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The one?
JacquesCousteau
Registered User regular
Registered User regular
I know I've submitted two works that I honestly haven't done anything with. I'm hoping this one (as it meens more to me) will be completed. I can't really tell you what it's about, but I dropped my omnitient narrative and picked up this third person deal in a sort of biographical way. I have to go eat dinner, so enjoy the read and feel free to criticize/critique.
Joseph’s tie fluttered in the wind. It had been raining for days with no end in sight but one. The whiskey bottle clenched loosely in his fist went first, scouting out the blackness below. With a final step, Joseph followed. A days worth of stubble, a mess of black hair and a designer suit sunk quickly into the river’s churning waters. This is the story of a man. A man who never took much, who never gave much, but who wanted it all. Up until recently he was a friend of mine. They combed that river for days without a trace. Joseph always told me he wasn’t made to last, so when nothing came up I figured he had just dissolved. The good stuff comes when he hits puberty. Apart from the fact he can’t carry a tune anymore, Joseph is changing. His mind begins to explode with possibilities and impossibilities. He becomes a bit awkward, and a lot angry, but it gives him a lot of time to observe. For now, everything is wonderful; out in the open. People’s motives are clearer and their reactions are suddenly predictable. Most everyone he meets is an open book for him to read. Joseph once told me his later problems came when he realized the only one he didn’t know was himself. He never said at the time, but in grade seven Joseph found himself deep in the throes of a crush. The girl’s name was Fara, a cut little brunette in Joseph’s homeroom. About the same time, Joseph’s love of writing from his childhood re-emerged. He would share his illustrated yarns with Fara and she would laugh politely. As she would date, he would write and as he gazed at their class picture longingly, he wished for the day she’d fall into his arms. He always blamed such romanticism on his years of reading, but we all know it was a part of him. As the junior high years passed, the battle between Joseph’s hormones and his intellect was still raging. He calculated the odds of Fara saying yes to approximately thirty-eight percent, but in him was the hope that she would most assuredly requite his feelings.
JacquesCousteau on
Posts
How about you write a scene where Joseph shares a story with Fara? Give them some dialogue, some tension, some warmth - it could be great.
If you want me to know that Joseph loves writing, show me him loving writing. If you want me to know that Joseph pines over Fara, show it to me.
Your first paragraph doesn't fit with the rest of your piece. I'd italicise it or something to separate it from the otherwise first-person narration.
Now, Zsetrek's already mentioned showing as opposed to telling. Often you can justify telling someone something -- it's often better to simply tell us something. And up until now, you've been doing so with some success; it fits the biographical narrative voice well enough to justify it. However, this paragraph contains some redundant telling that you could do away with. I've cut the first sentence because we don't need to know he enjoyed writing as a child. You could possibly replace it with something like "writing became his outlet for blah blah". Or leave it out entirely and leave his love of writing for us to discover. I also removed the reference to him wanting her to "fall into his arms" as simply having him gaze longingly at her is enough to convince us that he's head-over-heels.
How much time will be spent detailing his adolescent years? I'm presuming he kills himself somewhere in his 20s, which implies that at least some time will be spent on his adult life; which, in turn, implies an extended narrative that could probably do with more time spent on the specifics (showing as opposed to telling -- which may prove difficult with the biographical voice you're affecting). Are you ever going to shift into a more narrative tone where certain events are portrayed? That would be a perfect way to let the characters and their actions speak for themselves.
I agree with Piper Dawn's suggestion to italicize or isolate the first paragraph.
There's tense confusion which is distracting. I like the switch to present in the third paragraph, but it was kind of confusing with the switch to past in the second. I realize one is about the story, and the other is about actual events, so I think the change is legitimate, although confusing in the transitions. You also switch back to the past for some reason in the last two paragraphs.
From the fourth paragraph on, the writing is weaker, less conversational (which I think is what you're going for), and more expository. They can be trimmed too.
Right now, you have one stunning sentence, an okay structure for the intro, but there's not too much else to remark on. You obviously can write decent stuff, and I'd rather see something more substantive.
