Hatrack River Writers Workshop: Spice and Salt

This is topic Spice and Salt in forum Fragments and Feedback for Short Works at Hatrack River Writers Workshop.

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Posted by La' klan (Member # 2069) on :

This story(don't know if it's short, i'm still working on it.) is about a humorus smuggling crew who out smart the legionary navy, evil pirates, and have to share their ship with snobby women later on.

Captain was always a smart one. One of them blokes that appeared to demand authority. But passin' by him, he would always slap ye' on the back, and stop ye' in the middle of your chores to converse; like the two of ye' had always been good chaps in life!

Now that the poor man has passed away, I hang my head low in due-respect...but can't help a chucklin' when remembering what he did to me the time I was caught smoking weed during chores(a crime worth twenty lashes when under a regular officer).

Infront of crew-and-all, he unbuckled his pants, let them fall to his ankles, and with a proud voice announced,"This is what happens when you smoke the weed for forty-years."

Since that day, none of the men have touched the stuff.

[This message has been edited by La' klan (edited October 29, 2005).]

Posted by wbriggs (Member # 2267) on :

I don't get what they saw. (I agree you probably shouldn't spell it out!)

I suggest replacing goin' with going -- even Mark Twain used "ing," even in Huck Finn.

Beyond that, it's hard to comment. The style is amusing. I'd have to see if something interesting is going to happen.

Posted by Elan (Member # 2442) on :

I agree with wbriggs about the contractions. Dialect can be tedious and bumpy to plow through if you make us stutter around a lot of unfamiliar contractions. Use dialect sparingly, like cayenne pepper. Enough to give it some flavor, but not enough to choke you.

This presentation confuses me. I can't place the time, nor the genre with this bit. You are mixing a pirate story, which conveys an imagery of old world about it, with the term "weed" which is (do I have to explain this?) a very contemporary term for marijuana. I am left scratching my head about the milieu and not buying into it.

You have made a couple of hyphenation choices I don't agree with: "due-respect" and "Infront of crew-and-all"... I suspect it's a style choice, but it came across to me as incorrect usage and not style. Due respect should be two separate words. In front is two words. I'd use "In front of the crew" instead of crew-and-all. But, as I said, it may just be a style difference I don't agree with.

I'm not hooked. The pirate captain that smokes weed doesn't engage me, not even enough to figure out what is so frightening to the crew when he pulls down his trousers.