Word Choice Exercise

[MacAllister]

Okay--I was going to post a section from a King short, then thought better of it. Instead, I've slapped up an old flash piece that I've never done anything with. In terms of messing about with it, I thought we could all take a crack at it.

The main problem with the piece is that nothing friggin' happens...it's a decently literary 1K words, so it's fair game to blatantly sacrifice on Cthulu's literary altar...and muck about with to our hearts' content.

I was originally going to post a few paragraphs from a Stephen King short, so we could take it apart and figure out what made it scary--then I decided perhaps we could take a crack at making something fairly homogenous into downright creepy, instead.

Then maybe we'll go back and take a look at scary as done by a master. :)

So, to get the ball rolling, I'm slapping up an old flash piece. I am not emotionally attached to these words...but they belong to me, so we can do any old damn thing we wanna do to them, at will. <insert evil grin>

This is a writing exercise, open to anyone who wants to play--I am not looking for a crit.

It's a faily boring little thousand words, as is. So lets make it really creepy/evocative/tense/scary. Let's do so with word choice and pacing--not by introducing a serial-killer boogeyman in the closet, or making major plot changes. Let's also keep it PG-13.

Take on as much or as little of it as you care too--if it sinks without a trace, that's fine too. :)


(edited March 4th, to make more user-friendly:)
Okay--I did mention that this was an experiment. The clicking back-and-forth is frustrating and counterproductive. So I'm moving the flash piece over here, so we can work with it better:
__________________________________________________ _________

She came to the little old house in early spring. The shabby and weathered ship-lap siding reflected sun off snow, like the bottom of a sterling silver plate left too long a-sitting. Snow filled the yard, and lay drifted over the crazy tilting pickets of the garden fence.


She stood where the gate once hung. She sorted the strange keys on the ring, and dropped the note the realtor gave her into the snow. She sighed, tugged one glove off with her teeth, then bent and picked up the scrap of paper. She carefully brushed wet snow away with her gloved hand, and saw the words brush away, too, in bleeding smears. She shrugged and wadded up the little yellow note in her cold hand.

How important could Lenny-the-realtor’s advice really be, she thought.

So she put her hand in her coat pocket and let go of the note.

“I’ll need to shovel the walk,” she said. She rather liked the firm, decisive tone in her own voice. Before she spoke aloud, she feared she would sound unsure. Worse, perhaps she would inadvertently use a rising inflection at the end of her sentence, rendering it a question, instead of a statement. But she did not. Her own voice pleased her.

Michael would pull a folding shovel from a handy inside pocket and whack a path through the heavy snow, efficient as a tractor, before he even looked for his keys.

She did not shovel the walk. Instead, she went inside.

“What will you do there, alone?” her sister asked her yesterday. She had not answered her sister.


“I shall think. And take long walks in the countryside,” she said, now.


Damp chill filled the house. She noticed it immediately when she removed her coat and her remaining glove. Her other glove, she suspected, lay somewhere in the yard. She looked in all the likely places for a thermostat, and saw none. However, an iron stove squatted on a hearth of crumbling bricks in the corner of the sitting room.


She looked at the stove carefully, sizing it up as a potential adversary. She gripped the wooden handle on the lever that secured the stove-door and pulled. The fine hairs on her neck stood up when metal shrieked against metal, as she pulled the handle. The heavy door swung open on stiff iron hinges. She crouched to her hands and knees and stuck her head through the opening into the belly of the stove. She tried to turn her head enough to see if the sky showed through bottom of the stovepipe, that led to the roof. She could not.


“This was probably covered, in the damn note,” she said. She stood up and brushed the soot from her hands against her thighs.


She went outside without her coat to look for firewood. In a lean-to shed on the back of the little house, she found it, dry and split and stacked, with a box of kindling just to one side. The axe rested on its head, against a huge round of wood someone once used as a chopping block.


She picked up the axe, experimentally. It seemed terribly heavy to her. Michael would've used it to singlehandedly clear-cut the north woods for next year's firewood.


Back inside, she built a fire. The stove smoked a bit, at first. Michael would have laughed at her, watching her pushing and pulling at the moving parts on the stove and stovepipe, burning her fingers, her eyes watering from the smoke. But once she figured out how to open the damper, her fire burned neat and hot.

When darkness fell, so did the temperature. She stepped into the yard, wearing her coat again. She held both hands around a mug of tea that steamed wet and white against the distant sky. The stars were out, the sky black and very far away. It seemed terribly cold. Snow crunched and squeaked beneath her boots.

“I should go for a walk,” she said.


She stood in the yard in the snow, slowly rotated a full circle, her head tipped back to scan the sky. She thought she’d like to see the northern lights, but she wasn’t sure which direction was north. And she wasn’t sure what time of year she should expect them. She saw lights from her neighbor’s house, twinkling nearly a mile down the lane. No one tells you how very dark the nights are, here, she thought, and I never thought to ask.


She had left her desk lamp burning in the little house, and the soft yellow light glowed through the window. So she went back inside, where it was warm.


She removed her coat, set her mug on the white porcelain drainboard, then went to stand in front of the wood stove–which seemed so friendly now, with the fire banked safely behind the thick iron door.


She glanced at the dark rectangle of door between sitting rom and bedroom. She walked to the doorway and stood. She looked at the corner of the bed in the triangle of light spilling from the sitting room behind her. Two steps carried her to the foot of the bed, and she reached down and grasped the comforter covering the bed, pulled it to herself, wadding it into a soft bundle in her arms.


She fell asleep that first night curled into the loveseat, comforter tucked about her, reading a book she’d long been trying to finish.


The first morning of her second week in the little old house, she stepped into the yard with her tea. She caught and held her breath, mouth slightly open, filling with moist spring air and surprise. Hundreds of tiny, broad, stiff, green spears were pushing through the rotten snow. All along the house, beneath the single apple tree, along both sides of the silly little picket fence–not hundreds, thousands. Michael could have said if they were crocuses, or daffodils, or whatever. But she found she didn’t care.


“I’ll know, when they bloom,” she said. And she went back inside.

[maestrowork]

Deleted... the "discussion" posted here distracts from the purpose of this exercise...

[MacAllister]

nice crit, Ray--so the idea then, is let's make it scary!

These are the guidelines I posted in SYW to do so:perhaps we could take a crack at making something fairly homogenous into downright creepy, instead.

So, to get the ball rolling, I'm slapping up an old flash piece. <snip>

It's a faily boring little thousand words, as is. So lets make it really creepy/evocative/tense/scary. Let's do so with word choice and pacing--not by introducing a serial-killer boogeyman in the closet, or making major plot changes. Let's also keep it PG-13.


