Bill Richter paced the aisles between control stations that lined the main control center of the Apollo solar cell foundry. He paused momentarily at each station to check the status readouts on the monitors, and scowled at every one of them.
Richter was nervous and had good reason to be, even though he didn't show it. For the first time in fifty-two years, the foundry had completely shutdown. The computer would not allow it to be restarted, and the most maddening thing about it was they didn't know why. The one thing that was certain, at least in Bill Richter's mind, was that if they couldn't get the foundry back online soon, the Manufacturing Guild would take it out on him first.
 

I'd suggest your computer either needs to be some kind of AI with a mind of its own, or an intelligent computer with diagnostics he can't make sense of, or something. For me, no hook if it's not, um, computationally credible ;-)

But the idea of a foundry shutting down and big trouble from the local guild people could be interesting.

Hope this helps,
Pat
 

It doesn’t work for me and I think it starts with that first sentence…first paragraph, really. They are too packed with generic stuff for me to absorb an image.

Bill Richter – okay, pov.

paced the aisles – between control consoles – here I am having trouble visualizing. Why? I mean it is not too many concepts but I guess it is because this is so generic.

Even the “that lined the main control center of the Apollo solar cell foundry” doesn’t help. Solar cell foundry raises no specific image. Foundry raises visuals of huge spaces and the fiery glow of molten steel and vats and runnels of flame as metal is shifted down the line. But, having that image raised after being told it is a solar cell place – confuses me. Solar cells right now bring up the image of glass and small units of black in arrays…which clashes with the foundry idea. Confusion.

Basically everything in that first paragraph is generic. It doesn’t evoke a coherent image in “my” mind which leads me to shut down on reading further almost like reading gibberish.

By the time the second paragraph tells me the foundry is shut down – it’s too late. That is not what I get from the first paragraph where he scowls but I think because the stations are falling below whatever. Not that they are shut down.

There is a lot of story detail here but it is not arranged in a good order – for me, at least – and so the whole thing doesn’t work.

Something more like -- he checked the readout at the ___ station. Off. Same as the other sixty on line twenty-two. OFF, OFF, OFF! The whole foundry (foundry is not working…because of the steel image – could you come up with another term, even factory would work better) was dead. The computer had gone AWOL and taken the whole plant with it. He hunched his back as if from a physical blow. The Apollo Solar Cell workers guild: union number 3485, was going to burn him in effigy by tomorrow. String him up the day after if he couldn’t get the ____ computer up and running again.

“Jim,” he said over his bone phone, “Any luck on the ______ yet?”
“Negative. It’s ______

That would be closer to the pov and be specific rather than the generic details in the original paragraph.

 

Now...if only I could do that in my own story....

[This message has been edited by WouldBe (edited July 12, 2007).]
 

Actually, a lot of the bits of information you all have said needed to be there come very shortly after what I've posted here.

What I have here isn't set in stone by any means. I usually have to start a story a couple of times before I find my groove, anyway.

^JR^
 

But of course that sets up the character as somebody who cares more about the consequences of some higher up more than the actual shutting down of the foundry. That depends on whether you want to convey that or not.

I like that you introduce conflict in the first 13 lines.
 

Keep in mind, these are only suggestions. Good luck with your story.

Bill Richter paced the aisles between control stations of the Apollo solar cell foundry. He paused at each station to check the status readouts on the monitors, and scowled at every one of them. (What do the stations look like? I have no visual idea of what this place looks like. I'm imagining the NASA control center because of the use of Apollo, but that means there should be a lot of people there which isn't indicated at all.
Bill seems alone. And if the monitors are off, you should tell us now. Not hint at it in the next paragraph.)

For the first time in fifty-two years, the foundry had completely shutdown. The computer would not allow it (What is 'it'?) to be restarted, and the most maddening thing about it (What is 'it'? I get that it's probably a different it but I don't know what it is.) was they didn't know why. The one thing that was certain, at least in Bill Richter's mind, was that if they couldn't get the foundry back online soon, the Manufacturing Guild would take it out on him first.

[This message has been edited by Hunter (edited July 15, 2007).]
 

Bill Richter paced the center aisle that bisected the Main control center of the Apollo Solar Power Cell Foundry. At the front of the room, the three large monitors that normally displayed up to the minute production data from all sections, had zeros across the board. Every time he looked at them, Bill Richter swallowed another nervous lump in his throat, and loosened his tie just a little bit more. He had good reason to be nervous. If they couldn't get the foundry back online soon, The Manufacturing Guild was sure to take it out on him first. This was a thought that scared him more than the larger problems the shutdown was going to create for the entire Alpha Centauri colony territory.
Just over six hours ago, the computer falsely detected the station was rotating out of position in its orbit around Alpha Centauri-A.

Well, thats what I came up with on the spot. Some of the problems you all commented on are addressed, I think. It may have created some others.

The next lines that came after this (that I had to delete to fit "first 13" were really good, I thought, and did a lot for what came before them. Oh well, first 13 is first 13, I suppose.

Is this an improvement?

^JR^
 

Six hours. Six damn hours with zero production, Bill Richter thought, as he paced the center aisle that bisected the Apollo solar power cell foundry's main control center. He looked at the three large monitors that displayed production data from all sections and swallowed another nervous lump in his throat and loosened his tie just a little bit more. Damn computers! It's the computer's fault, and the Guild is gonna take it out on my ass.
At 2138 hours, the computer falsely detected the station rotating out of position in its orbit around Alpha Centauri-A. The safety protocols initiated an immediate shutdown; the first such shutdown in the station's fifty two year history. It was determined that the stations orbital attitude was correct, but

[This message has been edited by Jim Rage (edited July 18, 2007).]