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I've been working
I've been working on something new. (I've only got like one scene of LotRC left, I swear! It's a crime that I haven't finished it, I know, but I was stuck. And I couldn't wait.)
It's a fantasy story. Would you call it middle-grade? I don't know. The main characters are eleven-year-olds. My eleven-year-old sister said she found them easy to identify with so I must be doing a passable job. It's probably going to be a trilogy and I think it qualifies as High Fantasy even though there aren't any elves. But anyway I would be particularly interested to hear from people of that age group.
It seems like something I could post parts of on here since the chapters aren't terribly long so I just wanted to know if anyone had any thoughts on it. :) And so...!
Prologue:
Michael Salvador strode purposefully down the crowded city sidewalks of Trenton, New Jersey. In one hand, he carried a briefcase. In the other, a set of keys.
He was a busy man, and pedestrianism did not suit him. Yet there were no parking lots within three blocks of Sparkling Wellspring public gardens, and there was nothing for it but a short journey on foot.
Finally the high brick wall bordering the park came to a stop, and without a second glance at the high lattice gates, or the notice boards posted by them stating that closing time was in twenty-five minutes, he proceeded inside.
He was a businessman, tall and clean-shaven, thirty-five years of age. His hair was blonde and neatly slicked back. His shoes were immaculately shined, a fact which he regretted as soon as he left the path.
Ahead was a grove of tall oak trees. He fingered the key ring impatiently. It was a Tuesday. A Tuesday evening, and he hadn’t seen his father in months. Didn’t the decrepit old janitor have a sense of when might possibly be a bad time? The sad truth was, Michael thought as he came into the dusky grove, that he probably did, and had chosen exactly the wrong day on purpose.
Now, where was that custodial building? His feet crunched the fallen leaves uncertainly. North? How was he supposed to know which way north was? A flash of concrete caught his eye to the right, illuminated by the rays of the setting sun. He moved toward it at once.
Five seconds later a smooth, low stone building rose up before him out of the loam, and for the first time in his life he regretted not having come here before. If he had, he would have known whether this was the right place. As there was no door in sight, he proceeded around the corner.
On this side there was a door. The ground sloped downward to meet it, and the leaves were deeper at the bottom than anywhere else yet. Michael kicked a fallen branch out of his way and waded down to it. The door was concrete, heavy-looking, and unlike the rest of the building, was ornately decorated with floral and geometric designs.
He cleared a spot on the ground for his briefcase, and examined the key ring. There were roughly twenty-five keys on it, some clearly too large, others far too small. Still, it took some trial and error before an old-fashioned gold-colored key slid into the lock and clicked.
And the door grated open.
For whatever reason, it wasn’t entirely dark inside. A dingy, greenish light illuminated a bare, low-ceilinged hallway, at the end of which were stairs leading up. He stepped in, shutting the door behind him.
Exactly ten seconds later it opened again, and Michael Salvador stepped out, a different man.
submitted by Emily L., age WA, 16
(May 5, 2012 - 12:59 am)
(May 5, 2012 - 12:59 am)
keep going! :D
(May 5, 2012 - 11:22 am)
top! :)
(May 5, 2012 - 11:23 am)
1st chapter! :D
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Chapter One: A Visit
Yesrej Wen.
That was “New Jersey”, backwards. It sounded like some kind of magical land, out of a fantasy book, thought Alexander, poking the pieces of alphabet cereal absent-mindedly with his spoon.
New Jersey, on the other hand, was a stupid name. Who had thought of something like that? Why not “New Polo shirt,” or “New Converse”? If only they were going to Yesrej Wen instead. Then something interesting might actually happen to him.
“Stop playing with your food, Alexander,” said his mother, who was standing at the stove, her back to him. “What will the Rodneys think of you if you behave this way when we’re staying with them?”
“Sorry.” Alexander put down his spoon and ate New Jersey backwards.
“And when you’re done eating, why don’t you start packing? We only have a couple of days before we go.”
“Okay.” As if he didn’t know that. They had been marking off squares on the calendar for weeks.
Just as he was putting the last spoonful into his mouth, the telephone rang. His mom eyed it. “Actually, why don’t you go do that right now?”
“But don’t you want me to clean up?”
“No buts. Go!” She clapped her hands.
Alexander dashed out of the room and clambered up the stairs, leaving his dishes behind on the table.
***
The airplane ride had been long. Six hours, his dad had said every time he’d asked. Which, according to division, meant that he had asked about two times an hour.
Now they were waiting in front of the airport, for Mr. Rodney to get there and pick them up. So far, New Jersey didn’t look all that different than Seattle. The sky was blue, the roads were gray. Even the birds were the same. Just a bunch of dumb pigeons. Maybe pigeons lived at all airports, and the interesting birds went somewhere else.
