Back in the beginning of August, I discovered one of the most creative storytellers on the Instagram (bookstagram) community that I have yet to find. Heather Rose Walters' story, Ava Coulise & The Time Pieces, is a work of fiction told in extremely short chunks. The story is about a girl names Ava Coulise (obviously) who embarks on a journey that takes her not only to distant places, but also - as the title suggests - through time, as well. Ava inherits a watch from her now-deceased grandfather, and after hearing his many stories about jumping through time and changing the past - most of which she assumed to be tall tales - Ava decides to take on these same adventures herself. In an attempt to fix her grandfather's mistakes and to find her long-gone sister (an added mystery element within the plot), Ava teams up with a few other characters familiar with her family's unique time-travelling tendencies in order to set things right again.
While reading Ava's story I was reminded of Scarlet from Marissa Meyers' The Lunar Chronicles. They are similar in the context of family loyalty, adventure driven by searching for a beloved family member, and then having those adventures through France. As well, though, the sci-fi time jump aspects of the story were reminiscent of The Time Traveler's Wife by Audrey Niffenegger meets a more contemporary version of Hermione's time turner in J. K. Rowling's Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban. As Ava travels through time, the different adventures she undertakes allow the reader to feel as if reading a historical fiction piece. While the short trips to the past are not elaborately detailed in the way a longer work of historical fiction would be, these snippets into past lives still provide a change in setting and the new characters within those settings reveal enough to the reader to know which time period is emerging within that scene.
While the stories are reminiscent of these characters, plot lines, and literary elements, they do not - in ANY way - seem shallowly contrived nor do they hinder the story or character development. Rather, Walters seems to take the differing elements of these components and meld them seamlessly into a completely unique take on these timeless (pun certainly intended) story elements. It is important to note, though, that I do not know whether or not Walters gained any of her inspiration from these stories. They were simply recalled from my own memory while reading Walters' work. I thought it would be notable here in terms of giving interested readers an idea of the vibes of this particular piece of writing.
Each time Walters posts a new chunk of the story, she posts it on Instagram which allows her incorporate a photo that alludes to the plot in that section of reading. The photos are also manipulated slightly to include the number of the chapter that corresponds with that given post (an easy guide for those who follow the story). The images are often full of natural beauty and add intrigue to reading the newest section of the story, though they rarely reveal any major plot details too far in advance.
I love visuals that accompany a reading; a picture truly is worth a thousand words. And as a logophile I also believe that you can draw even more than those thousand words out of yourself after looking at an inspiring visual. I implement images to inspire and accompany writing prompts quite often in the classes I teach (I teach high school English). And as I writer myself, I often find beauty and inspiration in the visual aspects of the world around me rather than the inner workings of my own imagination. Therefore, I was curious to know which came first for Walters' creative process - the story or the photo.
As noted, she is quite active in the Instagram bookstagram community. Therefore, I simply reached out to her on her account and asked. Her response is as follows:
"...usually the story comes first, but occasionally the photo will happen and lead the story a little [...] when I first started the project I used images from unsplash.com because I am a writer first and photography really intimidated me. Then I started trying it out, occasionally editing the unsplash photos, then attempting to take a few of my own. [...] Then I started enjoying photography and doing it more and more! Then I decided to commit to only ever using my own imagery, Which is the rule I hold to now."
Her response reinforced to me how much inspiration, imagination, creativity, talent, and sense of adventure it truly takes to be a dedicated writer of any genre. Her ideas for Ava's stories and adventures, the talent she has in storytelling, and the willingness to take on a new skill (photography) in order to enhance her stories and promote them in a unique way show that Heather Rose Walters is truly a creative mind.
The story starts en media res and was somewhat difficult to understand the first time I read through the beginning chapters. I am the kind of reader who likes to understand all of the details as I begin to dive into a story, so I found the ambiguity of the beginning somewhat off-putting at first. However, as I got further into the chapters, the story began to unfold in a way that made the beginning details click better. I found myself re-reading these beginning chapters multiple times to try to put all of the pieces together (again, pun intended - you will only get it when you read the story). As such, though, I was still unable to answer all of my questions: How does Ava know how to use the watch? How does she know how to fix the timepieces? How do Charlie and Abe know so much about Ava's family and heritage? But with each continuous question I found myself asking, I realized that these are probably all details that can be answered as the plot develops and the storytelling continues. I'm hoping that as the story continues, Walters reveals more and more about Ava's background and family, the interrelationship between Charlie, Abe, and Ava, and even more about Cece's background as well (what happened in her life that made her so manipulative and cruel?!).
Readers can download a PDF copy of the first 90 installments of Ava Coulise & the Time Pieces at the following link: http://www.heatherrosewalters.com/ava-coulise-part-i. While this medium is easiest to read (in terms of having all of the story in front of you at once), it does not include the same visuals as Walters' Instagram account (@storiesforbreakfast). While reading the PDF on my tablet, I kept my phone handy to indulge in the photos at the same time to enhance my reading experience. I would suggest to interested readers that you find a way to incorporate Walters' Instagram images into your own reading of the story, as well, as it creates a different overall experience.
Again, Walters' Instagram handle is @storiesforbreakfast and when I first heard the account name, I interpreted it as an author whose dedication was found by being determined to write something every morning (hence, stories for breakfast). Whether or not this is true of Heather Rose Walters, I cannot say, and though this may not be a story in the traidtional sense, as I sit at my own laptop and watch the sun rise out my back window I am nonetheless thankful for the inspiration she has brought me.
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