I'll take the first paragraph:

She came to the little old house in early spring. The shabby and weathered ship-lap siding reflected sun off snow, like the bottom of a sterling silver plate left too long a-sitting. Snow filled the yard, and lay drifted over the crazy tilting pickets of the garden fence.
Okay--there is a certain amount of tension in things not being as they seem--reality as a face over something dangerous. But this is much too cute. So what about getting rid of the word choices that make this house a safe/innocent place, if a bit shabby? We know that the spring/snow juxtaposition doesn't quite work, so we ditch it...She came to the house in late February. The shabby and weathered ship-lap siding absorbed the sun off snow. Snow filled the yard, and lay drifted over the sharpened and tilted pickets of the garden fence.

We'll use the fence to set up an image in the reader's head of crooked, sharpened teeth--without saying so, right out--if we don't have to.

Now I don't like the rhythm of the second sentence--it jars me, but I'll fix it later, after we get all the way through this thing, once.

Who's up next?

[maestrowork]

AH! Now I get it. Somehow I missed the "let's make it creepy/scary" part in the guidelines... then yes, let's use that AXE! :-)

Oh this could be fun... :Jump:

Here's my take on the first paragraph:

She came to the house in late February. The shabby and weathered ship-lap siding absorbed the sun off snow. Snow filled the yard, and lay drifted over the sharpened and tilted pickets of the garden fence.


I like "sharpened." Not sure about "shabby." I like the idea of putting in "active" verbs to drum up the mood a bit. I'm not too crazy with the rhythm either...


She drove up to the log cabin in late February. The tattered, rain-chewed ship-lap siding absorbed the sun off snow. In the yard, drift snow half-buried sharpened, tilted pickets of the garden fence, which laid out like a shattered jaw.


1. log cabin. Give a more specific description than a general "house" -- it's about setting. And log cabin sounds like something from a horror...
2. tattered and rain-chewed. Wanted to get some "active" adjectives in there. I'm also running a theme here -- probably too obvious and on the nose -- chewed. Followed by...
3. Sharpened (as in teeth?). So I go with a simile: shattered jaw. If it's too obvious, then cut "shattered jaw."
4. Half-buried. Again, trying to choose a word that brings up some subconscious imageries...

I may have gone overboard here with heavily suggestive word choices.

Who's next?

[Birol]

What if you/we/whoever, did more with the pickets on the fence. I know they're tilting, but what if all the paint was off them, they were grey, and a few were missing, adding to an overall feeling of neglect and being forgotten?

Or is that too cliche?

(Psst. What's 'ship-lap' siding?)

[MacAllister]

ROFL--this is going to be a VERY different story by the time we get done with it...

Go for it, Birol--"come and play with us...forever, and ever, and ever...."

Ship lap siding is a kind of lapped board siding--we have to lose the siding, if it's a log cabin. I dunno, Ray--the cabin seems much too cozy. Even the word "cabin" evokes warm, pleasant, rural sorts of associations.

[maestrowork]

A little more details like peeled paint or missing pickets adds to the vividness of the setting. Watch for pace, however.

Can we do something about the sun/lighting?

RE: Siding, true. We can lose the log cabin. But "house" just seems so blah. I feel like there should be something more specific than a "house."

[BlueTexas]

I'll give it a go.

"She came to the little old house in early spring. The shabby and weathered ship-lap siding reflected sun off snow, like the bottom of a sterling silver plate left too long a-sitting. Snow filled the yard, and lay drifted over the crazy tilting pickets of the garden fence."

She drove to the long-neglected summer cottage in early spring. The weathered ship-lap siding reflected wan sun off snow, creating a patina on the siding like speckled, tarnished silver. The yard, untended through the empty summer, was closed in by the tilting picket spikes of garden fence. The snow topping the yard made odd shapes of the ordinary, leaving her to wonder what lay beneath. The garden gate hung on one hinge, rustily creaking as she left the bright lane....

[MacAllister]

Hurray!!! Another playmate! :hooray:

OH! I like "cottage", a lot--better than "cabin", more evocative than "house"--and it summons up fairy-tale associations, Hansel and Gretel, and so on...
Want to talk about which word choices you made, and why, Blue?

(For any lurkers: I should probably specify that we aren't really doing a rewrite by committee--we're just examining how different writers approach the same problem, from the same starting place. There is no "right way"--we all have our own styles. Feel free to jump right in, any old time...)

[Maryn]

She stood where the gate once hung. She sorted the strange keys on the ring, and dropped the note the realtor gave her into the snow. She sighed, tugged one glove off with her teeth, then bent and picked up the scrap of paper. She carefully brushed wet snow away with her gloved hand, and saw the words brush away, too, in bleeding smears. She shrugged and wadded up the little yellow note in her cold hand. How important could Lenny-the-realtor’s advice really be, she thought.


No gate guarded the cottage now, although its hinges left their bloodstains on the fence's crackled paint. The steel keys matched the sky idly spitting snow and chilled her hand right through her glove. The Realtor's note didn't flutter from her hand so much as willfully slap itself into the pitted snow. Tugging one glove off with her teeth, she stooped to retrieve the scrap of paper. Its words brushed away with the snow, in gory smears.


She must have touched her coat to a sculpted drift; a cold damp settled onto her legs and climbed her back. How important could Lenny-the-Realtor's advice really be? The damp yellow paper wadded most pleasingly in her cold hand.


[Note: Realtor has to be capitalized. And, obviously, I'm chilly as I write this and have more snow thoughts than seem healthy.]


Maryn, not sure this is better, but sure it's different!

[BlueTexas]

Hurray!!! Another playmate! :hooray:

OH! I like "cottage", a lot--better than "cabin", more evocative than "house"--and it summons up fairy-tale associations, Hansel and Gretel, and so on...
Want to talk about which word choices you made, and why, Blue?


Uh...to make it scary? Just kidding. I chose cottage because it conjured up a clear image in my mind, summer cottage to show it wasn't in use and was away from the everyday norm (safety) of life. Fairy tales didn't occur to me--neat. The patina of tarnished silver bit-I tried to picture your disused silver plate and apply it to the house. I wanted to see it on the siding, especially since I had no idea what ship-lap was (what is it?). I tried to choose words that were cold and hard and empty to me, like wan and spike. I fenced her in with the gate to give her some isolation. ( I was thinking of the entrance to a cave meets The Shining.) I wanted the place to seem cold and lonely, away from the people who might come to her rescue, and I wanted us to feel a sense of being trapped in there.

[maestrowork]

She stood where the gate once hung. She sorted the strange keys on the ring, and dropped the note the realtor gave her into the snow. She sighed, tugged one glove off with her teeth, then bent and picked up the scrap of paper. She carefully brushed wet snow away with her gloved hand, and saw the words brush away, too, in bleeding smears. She shrugged and wadded up the little yellow note in her cold hand.

