These are the first 13 lines of a short (less than 1000 words) story I submitted to Flash Fiction Online. If anybody would like to read the whole thing, I would appreciate any further input. It's about the Paradox of time travel and its affect on one man's life. v
Some say the pain of birth is so traumatic that the experience stays with the baby for the rest of its life, contributing hidden fears and anxieties to its everyday experience. Some also hypothesize that the trauma of a baby’s entrance into this world is blocked from its active memory, causing a short circuit that leads people to forget most of their infanthood. If it wasn’t for this trauma, they say, you could remember right back to the beginning. Maybe, maybe not. I don’t know. But I believe it’s possible, because when I was 12 years old something happened that was so traumatic that it wiped out the years from then until now. I remember those years, but it is as if they didn’t happen to me; it’s like somebody else lived them.
Posted by JeffBarton (Member # 5693) on :
I like this opening. It uses the free first paragraph to set up the subject even though the main character doesn't start first-person narration until the second paragraph.
The second paragraph begins to refer to a closed loop of time travel where the character meets his past self. There is the hook for me.
Nits to pick at in the writing are just tiny ones:
The second person 'you could remember' is a figure of speech rather than addressing the reader, so should be acceptable.
The narrative voice uses contractions, so reading gets rough where one isn't used but could be. I think 'but it is as if' in the last sentence would be smoother as 'but it's as if'
I'll offer to read the whole thing, if you like.
Posted by kingtermite (Member # 7794) on :
I like the opening.
I'd be happy to read/crit.
Posted by Rexwell (Member # 8719) on :
Cool. Thanks folks. I sent you both e-mails.
Alex
Posted by monstewer (Member # 5883) on :
Good stuff, I'll have a read if you like.
Posted by Rexwell (Member # 8719) on :
Monster,
I sent you an e-mail too. Thanks.
Posted by waterchaser (Member # 8729) on :
I think you have a good start. I'm not sure we to know how the infantile blocks memories. Its not common knowledge that the brain prunes itself in the first few years of life, but anyone with children or into hardcore science would know this and not need it to be hooked. Simply bringing it up might work. Also, I see a discrepency between starting with infancy and jumping to the point of prepubescence. Maybe the infantile brain works is unneccessary? P-tramatic stress causes people to block things out anyway. It needn't be a deep memory of trauma. Many a blockbuster has been written becasue an adult or teen is trying to rediscover some strange fragment of a memory.
That being said, you could start with a terrifying fragment that makes no sense at first, and then retro-con with something like, the dream came back again for umpteenth million time.