She sat with her arms crossed, staring at the doctor from under dark brows, hands buried in her armpits. “Just look at the photograph, Shirley,” Dr. Ricard wheedled. He pushed the paper towards her across the desk, his voice friendly but insistent. “Just take a look.” She stared. It was herself, at the school concert last Christmas. She’d had a part in Amahl and the Night Visitors, and danced up and down the center aisle of the church. The Shirley in the picture, younger and with long hair, smiled in her costume and dancing shoes. Her hands were visible in front of her: mirror images. But she wouldn’t be fooled. “You messed with my picture,” she accused the counselor.
Posted by extrinsic (Member # 8019) on :
An individual conferences with another individual.
Two left hands holds much dramatic subtext promise, though a specific impetus not developed. Fourteen hundred words' brevity wants rapid though not rushed or forced up-front developments. Two relatable representations for two left hands; one, similar to the proverb two left feet, clumsy; two, doubly devious and sinister, from traditional beliefs about left-handedness. If Shirley were red-headed as well, oh my, the proverbial red-headed stepchild.
The play Amahl and the Night Visitor undeveloped; what Christian denomination the church as well undeveloped. Their relevance relationships to each other and to two left hands undeveloped.
Narrative point of view: Third person semi-detached, somewhat superficial omniscient limited to one persona Simple past, present progressive, and past perfect mixed tenses Indicative grammatical mood, some subjunctive mood Greater narrator summary tell emphasis to agonist-contestant personal sensory and emotional experience show
Event, doctor-patient conference Setting, undeveloped Characters, young patient and doctor, doctor-counselor type underdeveloped Conflict, acceptance and rejection Complication, want for social inclusion and social alienation problem Tone, undeveloped Message and moral, undeveloped
The title's "Two Left Hands" offers the strongest and clearest dramatic development, does somewhat work for me, though underdeveloped within the start's thirteen lines. A small engagement feature there, though I would not read further as an engaged reader due most to undeveloped dramatic movement and shy detail developments. Some punctuation strays and unnecessary tense shifts. Overall, doesn't work for me.
[ August 28, 2018, 10:46 AM: Message edited by: extrinsic ]
Posted by drworm (Member # 10803) on :
Lucky you ricco, you get the pleasure of being my first feedback.
I agree with extrinsic that the title has the most pull for me to keep reading further. The 13 lines leave me wondering who Shirley is and why I should care about her. But I would probably read on for a page or two to give it chance.
Posted by ricco (Member # 10985) on :
Thanks for the feedback. It reveals several possibilities for improvement.
Posted by Grumpy old guy (Member # 9922) on :
Despite some reservations, I would read on. The only reason for this is the rhythm and tempo of the prose; I’d call it easy conversational. This is called the ‘writer’s voice’, and in this instance I found it peasant and reassuring. By reassuring, I mean it’s written in a manner that gives me confidence, as a reader, the author has a clear destination in mind and I won’t have to work to discern their meaning or intent.
On the down side, my main reservation is 1376 words usually requires the writer to focus on the dramatic conflict’s incitement, climax and resolution to the exclusion of almost everything else. With the exception of making the reader invest in the main character, of course. If I don’t care about the character why should I invest in their story? According to Aristotle, the quickest way to do this is by inducing a feeling of pity in the reader. Essentially this means showing that bad things happen to good people for no reason.
This site/forum/workshop is all about beginnings, mainly, and is predominantly about the first thirteen lines of a manuscript. The truth is, however, that for a reader choosing which story to read, the first word counts. Then the second, and so on, until the second sentence begins; then repeat and repeat over and over again. You almost lost me with the first word -- “She”. Who or what is she? A horse, a cat or a ship perhaps? It is such things as this which will stop a reader dead in their tracks and perhaps decide not to read on.
For me, the fragment has promise but needs work and polishing. Good luck.
Phil.
Posted by ricco (Member # 10985) on :
Thanks GOG, another little pearl. It's a PG story which is hard for me and hence worth the work.
