Title: Elephant by Natalie Rodriguez
Publisher: Natalie Rodriguez
Genre: Contemporary, Young Adult, Novel
Length: 316 pages
Summary:
Summer of 2006. Four childhood best friends. A family secret.
After a strange encounter leaves him hospitalized, a timid teenage boy named Matt “Matty” Smith comes home to a continuous series of events met with anxiety, depression, and PTSD.
Under the guardianship of his grandma, Lucia, Matt lives with unspoken questions about his deceased grandpa and father, and his missing mother. The elephant in the room. As Matt develops over the summer, the secrets only grow more profound and complex. Will the answers ever come? While searching for answers, Matt and his three childhood best friends encounter the meanings of love, forgiveness, and fate.
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Excerpt
IT WAS DIFFICULT TO SEE, as though an ice cube had enclosed his body. Frostbite worked its way down his fingertips, turning bluer by the second.
Something was visible. He was visible to the eye of the silhouette.
Around 5’8”, a silhouette of a man—no taller than the teenage boy––stood in front of him.
“Wait!” The teenage boy called after; his breaths vapored out into puffs of clouds.
He pushed forward
“Come back!”
But the teenage boy was distancing away, not the silhouette. The boy lunged forward and came to an abrupt halt. Somehow, somewhere, in the white frosty air, his feet kept getting sucked into the ground, into the white floor. Winter wonderland.
An invisible force field was amongst the boy and the unknown man.
“Wait!” his voice now croaked. The boy stretched out his arms, but, starting at the tips of his fingers and working its way down his wrists, forearms, and arms––a blaring light shone.
He squinted as the light traveled through the white cloud storm, forcing him to look away.
* * *
The teenage boy’s eyes shot wide open, awakening. He wormed his way up, giving the mattress a few squeaks. The door was closed, and the curtains were concealed with floor length curtains. There was zero amount of light coming into the bedroom. He kept his hand on the chain of the lamp atop the bedside table.
Matthew Jimmy Smith was his name.
Around 5’8”, he was a teenager in the midst of puberty with a possibility of another growth spurt, not a boy,
Acne: great. Body type: lean-ish. Puberty check: no fucks.
Mood: moody. The childhood paintings on the walls also had a mind of their own, with squiggly letters of his name, Matt, and his nickname, Matty. A few of them were written in bold as well.
Author Bio
Natalie Rodriguez is an award-winning writer, director, and mental health and anti-violence/trauma advocate based in Los Angeles, CA. In 2014, she graduated from California State University, Fullerton with a Bachelor of Arts in Radio-Television-Film. Her first experience in entertainment was an internship at the Conan O’Brien show and Peter Guber’s Mandalay Pictures, where she worked at the offices of producers, Matthew Rhodes (“Cherry,” “Men in Black: International”) and Academy Award-winner, Cathy Schulman (“Sharp Objects,” “Crash”).
Natalie was also a panelist at events, including Google, Hispanicize, and YouTube, where she has shared her story as a writer, filmmaker, and a female working in the entertainment industry. Some of her previous writing work can be found in publications such as the HuffPost Blog, Thrive Global, Anxiety Resource Center, Opposing Views, NowThis News, Zooey Deschanel’s Hello Giggles, The Mighty, and more.
In 2017, she founded her production company, Extraordinary Pictures, focusing on both films, television, digital series, and social issue projects. The company has a list of projects in its roaster, including development on a TV sitcom, “The D,” which placed in top-ten for best comedy screenplays at Stage 32. At the moment, Natalie’s second directorial feature film, “Howard Original,” is in post-production and set for an August 2020 release date on YouTube Premium. The film is based on the award-winning short film about a washed-up screenwriter named Howard, who encounters more than just selling a story, a studio rejection, and writer’s block when his pet cat comes to life.
Natalie’s directorial feature film, “The Extraordinary Ordinary,” which she also wrote, produced, and was the executive producer on, is making its round through the festival circuit. The film deals with young adults, mental health awareness, and the aftermath of trauma. The film won ‘Best Film About Women’s Empowerment’ at the Glendale International Film Festival and scored nominations in Best Director, Best Female Director, and Best Picture. The film also had a sold-out world premiere screening at the Los Angeles Diversity Film Festival (LADFF), winning ‘Best Performance’ by the leading actress, Maddison Bullock. Further details on the project can be found @theextraordfilm, including recent film festival awards and nominations.
Her other screenplays and films have also been featured and placed in the final rounds at HollyShorts Film Festival, NALIP: Latino Lens Film Festival, ShortsTV, Stage 32: Comedy Screenplay, Beverly Hills Film Festival, Culver City Film Festival, Indie Night Film Festival, Hollywood Screenplay Contest, Table Read My Screenplay – Austin Film Festival, and others.
Natalie was most recently an ambassador for Jen Zeano Designs (JZD), a clothing company in association with USA Networks. While she continues to build her creative background, Natalie is always open to collaborating with other artists and advocates. Currently, she awaits the publication of her first young adult novel this April 2020, “Elephant,” a story about four childhood best friends who uncover a family secret. The book was also a finalist at Clare Books’ the Binge-Watching Cure II contest for ‘Best Novel.’.
Author Links: Twitter * Instagram * Goodreads
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Not normally one for teenage books but the mystery element and the few diary like teenage comments have me interested