This has been through my crit group and I'd like to get some fresh eyes to look at it, but I liked to know (from those who saw it first-time through) if this opening works better.
This is SF with a bit of a metaphysical slant. It's a short story, about 7,500 words; I'd like to get some feedback on the opening, and I'm also looking for readers.
This frag is a bit long, but it's the lead-in to the present-time of the story, and it seemed more complete this way. I hope you don't mind...
Autism:
When first contact arrived in the form of an invitation--"One of you may come...alone"--Darwin was fixing the Admiral's toilet aboard the Jovian Orbital Platform, St. Francis Station.
Chief Engineer Darwin Miles was a "hands-on" kind of guy, as important to Project Voidship as anyone: designing the cradle for the exotic matter of the space-breaching "Key" that had gotten humanity noticed; directing the conversion of a vast ore ship, whose massive drives would feed the Key's energy needs. There wasn't a hardware system on ship or station that Darwin didn't love like a child. But the ignominy of "The Toilet Incident" haunted him for years in jokes and sly looks.
So when the psychs said he was the logical candidate for the next voidnaut, the last chance for humanity to get beyond its own star system any time soon, it didn't matter to him that six had already gone, failed, and died. Darwin, without hesitation, said yes.
Darwin the Wrench, that's what they called him. He could fix anything. Sure.
If he'd only known then what he'd found out since...he would've told them all to get properly screwed.
Now he lay in the voidship's wheel-walk like a cold wilted comma...
Any help with this one would be appreciated, Joe
[edited to warn potential readers that the story contains a bit of strong language, and mildly graphic imagery]
[This message has been edited by onepktjoe (edited May 06, 2005).]
posted
I'm glad to see you're still working on this. I like the changes but...Would you smack me if I said you could still cut things? Paragraph 3 and 5 in particular. We'll need to know that "six had already gone, failed and died," but I think you can hold it for a bit. Or use it here, but the rest seems unneeded.
Posts: 2022 | Registered: Jul 2003
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posted
Interesting, but disjointed and poorly organized. Some of the disjointedness can be fixed with tense and rewording. For instance, you can keep the first line the first line if you recast it in past perfect. But overall, there is a need for rearrangement.
If you want to establish this as his own train of thought as he's lying there in the voidship, a simple rearrangment might work well.
quote:When first contact arrived in the form of an invitation--"One of you may come...alone"--Darwin was fixing the Admiral's toilet aboard the Jovian Orbital Platform, St. Francis Station.
Now he lay in the voidship's wheel-walk like a cold wilted comma...[and the rest of this paragraph, which is establishing the current scene and character state--apparently not a happy one]
[]Darwin Miles was a "hands-on" kind of [Chief Engineer], as important to Project Voidship as anyone: designing the cradle for the exotic matter of the space-breaching "Key" that had gotten humanity noticed; directing the conversion of a vast ore ship, whose massive drives would feed the Key's energy needs. There wasn't a hardware system on ship or station that Darwin didn't love like a child. But the ignominy of "The Toilet Incident" haunted him for years in jokes and sly looks.
So when the psychs said he was the logical candidate for the next voidnaut, the last chance for humanity to get beyond its own star system any time soon, it didn't matter to him that six had already gone, failed, and died. Darwin, without hesitation, said yes.
Darwin the Wrench, that's what they called him. He could fix anything. Sure.
If he'd only known then what he'd found out since...he would've told them all to get properly screwed.
Of course, you'd still need to go back and put more of that attitude shown in the last couple of paragraphs into the two before them. As it is now, the whole "Chief Engineer Darwin Miles...said yes" section is a bit too detached. I think that he should be using this all to psych himself up for whatever he's about to face. The fact that his internal devil's advocate is trying to psych him out suggests it.
Or you might be wanting to start the story somewhere else. That might require moving all the bits into more chronological order and putting some action in the gaps.
Also, your title might be giving away too much. And it might indicate that you're using a high concept that won't fly well. Autism has become a popular topic, but there is no concensus about it. I would (well, did) create a fictional autistic spectrum condition without ever saying "autism".
posted
Mary: It just wouldn't feel natural if I wrote something that DIDN'T need to be pared down. [Insert embarrassed-looking smiley-faced thingey here]
Survivor: Yeah, that kind of pinpoints the uneasy feeling I have about this opening. This was the original opening (or, one of them):
The central part of the voidship resembled an egg skewered lengthwise, and he, Darwin Miles, felt like its tenaciously clinging yolk sac.
Lying in the ship's wheel-walk like a cold wilted comma, with his stiff neck tucked into the crook of his long-past-sleeping arm, he was only aware of his own nudity now because of the chill. But there was no cause for modesty in this place of solitude. The naked vulnerability was an essential part of the ritual, one he’d performed regularly for the past fifty one days: just another act of defiance against the darkness...and the fear.