I think the pacing is fine here -- adding vivid details. As for the word choices, I am not seeing anything that need a lot of work. Perhaps a tweak or two. I also rearranged some sentences and cut out abverbs:

She stood where the gate once hung, now a wide gap between two jagged posts. As she sorted the brass keys on the ring, she dropped the note in her hand onto the snow. She sighed, tugged one glove off with her teeth, then bent and picked up the little scrap of paper. She brushed wet snow away with her gloved hand, and saw the words brush away, too, in bleeding smears. She wadded up the yellow note in her chilled hand.

[jdkiggins]

She came to the little old house in early spring. The shabby and weathered ship-lap siding reflected sun off snow, like the bottom of a sterling silver plate left too long a-sitting. Snow filled the yard, and lay drifted over the crazy tilting pickets of the garden fence.

She stood where the gate once hung. She sorted the strange keys on the ring, and dropped the note the realtor gave her into the snow. She sighed, tugged one glove off with her teeth, then bent and picked up the scrap of paper. She carefully brushed wet snow away with her gloved hand, and saw the words brush away, too, in bleeding smears. She shrugged and wadded up the little yellow note in her cold hand.

Here's my take on the first two paragraphs.


Her car slid on the snow-covered drive. She should have waited until the weather broke, but she feared the little cottage would be sold before she had a chance to see it. She stepped out of the car; a brisk cold wind slapped her face. The weathered ship-lap siding reflected sun off snow, blinding her vision. She moved forward out of the glare.

Snow filled the yard, and lay drifted over a tattered fence; arrow-like spears poked out from the snow. She glanced at the rusted, broken hinges where a gate once hung, fumbled for the keys, and dropped the realtor’s note. The ink bled; few words were legible.


How important could Lenny-the-realtor’s advice really be, she thought.

She sighed. The outside looked more of a shack than a cottage; she wondered if the inside held more promise.

Joanne

[MacAllister]

Wow--it's cool to see everone's different styles in action. :)

[awatkins]

I love what I've read so far. When I get a chance, I'd like to play, too, if that's okay. :) What I'm really looking forward to is the bit about the axe. Muwah. :ROFL:

[MacAllister]

Absolutely, Anne! LOVE to have you come play! <g> The more the merrier.

[jdkiggins]

MacAllister,

Are you planning to compose a post with the words, phrases, sentences, paragraphs etc., that you like, and everyone continue with the story from there? Adding piece by piece, in our own style, with the prior post? Or are you simply looking for everyone's different style of gore? :)

Joanne

[MacAllister]

Joanne--I had actually thought the whole experiment thread might sink without a trace--NOW I'm thinking we'll have to put it together, when we work through the piece (thank god it's short)

It seems sort of fun and educational to look at the transformation. Everyone has such seriously different takes, that I'm not sure how we'll go about combining them.

Thoughts, anyone?

[jdkiggins]

:roll: Ready for the axe? :scared: Joanne

[MacAllister]

ROFLMAO--Go for it, JD--don't feel like you gotta wait on everyone else <eg>

[jdkiggins]

Oh, no, I'm waiting. I want to see what everyone else comes up with. :) Just not sure how long I'll be able to hold out. LOL:Jump:


Honest, I'm trying to be good. :D

Joanne

[maestrowork]

Are we gonna just change the words of the original to make it read like a horror, or are we going to insert our own elements to make it a horror (like what's she's gonna use the axe for....)?

[MacAllister]

hmm--Well, Ray--I had originally planned that we wouldn't do anything but muck about with word choice, and not actually add new elements to the piece.

However, rules are made to be broken, and all that. As long as everyone's into it, and having a good time. *shrug* Why don't we just play it by ear?

[maestrowork]

Always the diplomat. ;) Either way is fine by me, but the mindset would be different for me. <eg>

[jdkiggins]

Are we gonna just change the words of the original to make it read like a horror, or are we going to insert our own elements to make it a horror (like what's she's gonna use the axe for....)?

hmm--Well, Ray--I had originally planned that we wouldn't do anything but muck about with word choice, and not actually add new elements to the piece.

However, rules are made to be broken, and all that. As long as everyone's into it, and having a good time. *shrug* Why don't we just play it by ear?

:Wha: OOPS. Sorry.
MacAllister, get your :whip: out and beat me for adding elements. I'll try to stick with the program. :( I have to admit, I'm not very good at holding back once I get started. :gone: behind the screen door on the porch that wasn't there, and trying to find that dang axe.

Joanne

[maestrowork]

Joanne, go ahead and add elements if you want. I think that's what Mac's saying. Let's play it by ear. But the point is not to rewrite the story -- but to show ourselves how different word choices or sentence structures or pacing would create that "creepy, horror" mood -- without us specifically saying "she used the axe and chopped his head off." <eg>

[MacAllister]

right--I'm just not particularly controlling, to tell ya the truth...

Frex--I think the summer-cottage/before it sold out from under her thing was a really interesting choice. I made a choice in the original that I wasn't going to explain how she found the place, etc...you felt a need for that explanation, as a writer...

I think that's cool and interesting.

I'd probably balk at introducing new characters...but I think otherwise, as long as the story remains focused on this solitary woman--it's fair game.

[MacAllister]

okay--next chunk: “I’ll need to shovel the walk,” she said. She rather liked the firm, decisive tone in her own voice. Before she spoke aloud, she feared she would sound unsure. Worse, perhaps she would inadvertently use a rising inflection at the end of her sentence, rendering it a question, instead of a statement. But she did not. Her own voice pleased her.

Michael would pull a folding shovel from a handy inside pocket and whack a path through the heavy snow, efficient as a tractor, before he even looked for his keys.

She did not shovel the walk. Instead, she went inside.

“What will you do there, alone?” her sister asked her yesterday. She had not answered her sister. She feared the combination of her own emptiness and pain, confined within the palpable aura of despair hanging over the empty cottage, its windows staring blankly at her, its door waiting to gobble her up, with her single overnight bag. What if she simply imploded, trapped within? What if she finally disappeared completely?


“I’ll need to shovel the walk,” she said. She carefully modulated her voice, liking the firm, decisive tone. Before she spoke aloud, she feared she would sound unsure. Worse, perhaps she would inadvertently use a rising inflection at the end of her sentence, rendering it a question, instead of a statement--waiting for someone else to answer her; to tell her what to do.

Her husband, Michael, would pull a folding shovel from a handy inside pocket and whack a path through the heavy snow, efficient as a tractor, before he even looked for his keys. But Michael isn't here, is he? The nasty little whisper inside her head reminded her. Michael decided at the very last minute he had to "work", didn't he?

