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The Coronal laid down chords, bouncing as his head as his son drummed the beat. The Coronal was striking man, having experienced most sensations a man can feel in the company of stimulants, be them through the mouth, through the nose, arms, thighs, and the literal needle through the eye. He had inherited a healthy body, drawn wire thin by this lifestyle, but in fit condition owing to good genes and the dietary restrictions, remnants of his time with the Nation of Islam. His body held him in impressively good stead and into a comfortable old age, weathering the onslaught of heroin ingested nearly every day since he was fifteen, except for the three years he spent in the eighties in service to Allah.

The Coronal told stories through his music, confirmed by the tracks down his arm. The Coronal friends, not blessed with a strong constitution and an aversion to pork, had died in compromising positions, slowly decomposing on the streets or apartments or in hallways throughout Oakland, or became old-looking wretches in their twenties, as the Coronal’s iron constitution withstood all the miseries of poverty and seemed to thrive on its excesses.

The Coronal’s indestructible health was the bedrock on which he had built his twenty year long, and occasionally lucrative, career as a pimp. He spent the 60s and 70s and 80s introducing young women to men who appreciated the company of young women, as there is a great deal of money in trading on a man’s loneliness.

In 1982, the onset of AIDs had a sobering impact on the Coronal. Two of his pleasures had taken more foreign and severe consequences, and Coronal came to think on a man’s willingness to make love and shoot drugs even in the most dangerous circumstances. The Coronal decided to fall in love with Najiya al Shabazz, a sister in the Nation of Islam. He donned a bow tie, a crisp new cut, sold the Final Call, and stopped dealing women and drugs. The pushers laughed, the whores laughed, and even the Johns laughed, because when a pimp falls in love, it’s always funny.

The Coronal married Najiya al Shabazz, and to avoid confusion and signal the beginning of his new life, he took her name. Almost nine months later, Kadir al Shabazz was born. Raising a son placed a load on the Coronals mind took some of the desirability from Najiyas hips, making his bow tie itch, the Final Call a chore, and Temple tedious. Najiya, practical in her faith and desperate in her situation, let the Coronal lapse into his old habits. She did not look too closely at the syringes, and he did not talk about the slimness of other women’s ankles. He had a connection at the hospital for clean needles, and such was the house of al Shabazz, and the Coronal told this story through the chords at the Fifth Amendment, and Kadir drummed this tale every Tuesday and Saturday night, their music telling stories that polite women and dapper men do not.

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The Coronal told stories through his music, confirmed by the tracks down his arm

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The Coronal was striking man

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The Coronal was a striking man .

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The Coronal told stories through his music, confirmed by the tracks down his arm. The Coronal friends, not blessed with a strong constitution and an aversion to pork, had died in compromising positions,

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the onset of AIDs

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Raising a son placed a load on the Coronals mind took some of the desirability from Najiyas hips, making his bow tie itch, the Final Call a chore, and Temple tedious.

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bouncing as his head as his son drummed the beat

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The Coronal was striking man

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The pushers laughed, the whores laughed, and even the Johns laughed, because when a pimp falls in love, it’s always funny.

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their music telling stories that polite women and dapper men do not.

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My two favorite lines.

My guess? I don't know. I feel like this is either someone smart but young, or someone deliberately concealing their writing style. So I'll go with Orange7Penguin for now...
 

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Posted by Teshi (Member # 5024) on :
 
Tom, I too initially thought it might be Colonel, but I suppose it's for the author to say for sure. It could be either.
 

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Posted by T_Smith (Member # 3734) on :
 
No correct guesses thus far.
 

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Posted by Little_Doctor (Member # 6635) on :
 
I've always seen it spelled Colnel also. Might be other spellings for it.

Edit: Oh, and Teshi, I'm flattered that you thought it was me, but I'm not much of a writer.

[ March 13, 2005, 09:09 PM: Message edited by: Little_Doctor ]
 

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Posted by quidscribis (Member # 5124) on :
 
I'm sad that I'm not on the list of possible authors.
 

