Say hello toย Eliana Kendrick, a 35 year old novelist born in San Francisco and lived it up in Arizona.
Name:ย Eliana Kendrick
Age:ย 35
Faceclaim:ย Rebecca Rittenhouse
Neighborhood:ย Oak Gardens
Occupation:ย Novelist
Time in Blue Harbor: 2 years
Biography:
For as long as Eliana Kendrick could remember sheโd been a storyteller. Imagination was something she had in spades, vast and ever wandering. Some of her parents most fond memories of Ellie had been when they were traveling and she sat in the backseat making up stories and told them off the top of her head, just staring out the window as she scenery went by. It wasnโt a mystery what her likely future was, even if it had taken Ellie a bit of time to figure it out for herself. Growing up in San Francisco, she had a charmed life. Her father worked in finance and her mother was a doctor. Friends were easy to come by given that in youth Ellie didnโt have a shy bone in her body. She was brave and bold enough to talk to anyone and tell them exactly what she thought and felt. To some kids it was hard to take, that amount of presence, and to be around someone so sure of themselves but Ellie was so independent and content with her own company that it never really bothered her.
In school she performed well, naturally having an easier go at language and arts than sciences and maths. She played sports, a swimmer and on the volleyball team. In her head though, Ellie was always somewhere else. To say she was a dreamer, wouldโve been an understatement. She became drawn to anything that told a story and offered an escape from her life. Not that it was a bad life, the girl wanted for nothing really. It was just mundane and boring, leaving her to hope that there was more to it than the every day routine that made every single day feel exactly the same. She read voraciously and got lost in the imagery the novels painted into her head, found thrill and excitement in the adventure each book led her on and wanted something like that for herself. No matter how dramatic the lines on the page were. Ellie was in the ninth grade, daydreaming her English hour away when her most unforgettable teacher told her where her future likely was. Until then, the ideas of who and what she could be when she got older changed on a dime. Sometimes even more than once in a day. From actor to director to real estate agent to fire fighter. Never once had she actually considered that there was something to the way her mind would wander and the worlds and lives sheโd create in her head.
Once Ellie moved on to university, was out of the house away from her parents and older brother, away from her friends sheโd grown up with, there was something that clicked inside. There was freedom to be whomever she wanted to be, to do whatever she wanted to do. She didnโt have to perform to standards and expectations set by her parents. Friends whoโd known her for years and years, thinking they really knew who she was, werenโt around to comment or judge the things she said or did anymore. The fact that being away from home for the first time offered her to be who she genuinely was, was the most freeing feeling Ellie had experienced in her life thus far. In university, states away from home, naturally Ellie studied creative writing and found herself writing beyond the short stories sheโd kept private almost like a diary when she was in high school. In months she was putting together intricate novels and feeling full of herself and a sense of accomplishment because of it. Compliments flowed from teachers and classmates, so Ellie had no reason to believe she wasnโt this incredible writer who wouldnโt have a difficult time getting a book out there.
The first three novels she attempted to publish were rejected. With her confidence shaken and sense of purpose crumbling, advice came from a handsome stranger that had been a speaker in one of her classes. Heโd been invited by her professor to talk to the class about his career and how heโd broken into the investigative journalism profession. Since Ellie had been the only person that hadnโt asked a question or seemed enamored by his success, when theyโd run into each other later at a coffee shop, where she was sulking and licking her wounds of rejection, she confessed why. She was giving up. Clearly she didnโt have the magic that it took to be some great novelist like sheโd dreamt of. When he offered to look at her manuscript, Ellie had been surprised but hadnโt really hesitated. His review was that she had the talent, the imagination for a good story, but it felt too much like fantasy. Given the genre she was writing in, there wasnโt enough realism, and his suggestion was: experience.
While in her final year of university, Ellie looked into what it took to be a private investigator and once she got her licensing, she went to work for a small two person agency. Essentially, it was just the name on the door and a bookkeeper heโd hired to keep things in order. In the beginning she was nothing more than his assistant, and in training, even if he hadnโt really had many years on her. But experience had been what she wanted and experience had been what she got. Ellie realized after sheโd been deep into a few cases just how sheltered sheโd been; how despite all the novels sheโd read and documentaries and films sheโd seen that she really only had a very general idea on police procedurals went and the real grit of how the law worked. There was so much nuance, so many varied secrets and things people did to one another that it had shocked her at first. She was out of her depth but as Ellie fell deeper and deeper into what it took to be a sleuth, dug deep into research it became a sort of drug.
The problem was, this private eye life she was leading had only been meant to be a temporary gig to understand and make herself a better writer. So Ellie had done it under a made up identity. She created a character for herself essentially and lived that life for years, to the extent of getting involved with her boss and becoming his partner in business. All the while Ellie began publishing suspense, thriller novels under her real name and had been topping the New York Times Best Seller List. By day, and sometimes under the cloak of night, she was a detective and partner to a PI, both professionally and personally. And in the moments she could square away for herself, usually in the apartment she had kept and told him that she was keeping but only so that she could rent it out for extra income, she would write. For years Ellie lived this double life, until one day it all stopped and she went to live in Illinois. She left her life as Callie Hendricks behind, abandoning the business and her longtime boyfriend with a suitable excuse that she was burnt out and felt the relationship had taken its course.
Winding up in Blue Harbor was for her brother. Heโd called her one day two years ago stating that he and his wife were getting a divorce and that he needed some help and support. There were a lot of complications on the wifeโs side, with her family attacking his character and attempting to stir up trouble. It wasnโt really anything Ellie truly desired getting involved in but since her brother never really asked her for anything, she felt the least she could was be there for him. Especially since he had supported her through her career. In truth, what Ellie saw was an opportunity to start over and start fresh. Something had begun to grow stale in her writing, in the last two books sheโd published, while theyโd reached the top of the charts in sales, they weren't reviewed as well. Some critics even stated that she may have lost her touch. And well, Ellie wasnโt ready for her tower to begin crumbling under her.