"Piss on that," she said to herself. She did not shovel the walk. Instead, she went inside.

“What will you do there, alone?” her sister asked her yesterday. She had not answered.


Okay--I made a deliberate choice to set up the character's frame of mind, foreshadow what I envision eventually happening, and offer a hint of explanation--by linking "someone would tell her what to do" and "Michael"...I veered away from the extremely descriptive language we played with in the first couple of paragraphs, in the interest of bringing the story to an internal monologue sort of place (ala Tell-Tale Heart) and try to pick up the pacing a bit...<g>

[maestrowork]

Interesting take and direction, Mac.

Here's my take.


“I’ll have to shovel the walk,” she said, surprising herself with the confident, decisive tone in her voice. Not the wavering questions she always managed to mutter. She looked around, instinctively offered an apologetic shrug. But nobody was around. For once, she was pleased. She relaxed her shoulders and stepped ahead.


By now, her husband, Michael, would have pulled a folding shovel from a handy inside pocket and whacked a path through the dead snow, efficient as a tractor, before he even looked for his keys.

She had been disappointed that Michael could not join her at the last minute. Now, suddenly she did not care if he was here or not.

"Screw it."

She abandoned shoveling the walk, even before she began. Instead, she went inside.

“What will you do there, alone?” her sister had asked her eariler. She answered with defiant silence.


I'm going along with her frame of mind, too, but I choose not to get into internal monologues. I'm trying to show that she was a mousy character, but now suddenly she seemed to find some confidence. I didn't change a few words: dead snow, abandon, silence. I like the original word "whack" so I keep it. Hopefully the suggestion is subtle.

[jdkiggins]

So she put her hand in her coat pocket and let go of the note.

“I’ll need to shovel the walk,” she said. She rather liked the firm, decisive tone in her own voice. Before she spoke aloud, she feared she would sound unsure. Worse, perhaps she would inadvertently use a rising inflection at the end of her sentence, rendering it a question, instead of a statement. But she did not. Her own voice pleased her.

Michael would pull a folding shovel from a handy inside pocket and whack a path through the heavy snow, efficient as a tractor, before he even looked for his keys.

She did not shovel the walk. Instead, she went inside.

“What will you do there, alone?” her sister asked her yesterday. She had not answered her sister.


“I shall think. And take long walks in the countryside,” she said, now.



Here’s my take.

She reached down and shoved the note in her pocket.

“I’ll need to shovel the walk,” she said aloud with conviction. Her tone pleased her. She finally rid herself of the annoying way she’d ended statements as questions.

Her husband, Michael would be geared with a folding shovel, whack a path through the heavy snow, efficient as a tractor, before he even looked for his keys. But that’s Michael and his work was more important.

“What will you do there, alone?” her sister asked her yesterday. She hadn’t responded.

She looked at the buried walkway and trudged through the deep drifts, gripping the strange keys in her hand.

A step crumbled under her weight; nearly sending her backward. She inched her way onto the porch carefully scraping snow with her boot, testing for a porch floor. Several floorboards were missing. Others were splintered and rotted. She sidestepped, holding onto what was left of the railing until she made it to the door.

She shoved the key ring into her coat pocket. “No need for these,” she said irritated. When was the last time anyone checked this place? she wondered. The screen door hung on one hinge and the front door was ajar. She peered into the room and went inside.

--And of course, I couldn’t hold myself back from adding elements to the outside of the house before she goes in, LOL.
Joanne

[MacAllister]

And of course, I couldn’t hold myself back from adding elements to the outside of the house before she goes in, LOL.


Heh--then don't <bg> GO for it! I really like the activity and feeling of motion you bring to it, Joanne. Heh--I'm about to start adding elements all over the place, it's only fair you get to, too.

[jdkiggins]

Heh--then don't <bg> GO for it! I really like the activity and feeling of motion you bring to it, Joanne. Heh--I'm about to start adding elements all over the place, it's only fair you get to, too.

I like motion. :banana: Glad you enjoyed it. I'm grabbing my :popcorn: and checking out the next scene. :)

Joanne

[jdkiggins]

Surely, there are other writers who want to play. Right? Where are they? :partyguy: It's party time.
I'm almost finished with my :popcorn: , who's next? The axe is coming up! :idea: :scared:

Joanne

[jdkiggins]

Damp chill filled the house. She noticed it immediately when she removed her coat and her remaining glove. Her other glove, she suspected, lay somewhere in the yard. She looked in all the likely places for a thermostat, and saw none. However, an iron stove squatted on a hearth of crumbling bricks in the corner of the sitting room.


She looked at the stove carefully, sizing it up as a potential adversary. She gripped the wooden handle on the lever that secured the stove-door and pulled. The fine hairs on her neck stood up when metal shrieked against metal, as she pulled the handle. The heavy door swung open on stiff iron hinges. She crouched to her hands and knees and stuck her head through the opening into the belly of the stove. She tried to turn her head enough to see if the sky showed through bottom of the stovepipe, that led to the roof. She could not.


“This was probably covered, in the damn note,” she said. She stood up and brushed the soot from her hands against her thighs.



Here’s my take on the next section.
For the sake of keeping this going. LOL :D


Must and dust permeated her nostrils. She slipped off her coat. The dampness inside chilled her more than the wind outside. She searched for a thermostat, but found none. In the corner of the sitting room, an old monstrous iron stove squatted on a hearth of crumbling bricks.

She eyed the stove as a potential adversary; its size and peculiar shape lured her. She gripped the splintered wooden handle on the stove door and tugged. Metal shrieked against metal. Fine hairs stood up on her neck. The heavy door swung open on stiff hinges. Crouched on the crumbling hearth, she stuck her head in the belly of the stove. She twisted her body to get closer to the bottom of the stovepipe, hoping to see sky. No light shone through. She banged on the slightly open damper. It swung open; cold, wet, dark remains dropped on her head. She jerked and stumbled off the hearth.

“This was probably covered in the damn note.”


She stood, picked the icy chunks of soot out of her hair and brushed her filthy hands against her thighs.





Okay, I stopped just before the axe. LOL While I get my :Coffee: and :popcorn: I’ll try not to think of anything too gory for the axe. :snoopy: But, I’m not making any promises. Now, where are the other players? :poke:

Joanne

[MacAllister]

Damp chill filled the house. She shivered and decided to keep her coat on. A creak from the back room startled her. She froze where she stood, holding her breath and listening. A footstep? A whisper? She heard nothing more. She walked silently through the house, throwing doors open suddenly, half-expecting to surprise a stealthy intruder. The cottage was empty, save shadows and dust.