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Posted by TomDavidson (Member # 124) on :
 

quote:

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I've always seen it spelled Colnel also.

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God, I hope not.
 

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Posted by Teshi (Member # 5024) on :
 
Well, considering it's pronounced "Kernel"...
 

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Posted by Little_Doctor (Member # 6635) on :
 
Oh come Tom, you know what I meant...It was a typo.

I said "Colnel", instead of "Colonel".
 

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Posted by Leonide (Member # 4157) on :
 
Man...i would have more guesses if it wasn't for the odd sentence structure throughout...

Also, I'm not exactly certain of JamGodJeff's age, but based on the fact that I cannot place this within the style realm of anyone I actually know, I'm going to guess him.
 

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Posted by eslaine (Member # 5433) on :
 
The piece reads like background for a story, not the story itself. It would be much more entertaining to me if we discovered the details of the protagonist's life during the story. What we get here is a chronological history. Perhaps the author could even use the piece as motivation for the character, and we need never know the details.

It seems as though we are in the middle of a jam session. I'll throw out JamGodJeff for the heck of it....
 

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Posted by eslaine (Member # 5433) on :
 
Whoop. Leonide beat me to it. Well, how about Irami?

(I really have no idea...)
 

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Posted by mothertree (Member # 4999) on :
 
I think the various composition errors that have been noted would tend to rule out Irami. I'm going to guess Astaril because no one else has yet, and it does seem like someone unfamiliar. I missed round one. Is there a master thread with links to all the rounds?
 

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Posted by The Pixiest (Member # 1863) on :
 
I was gonna say Irami, but someone already did.

My ratonal was that I couldn't think of anyone else who would be writing about the nation of Islam.

btw, "onset of AIDS" lead me to believe that he himself had gotten it so I was confused when later you talked about him having a child.

Perhaps it would have been better to say "With the coming of AIDS" and perhaps make mention of his devistating effect on the bay area.

[ March 14, 2005, 01:56 PM: Message edited by: The Pixiest ]
 

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Posted by mothertree (Member # 4999) on :
 
It might be good to repost the rules. You get more points for a critique, some points for a rationale, and -10 points for just guessing with no comment.
 

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Posted by TomDavidson (Member # 124) on :
 
Okay, this is a character sketch more than a story, from somebody who likes jazz and is not themselves black, Muslim, or a drug user; the author tries, but phrases like "going to Temple" aren't normally part of the Nation of Islam. I'm going to guess a female author, despite the rest of the tone, because I can't think of a man on Earth who would speak of "fat ankles" being an unattractive consequence of pregnancy.

The Fifth Amendment bar could be a place clue, but the only one I could find on Google is a gay dive bar in New York and an unlikely haunt for the Coronal (sic?). And we're looking for someone familiar with California, anyway, since we're dealing with Oakland.

The author strikes me as moderately conservative but consciously open-minded. And I disagree with Leonide's assessment: I think the author here is trying to be comic (though dryly so) in places, and succeeds fairly well.

Based on my conservative female guess, the Oakland setting, and existing posting trends, I'm going to say The Pixiest.

[ March 14, 2005, 01:00 PM: Message edited by: TomDavidson ]
 

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Posted by Leonide (Member # 4157) on :
 
Well i thought it was very funny, but certain phrases led me to believe the humor was unintentional...the author seems to be trying very hard to write "wise sayings"... pithy turns-of-phrase that make him/her sound street-wise and weathered.
 

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Posted by T_Smith (Member # 3734) on :
 
And eslaine gets another 6 points. It was Irami.

You may continue to critique if you haven't already.
 

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Posted by TomDavidson (Member # 124) on :
 
Wow. I would have bet ten dollars that the author was not black. And I would have bet another ten dollars that Irami knew how to spell "Colonel."
 

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Posted by eslaine (Member # 5433) on :
 
Rock-n-roll!
 