[i]Joseph’s tie fluttered in the wind. It had been raining for days with no end in sight but one. The whiskey bottle clenched loosely in his fist went first, scouting out the blackness below. With a final step, Joseph followed. A days worth of stubble, a mess of black hair and a designer suit sunk quickly into the river’s churning waters.[/i] This is the story of a man. A man who never took much, who never gave much, but who wanted it all. Up until recently he was a friend of mine. They combed that river for days without a trace. Joseph always told me he wasn’t made to last, so when nothing came up I figured he had just dissolved. When you write about a man, you usually start at the beginning. Joseph was never much for his own beginnings though. He claimed he didn’t remember much from his childhood; he skipped a grade, always had his nose in a book, his parents got divorced when he was ten; the only really important tidbits. The good stuff came when he hit puberty. Apart from the fact he couldn’t carry a tune anymore; his mind began to explode with possibilities and impossibilities. He became a bit awkward, and a lot angry, but it gave him a lot of time to observe. Everything was wonderful; out in the open. People’s motives were clearer and their reactions were suddenly predictable. Most everyone he met was an open book for him to read. Joseph once told me his later problems came when he realized the only one he didn’t know was himself. He never said at the time, but in grade seven Joseph found himself deep in the throes of a crush. The girl’s name was Fara, a cut little brunette in Joseph’s homeroom. He would share his illustrated yarns with Fara and she would laugh politely. As she would date, he would write and as he gazed at their class picture longingly, he wished for the day she’d fall into his arms. He always blamed such romanticism on his years of reading, but we all know it was a part of him. As the junior high years passed, the battle between Joseph’s hormones and his intellect was still raging. He calculated the odds of Fara saying yes to approximately thirty-eight percent, but in him was the hope that she would most assuredly requite his feelings. After realizing he’d never build up the courage to ask Fara out, Joseph became angry again. He said it was a pretty bad time for him, but never went into the details. All I know is when we went to high school together, Joseph never mentioned Fara and when they passed each other in the hall, there were no polite hellos. Even when the announcement came over the PA that Fara Riley had been killed in a car accident, Joseph didn’t flinch. He told me a few years later that when he had heard, he wished he could’ve taken her place. Even then it was hard not to believe he would’ve. Joseph never complained about high school, but you could tell he was never quite at ease there. Just a look I guess; something between friends. He kept only a small portion of old friends as many moved or dropped out. Joseph and change had never got along well. Things were beginning to look different though in our senior year. Joseph finally realized he was a slave to his habits and began to see the social scene for its opportunities. If only for the purpose of regaining control, Joseph began to mingle. He never really said this, but people close could tell Joseph had rules when he talked. He’d always keep it light and funny. Joseph said to me once that he could get away with saying anything, as long as he timed it right; and he always did. Though he kept to himself outside of school, by the end of the first semester, everyone knew his name. “Joseph,†his mother calls from her own bed, “time to get up!†He’s already awake and he turns over to look at his alarm clock, which is unusually quiet. He’s forgotten to set the alarm, but no harm done; if he only washes the vital parts he’ll make the bus. In 10 minutes, Joseph is at least sufficiently clean and has thrown together an outfit from his dresser. Beige cargos and a blue short sleeve with the top button undone; definitely manly. Having finished early, he grabs a bowl of cereal and flicks on the computer, whose hum can only be heard faintly over his mom’s shower. Finishing his cereal, he cranks up some music on the computer’s new speakers and checks the bus times. It always arrives the same time, he just likes to be sure. It’s getting late, “Bye ma!†shouts Joseph as he walks out the door, his pack slung lazily over one shoulder. It’s warm for a January and Joseph’s spring jacket keeps him comfortable. Also blue, he thinks it might even match or something, but who knows? The walk to the bus is still long though; always is. He arrives just as the bus pulls up and he can tell the people who had waited resent him a bit for it. Letting the women get on first, Joseph finds a spot near the front. The bus driver sometimes makes conversation, even though Joseph doesn’t keep up with sports or current events. Sometimes people just need someone to listen, even if it is just shooting the shit. Joseph really just enjoys the radio chatter coming over the driver’s CB. He hears a good one, “There’s someone on top of your bus Hal,†says one of the voices. Joseph can’t help but chuckle to himself even though no one else heard. The mornings are still dark and Joseph can see the headlights of oncoming traffic clearly. He’s always though they were sort of nice looking, and they remind him of Van Gogh; an endless stream of stars reaching into the distance. Everyone else on the bus looks so sad; if only they knew. The bus pulls up to the school. Joseph normally gets off last, but this time hops off quickly, giving a short wave to the driver. He looks up at it with that long-time-no-see glare and moves toward the door. The bus crowd is suddenly alive around him, as if they’d forgotten the morose pact of silence they had earlier taken as they stepped from the bus.