Finally, the chill became too much, so she looked in all the likely places for a thermostat. There didn't seem to be one. She stood in the center of the little sitting room and stared at the rusty iron stove squatting on a hearth of crumbling bricks.

“This was probably covered, in the damn realtor's note,” she told herself.

She looked at the stove carefully, sizing it up as a potential adversary. After she'd walked all the way around the thing, she gripped the handle on the that secured the stove-door and pulled. Metal shrieked against metal, as the door opened, stiff with disuse. The fine hairs on the back of her neck prickled at the shrill noise; like a scream in the otherwise silent house. The heavy door swung open on stiff iron hinges.

She crouched to her hands and knees and stuck her head through the opening into the belly of the stove. She thought she could almost hear voices inside the belly of the stove. She stayed there listening, trying to decipher words. Just wind in the chimney. It's got to be.

She pulled her head back out of the stove, stood up, then brushed the soot from her hands onto her jeans, leaving long smudeged black streaks up each thigh.

[Kevin Yarbrough]

She came to the little old house in early spring. The red cottage reflected sun off snow, the red paint and sunlight reflected on the ground making her think of blood. Guarding her face from the sun she looked along the side of the house, the blood red reflection extended to the fence. Glancing at the worn down picket fence, planks missing and tilted towards the house, she could almost imagine that something had been impaled on there at one time, its blood seeping into the snow and running towards the cottage.

She stood where the gate once hung, it's rusty blood stained onto the wood and the small holes that had once attached it to its mate. Reaching into hwer pocket she withdrew the keys. Sorting through the strange keys on the ring, she dropped the note the realtor gave her into the snow. She sighed, tugged one glove off with her teeth, then bent and picked up the scrap of paper. She carefully brushed wet snow away with her gloved hand, and saw the words brush away, too, in bleeding smears. She shrugged and wadded up the little yellow note in her cold hand.

How important could Lenny-the-realtor’s advice really be, she thought.

So she put her hand in her coat pocket and let go of the note, the red ink staining her hand unknowingly.

“I’ll need to shovel the walk,” she said. She rather liked the firm, decisive tone in her own voice. Before she spoke aloud, she feared she would sound unsure. Worse, perhaps she would inadvertently use a rising inflection at the end of her sentence, rendering it a question, instead of a statement. But she did not. Her own voice pleased her.

Michael would have pulled a MacGyver, grabbing a few of the worn out planks from the fence he would have tied them together with his shoelaces and made a shovel. He would have then set forth to whack a path through the heavy snow, efficient as a tractor, before he even looked for his keys.

She did not shovel the walk. Instead, she went inside.

“What will you do there, alone?” her sister asked her yesterday. She had not answered her sister. She didn't know the answer then, but she did now.


“I shall think. And take long walks in the countryside,” she said, now.


Damp chill filled the house. She noticed it immediately when she removed her coat and her remaining glove. Her other glove, she suspected, lay somewhere in the yard. She looked in all the likely places for a thermostat, and saw none. However, an iron stove squatted on a hearth of crumbling bricks in the corner of the sitting room.


She looked at the stove carefully, sizing it up as a potential adversary. She gripped the wooden handle on the lever that secured the stove-door and pulled. The fine hairs on her neck stood up when metal shrieked against metal, as she pulled the handle. The heavy door swung open on stiff iron hinges. She crouched to her hands and knees and looked into the stove, not knowing if some animal had claimed it as its home. No animal, just burnt remains. Picking up a peice of the remains she examined it.

"Clothes?" She said as she held the charred fragment of the shirtin front of her. "Maybe someone got really cold? Better yet, maybe some wife, mad at her cheating husband, torched all his clothes." Laughing to herself she put the shirt back in and then stuck her head through the opening into the belly of the stove. She tried to turn her head enough to see if the sky showed through bottom of the stovepipe, that led to the roof. She could not.


“This was probably covered, in the damn note,” she said. She stood up and brushed the soot from her hands against her thighs.


She went outside without her coat to look for firewood, the cold air freezing her. In a lean-to shed on the back of the little house, she found it, dry and split and stacked, with a box of kindling just to one side. The axe rested on its head, against a huge round of wood someone once used as a chopping block. Staring at the axe she felt colder, as if the temperature had dropped another ten degrees in seconds. Walking over to it she picked it up,it seemed terribly heavy to her. Michael would've used it to singlehandedly clear-cut the north woods for next year's firewood, but not her. She wasn't strong enough to weild the axe properly, but she would, in time.

The dirty head soaked up what little light shone on it through the open door. Wiping away the dirt she could see the metal was stained with something dark. Not knowing what it was she put the axe down and grabed some wood and kindeling.


Back inside, she built a fire. The stove smoked a bit, at first. Michael would have laughed at her, watching her pushing and pulling at the moving parts on the stove and stovepipe, burning her fingers, her eyes watering from the smoke. But once she figured out how to open the damper, her fire burned neat and hot.

When darkness fell, so did the temperature. She stepped into the yard, wearing her coat again. She held both hands around a mug of tea that steamed wet and white against the distant sky. The stars were out, the sky black and very far away. It seemed terribly cold. Snow crunched and squeaked beneath her boots.

“I should go for a walk,” she said.


She stood in the snow, slowly rotated a full circle, her head tipped back to scan the sky. She thought she’d like to see the northern lights, but she wasn’t sure which direction was north. And she wasn’t sure what time of year she should expect them. She saw lights from her neighbor’s house, twinkling nearly a mile down the lane. No one tells you how very dark the nights are, here, she thought, and I never thought to ask.


She had left her desk lamp burning in the little house, and the soft yellow light glowed through the window. The wind picked up again, biting through her coat. There was way she was going for a walk, a few feet down the drive and she would be a popsicle. The lamp beckoned through the window so she went back inside.


She removed her coat, set her mug on the white porcelain drainboard, then went to stand in front of the wood stove–which seemed so friendly now, with the fire banked safely behind the thick iron door, the remainder of the cheating husbands clothes burning inside.


She glanced at the dark rectangle of door between sitting rom and bedroom. She walked to the doorway and stood. She looked at the corner of the bed in the triangle of light spilling from the sitting room behind her. Two steps carried her to the foot of the bed, and she reached down and grasped the comforter, pulled it to herself, wadding it into a soft bundle in her arms.


She fell asleep that first night curled into the loveseat, comforter tucked about her, reading a book she’d long been trying to finish.


The first morning of her second week in the little old house, she stepped into the yard with her tea. She caught and held her breath, mouth slightly open, filling with moist spring air and surprise. Hundreds of tiny, broad, stiff, green spears were pushing through the rotten snow. All along the house, beneath the single apple tree, along both sides of the silly little picket fence–not hundreds, thousands. Michael could have said if they were crocuses, or daffodils, or whatever. But she found she didn’t care.