Posted by mayflower988 (Member # 9858) on :
Well, I definitely want to read more. I'm guessing from the title and context clues that Shirley literally has two left hands. I would say change the first "she" to Shirley. The name gives us a person with whom to empathize. I wouldn't mind reading a PG story. Do you need another reader?
Posted by ricco (Member # 10985) on :
Thanks may. I haven't been back to the forum due to lack of time. If I figure out how to contribute further I'll avail myself of your offer.
Posted by Jay Greenstein (Member # 10615) on :
quote:She sat with her arms crossed, staring at the doctor from under dark brows, hands buried in her armpits
This line is problematic for several reasons.
First, is she the protagonist? It would seem so, but also seems she's not important enough to have a name. Giving her one, here, would place her in the center of the reader's "view."
Next: At this point, we don't know where we are, who we are, or what's going on. So her having her hands hidden is meaningless to anyone but you. From a reader's viewpoint it might be cold, or she's protacting them from danger. Remember, while we know how she's sitting because you have the visualization of the scene, for the reader it's missing all the visual impact and detail it would have if we were seeing this, as against hearing about it from a dispassionate external "voice."
Personally, I'd suggest dumping the line and beginning with the doctor's comment. That places us in a doctor's office, names her, and gives a hint as to what's going on, thus setting the scene. Having him tell her to stop hiding her hands and look at the picture removes any need for that first line.
And given that we can't see the scene, does it matter where she's hiding her hands?
quote:... Dr. Ricard wheedled. He pushed the paper towards her across the desk, his voice friendly but insistent.
"Weedled" is to obtain through flattery. So the word use doesn't track—especially given that we don't know why he would want to, or have to. And it doesn't track with him next being insistent.
quote:She’d had a part in Amahl and the Night Visitors, and danced up and down the center aisle of the church. The Shirley in the picture, younger and with long hair, smiled in her costume and dancing shoes.
It's a picture of her with normal hands. Do we care, at this point what play it was? Do we care that she "danced up and down the aisles?" No. That's irrelevant visual detail. All that matters is that the picture shows her with normal hands.
quote:Her hands were visible in front of her: mirror images. But she wouldn’t be fooled.
Here's where I fell out of the story. The situation, as presented, makes no sense.
At this point we don't know if her hands have magically reversed or if it's a delusion. And if a delusion, you don't reason someone out of it with a picture. Have you discussed this with someone who has experience with such things? You should.
And if her hands are reversed, she would learn to use them, and it would be her normal (and in any case, only hide the "wrong one). People who have curious deformities, such as you described have no reason to be upset as you present it.
So, either way, I'm lost. But of more importance, since you say that she "wouldn't" be fooled we're in her POV. So she's obviously pretty far out there. Does the reader want to identify, emotionally, with such a person? I'd have to read more to know, but the presentation, at this point, had me wearing a frown.
That's what hit me so far as the situation. But put that aside because there is a more serious problem, which is that you are "telling" the reader the story, as the narrator—someone external to it, which makes it read as a transcription of someone telling the story to an audience. But that can't work on the page because we can't hear the emotion in the narrator's voice, or see the performance: the body-language, expressions, and gestures. Readers aren't seeking to know what happened. That's a history lesson, which lacks immediacy. They want to be made to live the story in real-time, minute-by-minute. They're looking to be entertained, not informed. And to do that requires a far more emotion-based approach, one unlike the nonfiction techniques we're given in our public education days. The kind of writing we learn there is meant to ready us for the needs of our future employers, not teach the profession of writing fiction for the page. So adding a few of those tricks to your current skill set would make the task a lot easier. The library's fiction writing section can be a huge resource in that acquisition of skill, so time spent there is golden.
In the words of Mark Twain, “It ain’t what you don’t know that gets you into trouble. It’s what you know for sure that just ain’t so.” So spending some time acquiring your writer's education and smoothing the "just ain't so areas" would be a wise investment of time. After all, if we want to write like a pro, it follows that we need to know what the pro knows. Right?
One thing to keep in mind: Nothing I just said has to do with your talent or potential as a writer. And it applies to most hopeful writers, because we leave our schooldays believing that writing-is-writing, and we have that taken care of.
If only.
So hang in there, and keep on writing.
