Okay, so I'm not sure what the title will be, I know this title is corny (Like the old-fashioned titles, i.e. "The Bachelor and the Bobby-soxer"), but that was the initial idea of the story (from a dream, actually)and it has a strange appeal to it--for the LDS audience and perhaps generating curiosity for non-LDS readers. I'd like any feedback, but it probably won't be the real title.
Anyway, here's the first 13:
“Admit it, we’re lost. You don’t know where we are or where to go from here.” Samuel Erickson let out a sigh of frustration as he pulled off into a Chevron parking lot. He could feel the summer heat from the California sun begin to burn his arm through his dodge caravan’s open window. Perhaps his parents didn't mind roasting in this portable oven, but the broken AC only added to his frustration. His “navigator” had been giving him a steady stream of directions and “course corrections” for the last 15 min.
“Look man, I’m just following the MapQuest directions you printed, but they don’t make sense,” Mike complained. “None of the street names match up with the real world.” Mike was Samuel’s best friend, but despite his friend’s genius, he was also rather unorganized and unreliable.
[ September 27, 2013, 03:23 AM: Message edited by: legolasgalactica ]
Posted by Denevius (Member # 9682) on :
Well, besides the fact that we don't know where they're going, I think you've introduced a conflict fairly well, them being lost, as well as have drawb the beginnings of distinct characteristics to each character. Not a bad opening.
I think you overdo it with quotation marks, though. And MapQuest? What year is this, early 200s? I haven't seen anyone with printed out MapQuest directions since the advent of GPS and smartphones.
Posted by legolasgalactica (Member # 10087) on :
Thanks for the review. Can you show how the dialogue should look? I'm totally new at this. As to the Mapquest, the next few lines deal with that--that he's technologically outdated by several years... not that it really matters other than to establish that he is seen as and acts old-fashioned and as a social outsider of sorts since his return from a dedicated 2 years as a missionary where technological and other distractions, I.e. personal relationships and interests were strictly forbidden.
[ October 02, 2013, 03:27 AM: Message edited by: legolasgalactica ]
Posted by Denevius (Member # 9682) on :
The dialog is fine. I just meant that you have a lot of quotation marks. Besides the dialog, 'navigator' and 'course corrections' are all in quotation marks. It just seem overkill.
And about the Mapquest. Did they both just return form missionary work? I guess it's not really that important. It just struck me as odd, the use of Mapquest. It's technologically ancient, but only all of five years since the advent of smartphones.
Posted by extrinsic (Member # 8019) on :
This opening is largely a narrator summary and explanation that doesn't work for me.
Posted by JSchuler (Member # 8970) on :
For some reason I recoil when I see trademarked names when they aren't really necessary. If someone walks into a diner and orders a Coke, or sneezes and reaches for a Kleenex, I'm not going to blink twice, because these names are part of the everyday vernacular. But if someone is watching their Sony TV, eating Barilla pasta, or sleeping on their Serta matress, it jars me, because the brands aren't important and not descriptive. MapQuest falls into the later category for me. And I've used MapQuest and Google Maps print outs up until last year, so I'm not dismissing them as archaic technologies. I just can't remember any time in usage where I or anyone else referred to them as "MapQuest directions." They were just "directions." But, that's personal taste.
The references to the broken AC and the printed directions did let me know that these characters aren't dealing with a modern car equipped with a GPS, or that they had much in the way of cellphones. They might be poor, or they might choose to stay away from pervasive technology. I don't know much about them to say one way or the other, but it does help me place them.
The dialog is expository and feels padded. You tell us that Mike is unorganized, when you could show us this by having him rifle through the mess in his floor well, looking for missing pages of the directions. You also tell us he's a genius, but we a) have no evidence of that and b) have no need to know it at this point. Of course, if he had to open his biochem textbook because he had been using page number 2 as a bookmark, we'd get a two-fer.
Posted by legolasgalactica (Member # 10087) on :
Thanks Jschuler, that helps me understand what everyone's said. I think I can work out a much better beginning from this. I'll work it over and repost.
Posted by Zack Zyder (Member # 9162) on :
I think it's a great idea. I started on something similar with a partner, but it didn't work out. We were teaming up a male producer with a Mormon young adult female, but I think the movie star angle is better. I wish you the best of luck with it. You might consider having a non-Mormon as a writing partner. Just a guess, but do they both learn something from the other in the end?
Posted by Reziac (Member # 9345) on :
It's a little too summarized, yet a little too much needless detail, specifically brand names when it doesn't matter... frex, do we care if it's a Dodge Caravan? just 'van' would suffice for now. (And my brain insisted it's an old VW van regardless of what you called it.)
Otherwise, a good start; easy voice to read.
Love the bit about the portable oven.
And the title made me look. It's funny in the right way!!
Posted by lala412 (Member # 10194) on :
When I read the friend saying he was reading the MapQuest directions, I read that as a slam to MapQuest - as in, "well, if you had printed better directions, we would have been there by now" - not as some kind of product placement or show that his friend was out of touch with current tech. Maybe that's just me. However - in defense of MapQuest, LOL - I was looking at a house to buy in a very, very small town in west TX three months ago, and google had every street name in the town wrong. MapQuest was the only map online that had the names right. My Garmin didn't have them right, either. I had to use the MapQuest map I printed to find the house.
![[Smile]](smile.gif)