“I’ll know, when they bloom,” she said. And she went back inside.
*****

I took out some repeated words and added some scenes. Some of the flow in a few of the paragraphs dosen't feel right to me but I left them. I didn't want to change the whole story, just add some elements to make it...not scary, but some foreshadowing maybe. I took the liberty off adding why she and her husband were no longer together, don't know if this is the real reason but it worked. Plus it helped add to what might have happened in that cottage.

[Kevin Yarbrough]

I added some repeated words, arghhhhh. Oh well.

[jdkiggins]

:Clap: another player!

She removed her coat, set her mug on the white porcelain drainboard, then went to stand in front of the wood stove–which seemed so friendly now, with the fire banked safely behind the thick iron door, the remainder of the cheating husbands clothes burning inside.

:roll: And I thought my suggestive imagery of wet,cold remains in the stove-pipe might have pushed it too far. LOL I was behaving. Oh Kevin, now you've got me running to my file to do the axe scene. :snoopy:

Joanne

[MacAllister]

:snoopy: Hurray!!! So GLAD you came to play with us, Kevin! Nice job! Heh...:hooray:

[jdkiggins]

Mac,

I would love to know what you had in mind with your original post. Was Michael a boyfriend or husband? Why did she go to this house/cottage? Yes, and one more thing, what the heck is her name? :roll:

I get the feeling that it has taken on a whole new theme. :) It is quite fascinating to see the different styles and images placed by different writers.

Joanne

[MacAllister]

Joanne, the original post was essentially just a limbering-up exercise from I-don't-even-remember how long ago. IIRC, I was more concerned with using an evocative tone, and choosing very specific words to that end--the actual details of plot were left to the reader's imagination.

I never did anything more with it. I do remember being awfully pleased with myself over the central character having symbolically put her head in the oven, then choosing to cope, instead.

I dug it out of a drawer and cleaned it up a bit about a year ago, and thought then that it might make a nice, creepy, "Yellow-Wallpaper" style piece--but never got around to bashing it into that configuration.
I get the feeling that it has taken on a whole new theme. :) It is quite fascinating to see the different styles and images placed by different writers.
Oh, I agree completely! This is way more fun than anything else I might have done with it.

I think the exercise is about to run the limit of everyone's attention span, though--so my thought was we could finish up, and each post our individual take on the changes we would make--in their entirety.

I'll put mine up tonight, I think. Have a couple of other projects looming today that I have to get to, first.

[jdkiggins]

Great, Mac! http://www.absolutewrite.com/forums/images/smilies/emoteThumbs.gif

I'll wait until I see your entire post, then I'll place all my sections in one post with the last "axe" scene. http://www.absolutewrite.com/forums/images/smilies/biggrin.gif

This has been fun. Thank you for doing this. I have to make a quick trip to WalMart to get another box of microwave popcorn. http://www.absolutewrite.com/forums/images/smilies/smile.gif

Joanne

[MacAllister]

Lucy Jordan drove up to the cottage in late February. Lenny Sharboneau, the realtor, had kept his promise to get the local handyman out to the place to plow the driveway. She turned into the driveway, killed the engine, then just sat there clutching the wheel and trying not to cry. Finally, she left the safety of her car and took a few tentative steps towards the cottage.

She stopped and stood where the gate once hung. The shabby siding on the derelict little house absorbed sun off the snow that filled the yard and drifted over the sharpened and tilted pickets of the garden fence.

She sorted the strange keys on the ring, and dropped the note the realtor had given her into the snow. She sighed, tugged one glove off with her teeth, then bent and picked up the scrap of paper. She carefully brushed wet snow away with her gloved hand, but the words brushed away, too, in bleeding smears. She shrugged and wadded up the little yellow note in her cold hand.

How important could Lenny-the-realtor’s advice really be, Lucy thought.

So she crumpled Lenny Sharboneau's instructions into a tight wad, then stuffed her cold hand into her coat pocket.

“I’ll need to shovel the walk,” she said. The handyman apparently had done no more than was absolutely necessary. Snow still clogged the narrow sidewalk between the gate and the front steps.

She stood a moment longer. What if she simply imploded, trapped with her single overnight bag inside the empty cottage--its windows staring blankly at her and its door waiting to gobble her up? What if she finally disappeared completely, the combination of her own emptiness and pain confined within the palpable aura of despair hanging over the house?

“I’ll need to shovel the walk,” she said again. She carefully modulated her voice, liking the firm, decisive tone. Before she spoke aloud, she feared she would sound unsure. Worse, perhaps she would inadvertently use a rising inflection at the end of her sentence, rendering it a question, instead of a statement--waiting for someone else to answer her; to tell her what to do.

Her husband, Michael, would pull a folding shovel from a handy inside pocket and whack a path through the heavy snow, efficient as a tractor, before he even looked for his keys. But Michael isn't here, is he? The nasty little whisper inside her head reminded her. Michael decided at the very last minute he had to "work", didn't he?

"Piss on that," Lucy said to herself. She didn't shovel the walk. Instead, she went inside.

Damp chill filled the house. She shivered when she took her coat off and hung it beside the door. A creak from the back room startled her. She froze where she stood, holding her breath and listening. A footstep? A whisper? She heard nothing more. She walked silently through the house, throwing doors open suddenly, half-expecting to surprise a stealthy intruder. The cottage was empty, save shadows and dust.

Finally, the chill became too much, so she looked in all the likely places for a thermostat. There didn't seem to be one. She stood in the center of the little sitting room and stared at the rusty iron stove squatting on a hearth of crumbling bricks.

“This was probably covered, in Lenny's damn note,” she told herself.

She looked at the stove carefully, sizing it up as a potential adversary. After she'd walked all the way around the thing, she gripped the handle on the that secured the stove-door and pulled. Metal shrieked against metal, as the door opened, stiff with disuse. The fine hairs on the back of her neck prickled at the shrill noise; like a scream in the otherwise silent house. The heavy door swung open on stiff iron hinges.

She crouched to her hands and knees and stuck her head through the opening into the belly of the stove. She thought she could almost hear voices whispering inside the belly of the stove. She stayed there listening, trying to decipher words. Just wind in the chimney. It's got to be.

She pulled her head back out of the stove. When she stood up, she brushed the soot from her hands onto her jeans, leaving long black streaks smudged up both thighs.

She went outside without her coat to look for firewood. In the lean-to shed on the back of the cottage, she found it, dry and split and stacked, with a box of kindling to one side. The axe rested on its head, against a huge round of wood someone once used as a chopping block.