The wheel-walk spun quickly, providing the illusion of Earth-normal gravity. The central axis spun synchronously, giving the impression that nothing moved. But, these were lies. There was nothing Earth-like or normal about this place; not with the infinite expanse of the void--this empty in-between place, just "outside" of all conceivable space-time--stretching out all around him, forever. Even the truth about gravity was revealed when he strayed from the equatorial extremes of the wheel-walk.
As for the movement...well, that was just everywhere...
It proceeded from there to more firmly establish the setting and Darwin's condition, before finally moving into some of the exposition. The problem was it just took me too long to get into the backstory and the real plot components. Perhaps if I just got to it quicker?
I did originally start this at the very beginning (when the invitation came), but it obviously went from a 7500 word short story to an almost 15K word novelette. The real meat is here, aboard the ship, and I would still like to try to avoid the novelette angle if at all possible.
As for the title, I've actually received just the opposite complaint from readers--that it didn't seem connected to the story at all. I only meant to use it as an oblique analogy for humanity's condition in respect to the infinite and the ineffable (and its condition in respect to us), and the only real aspects that indicate a connection are in Darwin's little rituals, and in the communication problem that is at the heart of this story. I'm considering making up a word for the title and calling this, "The Autist." Any thoughts?
[This message has been edited by onepktjoe (edited May 06, 2005).]
posted
Unfortunately, "autism" has a meaning that isn't very closely related to its etymology. You've run up against this already, since people are telling you the story has nothing to do with autism. You need to listen to them. Use a different term.
As for where you want to open the story, try starting it just before the interesting stuff starts to happen. That's a good rule, don't you think?
This is spurring some productive cerebral spring cleaning.
wbriggs: I was going to post a rant about overlaps in the MICE formula, but I ranted myself into a blinding cognition that straightened out more than a few of my stories. I did, however, post a question in your thread.
Survivor:
quote:the whole "Chief Engineer Darwin Miles...said yes" section is a bit too detached.
I just wanted to clarify that. Your comments that followed this suggested you meant it seemed too psychologically detached for the character (I had hoped to close that distance with the next sentences--didn't quite do it, huh?), but the context of the content (can you say that?) suggested this might be what you meant about saving the exposition for a better spot (I know you said chronologically, but I'm still trying to stay away from that). Or did you mean both?
quote:That's a good rule, don't you think?
Point well-taken. It's amazing how easily you can complicate things when you really try.
One last thing about the title (help, I've fallen into the "Untitled" zone!): this is a story about someone who is pathologically independent, who finds this to be a connection with the Infinite--calling it a religious experience is not inaccurate. I'm still considering "The Autist." It doesn't seem etymologically clear either though ("The Selfist"), does it? It does, however, continue a made-up-word theme with some other stories of mine. ("The Sibyllant," comes to mind; a story about clairvoyants with reference to the snake in the garden of Eden--Clever? Kitschy? Stupid? ... Off-topic?) Any other thoughts on this would be appreciated.
Thanks again for the help.
Joe
[This message has been edited by onepktjoe (edited May 08, 2005).]
posted
If you call it "The Autist" I'm going to think it has something to do with autism, and am going to be confused when it doesn't.
Posts: 1750 | Registered: Oct 2004
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posted
"Pathologically independent" sounds a bit self-contradictory. It has no valid place in current theory. Besides, it has no application to your current main character, so it must be describing the alien. Saying that an alien viewpoint is pathological insofar as it is different from the human norm...it's not like there is no SF that takes this view, but still.
About my "too detached" comment, I meant it both ways. Insofar as the POV has a character motivation for explication, the explication should always clearly arise out of that motive. Naturally, by suggesting you could keep the passage at all, I was assuming your POV character would have a strong reason for thinking about past events in the face of the rather exciting events that proper dramatic structure demands be forthcoming.
As for a title, if you're going to choose a meaningful title, then make it a clearly meaningful word, one that is either unambiguously defined already or one that is clearly defined in your story at some point. If you're going for a cryptic title, make it really cryptic. Either you want the reader to understand the title, or you do not. It's an X ~X situtation.
"Autonomy" and related words will give you a better shot at clarity, perhaps. But you could go with tradition and title the story "Voidship". Nothing wrong with tradition, particularly when it works.
posted
I dislike the large amount of ideas that the reader has to grasp.
1. Darwin 2. Admiral 3. Jovian Orbital Platform, St. Francis Station 4. Chief Engineer Darwin Miles 5. Project Voidship 6. space-breaching "Key" 7. "The Toilet Incident 8. voidnaut
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Paragraph 3 and 5 in particular. We'll need to know that "six had already gone, failed and died," but I think you can hold it for a bit. Or use it here, but the rest seems unneeded.