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Posted by T_Smith (Member # 3734) on :
 
::double checks sender::

It was indeed Irami.

I'll add up the points later. Grocery shopping time, now.
 

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Posted by The Pixiest (Member # 1863) on :
 
Wow.. Tom confused Irami for me. I wasn't even on the list of possible guesses....
 

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Posted by Icarus (Member # 3162) on :
 
Coronal = Colonel?

Lots of background exposition = a break in the action. May lose reader.

In the first paragraph, much of that description is physical. I'm a lot more forgiving of background exposition that gives me insight into character--and this accomplished that as well, by explaining the reasons for his appearance: drugs, time in Nation of Islam--than lengthy exposition that only gives me a physical description. I prefer physical description in small doses. You are on the right side of the line here, for me, but too much more about how he looks would send me away.

quote:

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The Coronal told stories through his music, confirmed by the tracks down his arm.

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quote:

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The Coronal friends, not blessed with a strong constitution and an aversion to pork, had died in compromising positions, slowly decomposing on the streets or apartments or in hallways throughout Oakland, or became old-looking wretches in their twenties, as the Coronal’s iron constitution withstood all the miseries of poverty and seemed to thrive on its excesses.

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as there is a great deal of money in trading on a man’s loneliness.

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The Coronal decided to fall in love . . .

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Raising a son placed a load on the Coronals mind took some of the desirability from Najiyas hips, making his bow tie itch, the Final Call a chore, and Temple tedious.

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Najiya, practical in her faith and desperate in her situation, let the Coronal lapse into his old habits. She did not look too closely at the syringes, and he did not talk about the slimness of other women’s ankles.

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Very nice. This is my favorite part of the whole passage. I like the characterization of Najiya, and the tragicomic description of their trade-off.

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. . . and the Coronal told this story through the chords at the Fifth Amendment

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I don't understand what is being said here.

I don't read this as a comic piece, but perhaps as a modern parable.

Some of the language issues lead me to suspect the writer is young (but gifted, given the very gritty feel of the cultural description) or perhaps someone with a first language other than English. I tend to think it is an American, though, because the culture feels right.

My gut tells me the author is male, but I can't really think of a good reason why, so it might merely be my own inherent sexism telling me so--and I see from a reload that the writer has already been found out. Oh well. Next time I'll have to write faster.

[ March 14, 2005, 03:41 PM: Message edited by: Icarus ]
 

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Posted by eslaine (Member # 5433) on :
 
Really, my guess was not based on Irami's writing. I've seen too many of these stories turn out to be unlike the usual style of the author, specifically designed to mislead.

It was a blind guess this time.
 

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Posted by TomDavidson (Member # 124) on :
 
"I wasn't even on the list of possible guesses...."

Well, it was either you or pooka, and you were Californian.

The mental process should have gone "black character in California" and produced Irami, ideally with a little beepy sound effect. But it didn't. *grin*
 

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Posted by Teshi (Member # 5024) on :
 

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There is faulty parallelism here.

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I was trying to remember what it is called. Parallelism. Right.
 

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Posted by The Pixiest (Member # 1863) on :
 
maybe I should write one of these (or maybe I won't =) Is the submission still open?
 

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Posted by Irami Osei-Frimpong (Member # 2229) on :
 
This is the first page of the fifth chapter, and the Coronal is based on my old barber in Inglewood. He was strung-out, but he cut a fine head of hair. I wanted to submit a section that only I would write. I figured it would be obvious. Even the typos were my brand of typos.

I needed a ghetto fabulous name that would serve as a running joke. Coronal is perfect because he got the name for being a "crown jewel," and yet it leaves the door open for people to presume or ask about some fictitious military service. I haven't decided whether the name is going to be his birth name or a nickname.