She picked up the axe, experimentally. It seemed terribly heavy to her. Michael would've used it to single-handedly clear-cut the north woods for next year's firewood. Michael...Michael.

"Lizzie Borden took an axe," she said. Her voice rang hollow in her ears. Or maybe it was just the acoustics inside the lean-to. She raised an eyebrow and half-smiled to herself. "Lizzie Borden took an axe and gave her husband forty whacks..."

She shook her head to banish the goosebumps creeping up her arms and the back of her neck, then leaned the axe back where she'd found it. If she was going to get that stove going before dark, then she'd better get to it.

Back inside, she kindled a fire. The stove smoked a bit, at first. Michael would have laughed at her, watching her pushing and pulling at the moving parts on the stove and stovepipe, burning her fingers, her eyes watering from the smoke. Once she figured out how to open the damper, her fire burned neat and hot.

When darkness fell, so did the temperature. She stepped into the yard, wearing her coat again. She held both hands around a mug of tea that steamed wet and white against the distant sky. The stars were out, the sky black and very far away. It seemed terribly cold. Snow crunched and squeaked beneath her boots. Michael...What's Michael doing, right now?

“I should go for a walk,” she said. But she didn't.

She stood in the yard in the snow, instead, and slowly rotated a full circle, her head tipped back to scan the sky. She thought she’d like to see the northern lights, but she wasn’t sure which direction was north. And she wasn’t sure what time of year she should expect them. She saw lights from the neighbor’s house, twinkling nearly a mile down the lane. No one tells you how very dark the nights are, here, she thought, and I never thought to ask.

She had left her desk lamp burning in the little house, and the soft yellow light glowed through the window. So she went back inside where it was warm.

She removed her coat, set her mug on the white porcelain drainboard, then went to stand in front of the wood stove–which seemed so friendly now, with the fire banked safely behind the thick iron door.

She glanced at the dark rectangle of door between sitting room and bedroom. She walked to the doorway and stood. She looked at the corner of the bed in the triangle of light spilling from the sitting room behind her. Two steps carried her to the foot of the bed, and she reached down and grasped the comforter covering the bed, pulled it to herself, wadding it into a soft bundle in her arms.

She fell asleep that night curled into the loveseat, comforter tucked about her, reading a book she’d long been trying to finish. Straining to understand the whispers that filled the cottage and surrounded her.

The first morning of her second week in the little old house, she stepped into the yard with her tea. She caught and held her breath, mouth slightly open, filling with moist spring air and surprise. Hundreds of tiny, broad, stiff, green spears were pushing through the rotten snow. All along the house, beneath the single apple tree, along both sides of the silly little picket fence–not hundreds, thousands. Michael could have said if they were crocuses, or daffodils, or whatever. But she found she didn’t care.

“I’ll know, when they bloom,” she said. And she went back inside.

She put the axe on top of her suitcase in the trunk of her car. She left a note for Lenny lying on the drainboard, and carefully locked the front door of the cottage. "Lucy Jordan took an axe..." she said. Then she laughed.

[jdkiggins]

Mac,
As soon as I read Lucy Jordan, I thought of Lizzie Borden and began saying the words. As I continued to read and saw that you included this, my first thought was, wow, there is someone as demented as I am, (when it comes to writing). :snoopy:

Seriously, the likeness between the names is great! And the wrap up ending, woo hoo. :Clap:

Joanne

[jdkiggins]

LOL, Oh good, now we have a name! I don’t know that I can compete with your full post, Mac. It was great!

I’ll add the names and try to clean up my axe…I mean my act.



Lucy Jordan’s car slid on the snow-covered drive. She should have waited until the weather broke, but she feared the little cottage would be sold before she had a chance to see it. She stepped out the car; a brisk cold wind slapped her face. The weathered ship-lap siding reflected sun off snow, blinding her vision. She moved forward out of the glare.

Snow filled the yard, and lay drifted over a tattered fence; arrow-like spears poked out from the snow. She glanced at the rusted, broken hinges where a gate once hung, fumbled for the keys, and dropped the realtor’s note. The ink bled; few words were legible.

How important could Lenny-the-realtor’s advice really be, she thought.

She sighed. The outside looked more of a shack than a cottage and she wondered if the inside held more promise.

She reached down and shoved the note in her pocket.

“I’ll need to shovel the walk,” she said aloud with conviction. Her tone pleased her. She finally rid herself of the annoying way she’d ended statements as questions.

Her husband, Michael would be geared with a folding shovel, whack a path through the heavy snow, efficient as a tractor, before he even looked for his keys. But that’s Michael and his work was more important.

“Piss on that. Work. Right,” Lucy said. She pushed visions from her head.

“What will you do there, alone?” her sister asked her yesterday. She hadn’t responded.

She looked at the buried walkway and trudged through the deep drifts, gripping the strange keys in her hand.

A step crumbled under her weight; nearly sending her backward. She inched her way onto the porch carefully scraping snow with her boot, testing for a porch floor. Several floorboards were missing. Others were splintered and rotted. She sidestepped, holding onto what was left of the railing until she made it to the door.

She shoved the key ring into her coat pocket. “No need for these,” she said irritated. When was the last time anyone checked this place? she wondered. The screen door hung on one hinge and the front door was ajar. She peered into the room and went inside.

Must and dust permeated her nostrils. She slipped off her coat. The dampness inside chilled her more than the wind outside. She searched for a thermostat, but found none. In the corner of the sitting room, an old monstrous iron stove squatted on a hearth of crumbling bricks.


She eyed the stove as a potential adversary; its size and peculiar shape lured her. She gripped the splintered wooden handle on the stove door and tugged. Metal shrieked against metal. Fine hairs stood up on her neck. The heavy door swung open on stiff hinges. Crouched on the crumbling hearth, she stuck her head in the belly of the stove. She twisted her body to get closer to the bottom of the stovepipe, hoping to see sky. No light shone through. She banged on the slightly open damper. It swung open; cold, wet, dark remains dropped on her head. She jerked and stumbled off the hearth.

“This was probably covered in the damn note.”

She stood, picked the icy chunks of soot out of her hair and brushed her filthy hands against her thighs.

She went outside without her coat to look for firewood. Dry, split, and stacked wood sat haphazardly inside a lean-to on the back of the little house. Kindling poked through holes in a rotting wooden box. The axe rested on its head, against a huge stump someone once used as a chopping block.

Lucy picked up the axe, experimentally. It seemed terribly heavy to her. Michael would've used it to singlehandedly clear-cut the north woods for next year's firewood. Michael…Piss on him, too. She pushed him out of her mind. With one swift swing she buried the axe into the top of the stump.

