Drawn by Chris Ledbetter

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$4.99
SKU 978-1-77233-295-7
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Caught between the sweltering fall landscape of Wilmington, NC beaches and southern illusions and expectations, all sixteen year-old Cameron Shade thinks about is art. That, and for Farrah Spangled to view him as more than just a friend. Cameron hopes he can win her heart through art. 


After several warm interactions with Farrah, including painting together at the beach, Cameron discovers just how complex Farrah’s life is. Following a tense run-in with Farrah’s father, she forbids Cameron to speak to her again, but Cameron’s convinced there’s more behind the request. 

To impress Farrah, Cameron sketches her portrait into a mysterious sketchbook. He nearly jumps from his skin when the sketch moves and communicates with him. Farrah is now in grave danger because the sketch he drew of her sucked her real-life’s soul into the sketchbook. Cameron now has twenty days to extract Farrah. To save her, he must draw himself into the book. If he fails… they both die.

14+ due to adult situations

 

Excerpt:

I flip to a clean sheet. Heaven is a blank canvas.

Mr. Cassisi breaks the silence, pointing to my hand. “I see you are still showing off your master pencil tricks.”

I hadn’t even realized I’d been twirling the pencil around my thumb. A little trick Mom taught me, before her death. I turn away and close my eyes for a moment.

Mr. Cassisi snaps my attention back to the present. “So, my young Caravaggio, what is it on that mind of yours?”

“I prefer Da Vinci.”

“Of course you do.” He smiles warmly, acknowledging our long-running joke, and sits on a nearby stool. “Big shoes, my friend.”

I sigh. “See, I’m trying to impress this girl at school by drawing a portrait of her, but I want it to be, like, really realistic, you know? So I wanted some advanced pointers beyond the normal instruction you give. I want the good stuff you learned back in Italy.”

“When is she going to sit for it?”

“She’s not. I’m going to use a yearbook picture––”

“Hmmm, that is not stalking at all, is it now?” He coughs loudly.

“You all right?”

“Just my annual cold when the weather changes over. I can almost tell time by how reliable it is.” He coughs again into a paper towel, looks at the towel, and then crumples it up to throw it away. He returns his attention to me. The lines in his face are more severe. “Son, if there is one thing I have learned in these eighty years, it is this: If you like the girl, tell her. That is the only damn thing YOLO is good for, you hear me? The greatest deceit this life delivers is the belief that you have time.”

My gaze falls to the floor, and then shifts toward the cawing seagulls at the window. “She has a boyfriend.”

Mr. Cassisi rubs his scruffy face. “If the girl is worth having, then you can’t be surprised if she is taken. He is a boyfriend, not a husband. That is what high school is all about. Ahhh, young love … that means you have to fight a little harder, yes? And not with these.” He shakes his wrinkled fist at me. “The pencil is mightier than the fist.” His subsequent chuckle resonates from deep within his chest as he walks behind the counter. “Keep talking. I’m listening.”

“Anyway, so I thought I’d try to get her attention through art.”

Mr. Cassisi reappears from behind the counter, pressing his fingers to his thumb and kissing the tips before gesturing his hand in the air. “There is no greater pursuit in life than the pursuit of art, yes?” He loops his smock over his head. “Now, let us begin.”

“Wait, why are you wearing a smock? We’re not painting.”

“It is all about process. I put on the smock. I am all business.” He grabs the pencil from my hand. “Now, you have the chops already, yes? I have seen your work. It is not the technical things. You want advanced technique? Here is the thing about portraits. With portraits…” He taps the tip of his pruned finger against the center of my chest. “You must draw from there.”

My sternum bone hums and vibrates like he tapped a tuning fork. He shifts his weight from foot to foot as he sketches a portrait of his late wife. From memory. It takes him all of five or six minutes. Maybe less. His process enthralls me. A pencil in his hand may as well be a magic wand. I’m rapt. When he’s finished, her picture appears to hover right above the paper.

“Mr. Cassisi, that’s amazing,” I say. “Those fingers still have the juice.”

His voice thins. “Sometimes I hear a mysterious voice over the ocean, when the beach is empty. She speaks to me, still. Her whispers carry atop the waves.” He stares at the picture for a moment. “Amore mia … musa mia.” He reaches a finger toward the face, almost like he’s going to stroke her cheek. A single tear forms at the corner of his eye. “You must infuse the portrait with passion. Then and only then will she come alive on the page.”