We already kind of know the character and his son through their actions from previous chapters, so I didn't hesitate to dump some information, as long as I could keep the funny. As I read it now, the prose is down right unmusical. How about this:

quote:

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The Coronal laid down chords, bouncing his head as Kadir drummed the beat. The Coronal was a striking man whose continued life was a standing miracle, like time or physics or the beating of the human heart. He had felt most of the sensations a man can feel in the company of stimulants, administered through the mouth, nose, arms, thighs, and the literal needle through the eye. His healthy body, drawn wire thin, was in fit condition owing to good genes and dietary restrictions, remnants of his time with the Nation of Islam. The body held him in impressively good stead and into a comfortable old age, weathering the steady trickle of heroin He had nipped nearly every day since he was fifteen, except for the three years he spent in the eighties in service to Allah.

The Coronal told stories through his music, confirmed by the tracks down his arm. His friends, not blessed with a strong constitution and an aversion to pork, had died in compromising positions, slowly decomposing on the streets or in apartments or hallways throughout Oakland, or had became old-looking wretches in their twenties, as the Coronal’s iron constitution withstood all the miseries of poverty and thrived on its excesses.

His indestructible health was the bedrock on which he had built his twenty year long career as a pimp. He spent the 60s and 70s and 80s introducing young women to men who appreciated the company of young women, as there is a great deal of money in trading on a man’s loneliness.

In 1982, the advent of AIDS served a blow to men of his calling. Two of his pleasures had taken foreign and severe consequences, bringing him to think on a man’s willingness to make love and shoot drugs even in the most dangerous circumstances. He decided to fall in love with Najiya al Shabazz, a sister in the Nation of Islam, and he donned a bowtie, a crisp new cut, sold the Final Call, and stopped dealing women and drugs. The pushers laughed, the whores laughed, and even the Johns laughed, because when a pimp falls in love, it’s always funny.

The two married and to avoid confusion and signal the beginning of his new life, the Coronal took her name. Almost nine months later, Kadir al Shabazz was born. Raising a son placed a load on the Coronal’s mind and took some of the desirability from Najiya's hips, making his bowtie itch, the Final Call a chore, and Temple tedious. Najiya, practical in her faith and desperate in her situation, let the Coronal lapse into his old habits. She did not look too closely at the syringes, and he did not talk about the slimness of other women’s ankles. He had a connection at the hospital for clean needles, and such was the house of al Shabazz. The Coronal told this story through chords at the Fifth Amendment, and Kadir drummed this tale every Tuesday and Saturday night, their music telling stories that polite women and dapper men do not.

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quote:

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BTW, "Coronal" isn't pronounced like "Colonel." It's not a functional pun.

"Colonel" is pronounced "kernel" in most places; "coronal" is pronounced "koh-ROW-nul."

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I can't think of a man on Earth who would speak of "fat ankles" being an unattractive consequence of pregnancy.

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My father is an ankle and wrist guy, so I totally get it.

(For that matter, I guess I don't prefer large ankles either.)

-o-

Irami, I like your new version. It jars me out of the moment much less often.
 

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Posted by Irami Osei-Frimpong (Member # 2229) on :
 
I never thought to look at a woman's ankles either, but my friend's mom told him it's a predictor of whether a person is going to gain weight in their later years.

For clarity, this is written from the POV of a guy at the bar that night who knows the Coronal and Kadir. The description was originally just to set the scene of the bar, but as I started writing, I figured it was a good time to set down some thoughts about the family. This isn't supposed to be omniscient. To the best of my ability, this is written in the voice of the POV character, who is listening to the music and staring at a drink in the next sentence.

btw, this isn't science fiction. It's a straight story about courage, savagery, music and the Gods.

[ March 14, 2005, 05:44 PM: Message edited by: Irami Osei-Frimpong ]
 

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Posted by mothertree (Member # 4999) on :
 
I can't say I'm familiar with Oakland, but I have been there several times. Ironically, to go to the temple. But it was a Mormon Temple.

And if I used "coronal" in a story, it would be to explain why some Arabic words are not preceded by "Al-". Which I don't think most people care about.
 

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