Posted by ricco (Member # 10985) on :
Thanks JG. Some good catches and other food for thought. Learning to write seems like determining if you can skate on the thinnest ice of the pond. The only certain advice others can give is "don't do it" - but what fun is that? So you consider the advice, and go on writing, and end up shivering from time to time.
Posted by extrinsic (Member # 8019) on :
Much difference between general composition and creative expression. Grade schoolers learn general composition, and in large part is mechanical principles. Creative expression is at least a geometric multiplier of mechanics, if not exponential, predicated upon aesthetics principles.
First off, general composition wants impersonal and emotionless expression and organized from most-to-least significant details, and little, if any, liminal subtext, subliminal and sub-subliminal hidden, ulterior agendas, yes. Creative composition wants most of all personal and emotional expression and of a lively dramatic movement, organized from an initial crisis incitement and escalated middle crisis resolution efforts to a final, unequivocal, irrevocable crisis satisfaction, plus several other subliminal subtexts' likewise dramatic movements, situational and extended and both melded.
That there subtext's the exponential aesthetics multiplier, the fun of it all, and a frozen pond's thinnest ices.
Though instructable to a greater degree than commonly believed, subtext depends upon individual sentiments and variant aptitudes for it. A few possess no aptitude, the subtext deaf and blind; a few possess total aptitude for it; most all possess a shared range of similar aptitude for subtext creation and interpretation and inference -- a standard Bell distribution curve graphed.
That latter widely shared subtext aptitude category is learnable, less so instructable, and subject to implementation of and for prose's greatest and widest appeals, a foremost study and application focus for publication success aspirants.
[ October 06, 2018, 07:04 PM: Message edited by: extrinsic ]
Posted by Jay Greenstein (Member # 10615) on :
quote:Learning to write seems like determining if you can skate on the thinnest ice of the pond.
Naaa. It's like any other profession. There are things that, once pointed out, make you say, "Why didn't I think of that?" But till they are, you don't even know you're missing the information. There are things you take on faith till practice shows you how useful they are—just as in any other profession.
We leave our school days knowing that we can't write a screen or stage-play without some specialized knowledge, and the same for journalism. But somehow, we never apply it to fiction for the page. But you can learn that part as easily as you learned the nonfiction skills we're given in school.
I won't sugar coat it. It took us twelve years of school to make our writing skills feel intuitive, so you're not going to install and perfect a second, parallel set of fiction-writing skills in a week or three. But it does come. And if you write with a bit more knowledge and skill every day, and live long enough...
As E.L. Doctorow observed, “Good writing is supposed to evoke sensation in the reader, not the fact that it’s raining, but the feeling of being rained upon.” Master that, and it gets a lot easier. And in the end, it falls under the heading, tricks-of-the-trade. So dig in. There are lots of articles on the Internet (some of them mine). Your local library's fiction-writing section is filled with the views of successful writers, teachers, and publishing pros. There are retreats and workshops, and interest groups for your favorite genre. The Umbrella group, Meetup, has writing groups in many cities. There's lots of help to be had out there.
And something to think about. Talent may be overrated. There are lots of people who have been called "no talent hacks," who make a good living through their writing. Ind, in fact, there's no way to find out if you do have talent, and how much, till you train it, and give that talent something to work with.
So hang in there, and keep on writing. It never gets easier, but after a while you become confused on a higher level. And that improves the crap to gold ration for the better.
Posted by Jay Greenstein (Member # 10615) on :
Oops...I meant Crap to gold ratio Posted by MerlionEmrys (Member # 11024) on :
I like it. The voice is good, there is no action but the title promises something interestingly weird to come, arouses a mystery.
If you are looking for readers for the whole story you can send it to me.
Posted by mayflower988 (Member # 9858) on :
I came back here just to see if you'd edited the story. Let us know when you're ready for readers.
Posted by ricco (Member # 10985) on :
Hello all, as the year closes I thank you for your comments. I've sent the full story to those who requested same. On to a new topic
Happy New Year...jlr
There is something that is much more scarce, something finer far, something rarer than ability. It is the ability to recognize ability. -- Elbert Hubbard