"This is Not a Love Scene"

S. C. Megale is an author and filmmaker. She's been profiled in USA Today, The Washington Post, and New York Newsday, and has appeared on NBC’s Today Show and the CBS Evening News for her philanthropic and literary work. As a humanitarian, she's spoken on the USS Intrepid, at the NASDAQ opening bell, and to universities and doctors nationwide. She enjoys making connections all over the world.

Megale was raised in the long grass of the Civil War, hunting for relics and catching fireflies along the banks of Bull Run. A shark tooth, flutes, and a flask are some of the items that hang from her wheelchair, and she had a fear of elevators until realizing this was extremely inconvenient. She lives with her family which includes her parents, sister and brother, service dog, and definitely-not-service dog.

Megale applied the Page 69 Test to This is Not a Love Scene, her first published novel and reported the following:

From page 69:

I should have been paying attention. Instead, I studied the back of Cole’s head the whole time. How did he feel about this? When they portrayed the man limply being dressed, Cole didn’t move. When the heavy wheelchair needed to be pushed up a steep hill, he scratched his forearm. When the man confessed his self-hate because of the disability, Cole didn’t raise a hand to dry his eyes. He just watched.

Just. Watched.

Maybe he was dragged here by the other two, and the only thing on his mind was getting some eight-fifty nachos at the counter. Or worse, maybe he was thinking of me, with pity and that helpless feeling like you just can’t wrap your mind around something.

My God, you deserve to be loved like everyone else. But it can’t be from me.

I was used to men thinking, saying, or showing that on their faces.

Is page 69 representative of the rest of the novel?

I think so. Maeve, the protagonist with muscular dystrophy, happens to be in the same movie theater as Cole, the unlawfully hot guy she fell for. Only problem is, they're at a film about a young man in a wheelchair experiencing all the awkward and intimate things Maeve sort of doesn't want Cole thinking about or associating with her.

Visit S.C. Megale's website.

My Book, The Movie: This Is Not a Love Scene.

Writers Reads: S. C. Megale.

--Marshal Zeringue