Halloweentown

I have always loved Halloween. I have no idea why exactly, my family celebrated Halloween like most middle-class American families in the 1980s with candy, homemade decorations, and costumes, my parents eating popcorn and handing out candy while watching scary Halloween programs on the television. I went trick-or-treating with a giant pillowcase with my friends in the nearby neighborhoods. We didn't stop until that pillowcase was at least half full and then we'd stash that candy in our room and make it last until Easter. My mom usually made or helped me make my own costume. If you didn't have a homemade costume at some point in your childhood, I am sorry. I feel like you've been ripped off of a great Halloween experience. I have nothing against store-bought, but ah, the joys of a thrifted and hand-sewn Minnie Mouse costume!

Now I'm an adult and I still love Halloween. I'm a little miffed that I don't get to go trick-or-treating anymore. I still start thinking of costume ideas all summer. Last year I got bold and had a Sleepy Hollow themed party outside. I started planning it last summer, and as I gathered ideas (yay Pinterest!), I started to have an idea for a story that featured the characters of Sleepy Hollow.

I grew up with the Disney Cartoon and have always loved it. Probably because it features horses as main characters. I had a stubborn gray horse when I was fifteen, so I always felt a kind of kinship with poor old Gunpowder. I've looked all over for books and adaptations of the Sleepy Hollow tale. I've been to play adaptations that were good, I've been to musical adaptations that were not good, although the headless rider that always comes in at the end on a black horse thrills me right down to my toes. I just love the headless horseman as a villain.

I've even been to a local Sleepy Hollow themed haunted hayride with a recorded storyteller recounting the Legend as you sit in a wagon pulled by a team of draft horses sipping hot cocoa and looking at haunted scenes while waiting for the headless horseman to make an appearance. And of course, he does. At the very end of the hayride, a headless horseman gallops out of the dark trees and chases down the wagon, complete with a large black horse wearing blinders outfitted with red, glowing eyes. It's fantastic, I go every year.

Sleepy Hollow Utah Haunted Wagon Ride

by Rocky Mountain Outfitters, Soldier Hollow, Midway UT
SleepyHollowUtah.com

Last year the company I work for had a corporate contest for a fun Halloween activity where employees could write, film (on their iPhones), and submit a short homemade scary movie. I volunteered with my team to whip up a zombie script and had a blast doing it. The project never went farther than that, one team member had worked on actual movie productions in the past and started saying he wouldn't be attached to the project if we couldn't hire real actors, extras, and supply the "crew" with a craft service table (ugh, seriously)?

Gotta decorate the cubicle for Halloween, am I right?

That did it though, I was hooked on writing Halloween scripts. I decided to whip up a little Sleepy Hollow story idea since I didn't seem able to find a good novel featuring the characters - and I've looked everywhere. There are a few out books out there based on or inspired by The Legend of Sleepy Hollow, but in my opinion, they are pretty unsatisfying.

I put the idea aside for a few months during the winter of 2018, but then the story just hasn't stopped popping into my brain. I gave in and decided to plan another trip to Sleepy Hollow, NY in October 2019 and to also start writing the story for real.

I've been to Sleepy Hollow once before, in 2017, just for a day. I was instantly intrigued and smitten with the place. Halloween town? Beautiful, historical cemetery? Quaint village feel and great food? Um, yes, please.

My favorite view of NYC. October is a perfect time to visit.

The Sleepy Hollow Cemetery is absolutely gorgeous in the fall. 

I started planning my trip and writing the story in Spring 2019, and I have not been able to stop! It's been so fun to try something new. I have an English degree in technical writing, but I write software training, not fiction. It's been a huge challenge, but so much fun!

I was originally going to post each chapter here on the blog, but now that I've done some research and gotten some good advice from people in the publishing world who know what they are talking about,  I decided to publish the story on Wattpad and hopefully create a digital eBook in the future. I'm hoping to get it done by October so people can read it during Halloween! I also discovered after I decided to write the story that this 2019 and 2020 marks the 200th anniversary of Washington Irving's first publication of The Legend (coincidence? Maybe, maybe not!).

I am going to share fun Halloween (who doesn't love Halloween in the summer?) posts on the blog and all my trip research for spending a weekend in Sleepy Hollow, so I hope you stay and share your comments and trip ideas with me!

I can't wait for October. Don't lose your head . . .

- Kelly

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