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I’ve had an e-mail from one of my fabulous readers asking me about something I’ve been struggling with myself since I started writing Scars, so I thought I’d share my thoughts on the subject with everyone so there are no surprises.

For those who don’t know, Orlando was in a very bad accident when he was younger and he broke his back. I’ve been asked if I’m going to incorporate that into Scars now that Peyton is opening up about what happened to her. To be honest, I’ve thought about it. I know it would add another dimension to the story, give them something else in common, and give more reality to the Orlando character. For those reasons, I’ve been experimenting with putting it in, with having the Orlando character open up to Peyton about it. But in the end, I don’t think I can do it.

I know how personal my own accident was, what I went through, and I know how I’d feel if someone took details they’d gleaned from unreliable sources and tried to write about my experience from my perspective, and I’m pretty sure it wouldn’t be good. It would feel like an invasion of privacy, like someone was taking liberties with something that was really painful and hard to deal with for me. Because of that, I don’t want to do the same thing to Orlando. He has feelings that need to be respected, and knowing how intensely private he is about his life, I don’t want to cross that line. I glazed over his accident in my Charlie series because I wasn’t comfortable with going into details, but this time I’m going to avoid it all together.

I apologize if anyone is let down or disappointed by this, but I have to do what I feel is right. I have lots of ups and downs up my sleeve for these characters, so it won’t be boring, I promise. I hope you’ll all keep reading and leaving your wonderful comments for me!