rhythm and Cadence.
I am a poem.
I am young, and I am old;
I rhyme and rehearse in riddles;
I rejoice and mourn on the same line and at the same time.
I am a poem,
Expressive, enchanting, haunting,
Distant
Close.
I am a poem.
I wear a different mask for each reader,
And even I don't know who I really am because
I am a poem.
Learning Late
I sat in the class playing catch-up,
And I had already lived their lives.
The sun was hot and I heard the mowers drone.
I knew my children were playing
Without me this summer.
I studied things I'd never need again--
Plato, the Pythagorean theorem, and Paradise Lost
Were lost on me.
I could hardly hear
The professor for the mower.
I could hardly bear
To stay in my sticky seat,
So I closed my eyes
And smelled the clorined pool on their skin.
I tasted the peanut butter and jelly sandwich kisses
And knew my parents were too old to get into the water.
Catching Lowcountry Crabs
It's really quite a serious thing
To catch a crab with necks and string.
The look upon a face can tell
The gravity of the little spell
That ties one to the crab's ill fate,
And for the crab, it's much too late!
Nailing Jello
She is like Jello,
Soft and sweet and mellow.
She appears to be moldable and holdable;
However, whenever I try to nail her down,
Or place my arms around her,
She slips and slides
And silently falls away.
She's at her best when she is cold.
When she sets her mind, it is solid.
And then one day when I turned up the heat,
She melted away, like red water.
The Discordant Dancer
God's Orchestra played
And I whirled and waltzed to a Symphony--
Until I heard a few chords
That struck discord in my earthly ear.
I danced farther and farther from the Sacred Source
Until I heard the Masterful Music no longer
And became obsessed with the dancer and the dance.
Then I wondered if I moved in time with the Time,
Or was I like sin,
A ludicrous spectacle in God's grief-filled eyes,
Flailing and prancing insanely in vain,
Like a deaf child to Mozart?
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Readers' Links:
Find A Gathering of Flowers at Amazon.com & at Target.com
Writers' Links:
Scott Eagan (My Agent!) Greyhaus Literary Agency:
www.greyhausagency.com
Lowcountry Romance Writers of America:
www.lowcountryrwa.com
Romance Writers of America:
www.rwanational.org
American Christian Fiction Writers:
www.americanchristianfictionwriters.com
Faith, Hope and Love:
www.faithhopelove-rwa.org
Vicki's Articles on Writing:
"How Did She Do It?"
by Vicki Wilkerson Sweatman
Interviews with Vicki:
"Make-Believe Mondays" featuring
Vicki Wilkerson Sweatman
(Interview date: May 14, 2007 -- http://makebelievemondays.blogspot.com )
Critique Group
An important part of my life as a writer is my critique group which meets every Thursday night--unless there's a hurricane threatening the South Carolina coast.
Our gang includes Nina Bruhns, Judy Watts, Dorothy McFalls, Kieran Kramer and me! We occasionally have reunions with Dr. Adrienne Ellis Reeves (who now lives in California) when she visits Charleston for her book signings. C.J. Lyons and Al Chaput visit us, as well.
I look forward to Thursday nights because it is always more than entertaining--and it used to be fattening when we ate before we read our work to the group (Back then we called ourselves the Charleston Supper Club and Critique Society). We can get into some pretty heated conversations about writing, but we always end up laughing. I can't begin to tell you how much these writers mean to me. I respect them as professionals and value their information about the business of writing and their judgments about my writing.
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