posted
For the first time in months, I have something suitable for putting up here. It's not finished---I may never finish it, or I may finish it tomorrow---but it'll do for here. [Character names bracketed---I haven't named them yet.]
*****
"You want me to what?" [junior field anthropologist] said.
"You must be adopted into the Tribe," [elder field anthropologist] said. He smiled, as if he knew the punchline to some secret joke. Elder smiled like that a lot. To [junior], he seemed the very figure of the eccentric English gentlemen he had studied in school. The kind they had sent out to govern their brief empire on their small planet. The kind that always seemed to be laughing at the world around them. He even dressed the part...shorts, shirt, a helment that might have graced an Englishman in a tropical climate like this, where the sun beat down mercilessly.
But the last English gentlemen had died when there ceased to be an England, or an Earth, or any distinct ethnic stereotype based
[This message has been edited by Kathleen Dalton Woodbury (edited February 17, 2006).]
posted
This reads like the information that would be in the body of the story itself, NOT at the beginning. In this opening there is no one that grabs us and makes us care about them. There is no dire or at least compelling scene that makes us want to read further. The second paragraph does at least arouse interest and maybe it should be expanded to give us a compelling start.
posted
I've had a 'hack' at it. You may or may not like it...
Phil
"You want me to do what?" Junior spat.
"You must be adopted into the Tribe," Elder replied. He smiled, as if he knew the punchline to some hideous joke. Elder smiled like that a lot. He seemed the very figure of the eccentric English Gentleman Junior had studied in school. But the last English Gentleman had died when there ceased to be an England or a small backwater planet called Earth.
posted
Ah! Too wordy, then...I thought something was wrong with it when I retyped it in...and since I intend it to be either a two thousand word short or a thousand word joke, the less words the better...
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I'd be fascinated by seeing a Westerner adopted into a tribe, to study them.
Get right into some in-the-moment action, I think.
Does this need to be SF? You'd know, because you know what's going to happen. But if it's a primitive tribe, you could make a fictitious one in New Guinea (present day) or Africa (Livingstone era).
...and I'm having trouble with Kipling-era British explorers, pith helmets and all, in the *future*. The image is already outdated; nobody's like that any more. If it's future, I think you need a new image.
posted
Or, rather than a different image (since an eccentric professor is a fun idea here), you could show that image from the POV of a future anthropology student.
Right now, you're trying to do that but it just doesn't come across that this outfit is as ridiculous as a modern day university professor dressing up as Socrates to do his lectures.
posted
I didn't want to get too into the details, but...
(1) Yes, it's SF---I wouldn't mind it not being SF, but I really can't think of where to work it in.
(2) No, I'm not so in love with the "English gentlemen" image, that I wouldn't consider dropping it---if I could come up with something better.
(2) It's really an extended---and, in my opinion, unoriginal---joke about a tribe that eats any outsiders, but only at night. I have to rationalize *that*, plus make the characters work (Elder and Junior and maybe someone from the tribe).
(3) And I want to do it in somewhere between one and two thousand words---I don't think the joke will go much further.
Probably I'll toss it in my file after I take it through a couple of drafts...I need the practice, though...
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