Long flash/short short story. Would love readers for the whole thing, if any are interested. Thanks! -TG
*** (Version 1) Graham could already feel the fire burning. He checked the time on his laptop again. 3:46--a whole four minutes since he’d checked last. God, if this day could go any slower…
The busy days he didn’t mind. Life as a middle-rung copywriter wasn’t a page turner exactly, but when the job sheets were fluttering down onto his desk thick as snowfall, at least then Graham could distract himself from the way it was’s and could have been’s. Also, he wasn’t terrible at his job; half-decent, in fact, and there was a buoyant sort of pride there. Several lifetimes of bookishness had bought him a few marketable skills in a world where most of his gifts no longer translated.
The skill he exercised today was patience. Slow days were a terrible drain on his reserves, slow Fridays worst of all, but ***
(Version 2) Graham could already feel the fire burning. He checked the time on his laptop again. 3:46--a whole four minutes since he’d checked last. God, if this day could go any slower…
The busy days he didn’t mind. Life as a middle-rung copywriter wasn’t a page turner exactly, but when the job sheets came fluttering down onto his desk thick as snowfall, at least then Graham could distract himself from the pull of the fires within. Also, he wasn’t terrible at his job; half-decent, in fact, and there was a buoyant sort of pride there. With several lifetimes of bookishness he’d bought a few marketable skills in a world where most of his gifts no longer translated.
Today he exercised the skill of patience. Slow days drained his reserves like little else, slow Fridays most of all, but that was always the luck of it.
[ August 12, 2015, 09:54 PM: Message edited by: Kathleen Dalton Woodbury ]
Posted by Disgruntled Peony (Member # 10416) on :
The opening line seems at odds with the rest of the opening, but I find myself intrigued nonetheless. The second half of the second sentence in the second paragraph (I know, lots of seconds) reads awkwardly. It's the part about "way it was's" and "could have been's". Also, you don't need the apostrophe in "Friday's". Other than that, I enjoyed the pacing.
While I've never worked as a copy editor, I can empathise with the character's general job situation. I'm willing to read the full story.
Posted by Grumpy old guy (Member # 9922) on :
The opening is intriguing, I'll give you that, and I would be tempted to continue. There is one fault I have noticed, a fault of my own I'm trying to correct, which would close the narrative distance just a tad and enliven the prose; though it would require some slight tweaking. The fault is the use of passive voice in the second and third paragraphs.
Apart from that one little hiccup, a very pleasant read.
Phil.
Posted by T. Griffin (Member # 10411) on :
Thank you both for your comments--I've tried to address them with the second version. Let me know if it works better for you, or if I've made any new bumbles...
Posted by extrinsic (Member # 8019) on :
A copywriter of some metaphysical nature experiences a slow Friday workday routine, of an implied calm before a pendent storm routine.
The fragment is vivid -- paper shuffles and boredom and a pendent liveliness about to break loose.
For me, the fragment leaves little to the imagination, though. The stronger part of the imagination engagement for me is, "With several lifetimes of bookishness he’d bought a few marketable skills in a world where most of his gifts no longer translated." That's the sentence that implies a metaphysical being, though the strong part, "several lifetimes," vaguely implies the metaphysical characteristic. That could be interpreted as a world-weary worker, though, who lives a normal life and feels like the life stretches drearily out into more than one. Clarity is warranted that Graham, indeed, has lived many lifetimes, if that's the intent.
The fragment starts character and setting introduction development; a routine event is underway; a vague implication of a conflict and complication are suggested, though an effort perhaps greater than warranted to interpret what they are is required.
To me, the Friday workplace anxiety about the weekend reflects real life's every-Friday routine too banally, too ordinarily for much engagement, to substantiate the fantastical possibility. The "fire within" smolders and rises though doesn't strongly imply an eruption will happen soon.
A micro fiction best should dramatically move immediately, from a first line. Word count space is only about a thousand words or so, 1280 words in this case, for "flash"; the fragment consumes more than a tenth of that space and doesn't really start forward movement.
A shortfall, therefore, that I see is that lack of timely lively action start. The focus on Graham's state of being (more anon) of the moment suggests a character emphasis that then requires dramatic character movement that I don't see. Graham is a fiery persona and the only evidence of that is his self-reported thoughts. Livelier and vivider action could show rather than tell from his reported thoughts he's fiery. Conflagrational interaction with a coworker or boss, a spark that escapes and touches paper on fire -- vivid and lively and concrete motifs that abstractly symbolize Graham's true nature -- for best dramatic effect.