Back inside, she built a fire. The stove smoked a bit, at first. Michael would have laughed at her, watching her pushing and pulling at the moving parts on the stove and stovepipe, burning her fingers, her eyes watering from the smoke. But once she was able to get the damper to move more freely, her fire burned neat and hot.


When darkness fell, so did the temperature. She stepped into the yard, wearing her coat again, and warming her hands with a mug of tea that steamed wet and white against the distant sky. The stars were out, the sky black and distant. The air was frigid. Snow crunched and squeaked beneath her boots.

“I should go for a walk,” she said.

Instead, she stood in the snow-covered yard, slowly rotated a full circle, her head tipped back to scan the sky. She wanted see the northern lights, but she wasn’t sure which direction was north or what time of year she should expect them. She saw lights from her neighbor’s house, twinkling nearly a mile down the lane. No one tells you how very dark the nights are, here, she thought, and I never thought to ask.

She had left her desk lamp burning in the little house, and the soft yellow light glowed through the window. So she went back inside, where it was warm.

She tossed her coat over the back of a chair, set her mug on the white porcelain drainboard, then went to stand in front of the wood stove–which seemed so friendly now, with the fire banked safely behind the thick iron door.

The dark rectangle of door between sitting room and bedroom summoned her. She walked to the doorway and stood looking at the corner of the bed in the triangle of light spilling from the sitting room behind her. The emptiness of the bed reminded her of the void in her heart. She stepped forward grasped the comforter covering the bed, and wadded it into a soft bundle in her arms.

She fell asleep that first night curled into the loveseat, comforter tucked about her, reading a book she’d long been trying to finish. Misery by Stephen King.

The first morning of her second week in the little old house, she stepped into the yard with her tea. Lucy caught and held her breath, mouth slightly open, filling with moist spring air and surprise. Hundreds of tiny, broad, stiff, green spears were pushing through the rotten snow. All along the house, beneath the single apple tree, along both sides of the silly little picket fence–not hundreds, thousands. Michael could have said if they were crocuses, or daffodils, or whatever. She didn’t care.

“I’ll know, when they bloom,” she said. “If they bloom.”

Michael could have told her if spring flowers still bloom shortly after being dug up and replanted. Who’d know the difference anyway, it’s not like anyone kept up the place before now. She chuckled, and went back inside to make a list of repairs for her newly purchased little house. It needed a few more loving touches before she invited her sister for a housewarming party.

Joanne

[MacAllister]

bravo, Joanne! I laughed when I discovered she was reading Misery. :)

[jdkiggins]

Good Mac. Just a little pun.

I guess this thread finally died.
Do we need another little piece embellish?

[MacAllister]

I believe we do! Wanna post something? Or else we can pick a section from something we think really, really works, and deconstruct it. That might be informative, also.

[Kevin Yarbrough]

Wanna try something that might get more people involved? Try writing a whole book with members of the forum. If it got published it would be the only book with numerous writers. Might be hell for signings though.

[jdkiggins]

Great idea, Kevin. I don't know about a complete book. Maybe just a short story. Then the byline would be longer than the story itself. Might be worth a shot. What do you think, Mac?

I am being serious, just in case anyone questioned that. :)

[jdkiggins]

I also like the idea of taking a segment from a horror book and reworking it.

[jdkiggins]

Sure, sounds good, now I have to read it again. Drove me nuts until I found it, then when I saw the monkey on the cover, I did one of these. :Smack: But I did say, I just knew it had to be a King piece. LOL

[Kevin Yarbrough]

Lets try a novella. Get a few of us here, write a novella, edit it, edit again, tear it down and rewrite, and then edit again. Maybe we could then sell it to a publisher and put the royalties to a charity.

[Liam Jackson]

Sounds like a plan, Kevin. MacAllister has some experience with just such a collaboration. Mac, are you in?

[Kevin Yarbrough]

So as to not have to many writers I say we keep it at 5 or so. If we get more than that we can have a contest, like AW Idol, and have one person pick the 5 best stories. Those 5 will be the ones to write in the colloboration.

If we only get 5 or less, then don't have to worry about it then.

[MacAllister]

Sure--what the heck. I'm in. :) Why don't we spin it off into its own thread, and then keep the comments in THIS thread?

We can write it like a prompt, but for serious. Instead of taking "turns" perhaps whoever wants to work on the next piece can put up a placeholder post--then do an edit, later--and cut-n-paste in the piece of the story he/she worked on?

[Fractured_Chaos]

I'd love to join in on that one. :D


Um...How fast would I have to be to get my parts in?

[Kevin Yarbrough]

I'd love to join in on that one. :D


Um...How fast would I have to be to get my parts in?
Sounds good Mac. So if we read something and think we can do the next part justice we just jump and scream "I WANT THE NEXT PART, DON'T TOUCH IT OR I WILL BITE OFF YOUR HANDS!"?

[Liam Jackson]

Do we want to pursue this, chapter per writer, or just kick it off and write till the muse (co-conspirator) abandons you in favor of tequila shooters and a Nogales prostitute?

[MacAllister]

I think the tequila and Nogales prostitute method would probably work best for this crowd...

Kevin? Wanna start the Collaboration thread and kick us off, or would you rather someone else takes point?

[Kevin Yarbrough]

Don't talk bad about the Nogales prostitute, she so happens to be my muse. No wonder my room smells of wet sex, smoke, and liquor every time she is here...wait a minute, that could just be the porn I'm looking up, never mind. Muse, come back. I'm sorry....I'll leave you a ten dollar tip.

Someone else start us off, Mac. I would like to see what kind of material I will be able to mess up with my demented mind. If no one else wants to I will though.

[Kevin Yarbrough]

To heck with it Mac, I'll start us off.

Thread is called "AW Collab."

That thread will be for the story and this one for the remarks right?

[MacAllister]

Right--Go for it. The only thing I'd do is drop the "AW" from the title, so we don't get folks in who see it on the "new posts" list, and do a drive-by without reading the guidelines.

Of course, I can delete those, too.

[Kevin Yarbrough]

Damn, it is already up. Change the name to Horror Collab for me, will ya?

[Fractured_Chaos]

Took a gander, but it's nearly time for me to head to work, so if it get slow (rarely on Wednesdays), I'll read it closely, and make some notes. I'll let you know when I plan to add to it.

Is there a word-count limit? Like, more than X but less and Y?

[Kevin Yarbrough]

All right drgnlvr. The peice is something I wrote a year or so ago but dropped it like a nogales prostitute with a bad case of syphilis who is trying to buy me a few beers. I just found it and thought that maybe it could be something we could play around with. Have fun.

Just remember, if you want the next section you have to call it.