A Snippet from the Book I'm Writing...

This is the beginning from the book I'm currently working on. Let me know what you think so far!

I read somewhere that some Native American tribes used to make prisoners-of-war run the gauntlet. However, there was no running involved. It was slow, grueling, excruciating…a prisoner-of-war had to walk slowly between two lines of people, young and old, with clubs and rocks. You had to keep walking while people on all sides of you pummeled you with clubs, rocks, and their fists. If you made it through the gauntlet, you were a member of the tribe. Some made it through the gauntlet with injuries that healed over time; Others were scarred for the rest of their lives; And some didn’t make it at all. Sounds brutal, right? If you ask me, it sounds like middle school. I mean, have you ever attempted to walk down the halls of a middle school during the five minute class break? It can be brutal. Forget about tardies, most of us are just happy to be alive.

In middle school you are a part of the gauntlet many times. Sometimes you are the one running the gauntlet, just hoping to survive. Sadly, sometimes you are the one holding the club, swinging away at someone else. I wish I could say that I have never done anything to hurt someone else, but let’s face it, I’m thirteen (almost fourteen)—I think it’s in my DNA. I mean, we all come into middle school as these wide-eyed kids. The halls are so big, the cold, metal lockers, terrifying, the lay-out of the school, confusing. We are all scared and awkward together. We still say things like, “Do you want to come over and play after school?” and sometimes we accidentally call our teacher “mom”. By eighth grade, we are hardened soldiers. We’ve seen it all (or so we think). We make fun of the new little kids coming in, forgetting that it was us once, not too long ago. We wouldn’t be caught dead asking a friend to come play, instead, we say, “Do you want to hang out?” Calling your teacher “mom” would be devastating to your middle school survival, so we avoid talking to teachers altogether. By eighth grade, it’s like you lose your innocent and naïve outlook on life, and you realize that it’s all about survival. You do what you got to do to survive because, hey, it’s a jungle out there.