Though Grumpy old guy notes passive voice in the second and third paragraphs of the first version, the second version has the same markers, the voice is static, not passive voice. Passive voice inverts sentence syntax to place a sentence object in sentence subject position and either places a sentence subject in object position or omits the sentence subject altogether.
In other words, passive voice expresses an object as subject doer -- enactor -- of a predicate's action. Active voice expresses an object acted upon by a sentence's predicate verb. For example, passive voice, Graham was beaten (by his bosses). The doer of the predicate action to Graham, the sentence's as is object, is the bosses, the true sentence subject. Note the parentheses bracket an optionally omit-able true sentence subject that passive voice optionally includes or not, and that the preposition "by" given or implied is a marker for passive voice. Generally, passive voice syntax follows this order: Object of a predicate, to be auxiliary verb and main verb predicate phrase, preposition (optionally), subject doer of the predicate's action (optionally).
Passive voice is always static voice, though static voice is not always passive. Static voice uses nonfinite time span verbs and sentences to express a state of being in suspended time, in stasis, static, static voice -- stasis statements. To be verbs, like was, is, were, are, had, has, got, etc., mark the more overt types of static voice. Most any predicate construction can be static, though, if no finite time process of sequential action in progress takes place. Process statements, or dynamic voice, are the opposite of state-of-being, or stasis, statements, or static voice. For example, dynamic voice, At the Friday morning coffee break, the bosses beat Graham's backside bloody beside the water cooler. A finite time span process statement.
The fragment portrays Graham in a static state of being, expresses his normal Friday routine. That vaguely implies a routine interruption is pendent, about to break loose from routine. For me, however, the strength and clarity of the implied pendent routine interruption is underdeveloped and I feel stronger and clearer development is warranted, especially for a micro fiction's brief length.
I would not read on, due mostly to the static voice's shortfall in vaguely implying character and plot movement. For me, also, a missing feature is introductory implications of Graham's complication and conflict. Complication is personal, self-involved want and problem wanting satisfaction, Conflict is stakes, motivations, and possible outcomes forces in diametric opposition. Like life and death.
What does Graham want that is a problem for him at the moment and a challenge to satisfy in, say, 1280 words? Something tangible and concrete, like, I don't know, a desire to burn down the workplace and not be discovered. Also, what's at stake for him? Possibly successful identity concealment at work or problematic discovery of his true nature at work. He's some kind of secretly long-lived persona, he works a dreary copywriter job; he's of a fiery temper; the fiction's title is "Business Attire"; he likely has a hidden identity on the job; he's a Clark Kent-Superman persona type on the job. His "Superman" business attire is probably fiery. Again, all of that somehow set up in the fragment, though voluminous quality-wise, is doable through implication and only need be an expression of a concrete show of his abilities and a concrete and problematic personal want for Graham.
[ August 11, 2015, 11:17 AM: Message edited by: extrinsic ]
Posted by T. Griffin (Member # 10411) on :
Extrinsic, wow, thank you for the detail. Would something like the following indicate to you a stronger, more immediate conflict/complication?
Graham could already feel the fire burning--it ran the length of his arm and caused the print proof between his fingers to smolder in warning. He dropped the sheet and checked the time on his laptop again. Posted by Disgruntled Peony (Member # 10416) on :
quote:Originally posted by T. Griffin: Extrinsic, wow, thank you for the detail. Would something like the following indicate to you a stronger, more immediate conflict/complication?
Graham could already feel the fire burning--it ran the length of his arm and caused the print proof between his fingers to smolder in warning. He dropped the sheet and checked the time on his laptop again.
That is definitely more dramatic, yes. A random note regarding static voice: I've noticed, at least in my work, that it's easiest to slip into static voice when I'm writing descriptive passages. It just naturally seems to crop up.
Posted by extrinsic (Member # 8019) on :
Yes, stronger immediacy of finite time span, a certain implication of Graham's true metaphysical nature, a concrete motif expression, though not per se a more immediate conflict/complication development. For that, an expressed or clearly and strongly implied immediate personal want-problem is essential, though a sentence or two later is soon enough for that.
Also note that "could already feel" is hedging and unnecessarily emphatic wordiness. //Graham felt// is finite and immediate. However, "felt" is a narrator summary intermediation term that explains a sensation through tell rather than through show. How does Graham sensorily perceive the fire directly? Say, as a tingle that becomes an ache then a sharp pain, a sequential segment process progress, a tactile sensation.
Graham could also sense the fire aurally, a crackle; visually, a blue and green flicker; olfactorily, a singe or scorch of hair or skin oil; even by a taste of burnt cork. "Flash" warrants brevity, though, so one vividly "telling detail" sensation of an emotional strength and clarity is all that's needed at the outset.
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