Still, traveling to a different state was a bit like traveling to a different world. You went in on one end, and when you came out on the other, you were somewhere entirely different, without really feeling like you’d traveled at all.
Mr. Rodney’s suburban pulled up, and they piled in.
***
Rebecca Rodney was Sensible. And Quiet. She’d heard her mother talking about it on the phone, telling Mrs. Harrison what sort of playmate she could be for Alexander when he came over. It was high praise coming from an adult, she knew, but somehow it didn’t really seem to fit. She didn’t think of herself as quiet. Who ever thought of themselves the way other people described them?
What would Alexander be like when he got here? She pressed her nose to the window of the back seat. Oh, wait- she’d forgotten he was technically already here, she just hadn’t seen him yet. Her mom said that he was eleven, like her, with blond hair, unlike her. As if that was supposed to prepare her for having a completely unfamiliar person in the house. Unless you believed her mom’s magazines, a person’s hair color couldn’t tell you whether they were nice, or how to behave around them. Magazines like that were only good for cutting pictures out of.
“Rebecca,” called her mom from the front of the car. “Are you all right back there? You’ve been completely quiet for fifteen minutes…”
“We’re almost there,” sang out her dad.
After a few more minutes, the car stopped. The door rolled open and the Harrisons piled in.
“Alexander,” said a voice that was probably Alexander’s dad, “You sit in the back with Rebecca, and let the adults take the front.”
Alexander’s freckled face appeared between the middle seats. He was indeed her own age, and blonde. He sat down at the window across from her. And now, before her mother could tell her to do it…
“Hello,” she said.
Mrs. Rodney made a small assenting noise from the passenger seat.
“Hello,” said Alexander.
They did not speak again for the remainder of the car trip.
(May 5, 2012 - 3:28 pm)
I <3 your style of writing keep posting! :D
(May 5, 2012 - 9:40 pm)
I FINISHED LEGEND OF THE RED CLOAK WOO YEAH 34,707 WORDS 75 PAGES TOTAL
That is my first novel to finish evarrrrr (Well I did those fairy things but they were really short and I never completed the series.) so yeah I am really proud of myself. And y'all can read the last chapter which is on Wattpad! It is marked as complete and everything! And I can order the CreateSpace proof copies which I have from NaNoWriMo. And there is always editing. But one more time:
WOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!
(May 9, 2012 - 1:24 am)
Going to try again with chapter 2. The formatting last time didn't really work.
Chapter Two: A Trip to the Park
The sun was yellow and warm on the red-and-white checkered picnic blanket that had been spread in the middle of a grassy knoll at Sparkling Wellspring public gardens. Everyone had eaten, and the adults sat around discussing things like politics and the comparative weather of New Jersey and Washington, although it seemed to Rebecca that something about their conversation seemed a little off. She reminded herself that they hadn’t seen each other in two years, and things were bound to be a little forced… but still, there was something hanging in the air that she couldn’t place, even as her father lounged on the grass and the bees buzzed lazily around the empty ice-cream bowls.
And then she could place it. It was called a brooding atmosphere, and she’d heard about it in books, though she’d never thought she’d get the chance to actually breathe one.
“I have an idea,” said Alexander’s father suddenly. “Why don’t you two go off and play in the woods for a while? Do something entertaining. We’ll be here, you can find us in a couple of hours.”
Alexander jumped up and was off as though he had been sitting on a spring. Rebecca followed at a more leisurely pace. By the time she reached the edge of the copse, Alexander had disappeared. Oh well. She would find him in a minute. She leaned her back against the tree, listening to the birdsong start up again.
Behind her, her father’s voice floated up from the picnic site. “Nice to see them getting along, don’t you think?”
“Certainly.”
Rebecca wasn’t sure exactly how much getting along they had been doing, since they had barely said a word to each other since the Harrisons had arrived, but it was nice to see that their parents thought they were getting along.
“So have you told him yet?” It was her mother.
“Kathleen!” Alexander’s father. “You told them?”
“Just Lilly,” Alexander’s mother sighed. “It was supposed to be private.”
“No,” said Alexander’s father, “We haven’t told him. We wanted him to be able to enjoy his vacation. We have no idea if it’s going to be his--”
There was silence.
Finally her own mother spoke again. “But you have just done the preliminary testing, right?”
Alexander’s father answered. “I’m afraid it seems conclusive.”
“How long?” her mother sounded strangled.
“About a year.”
“But there are things we’re going to try,” Alexander’s mother piped up quickly. The silence started again, after that, and didn’t stop.
Rebecca moved further into the woods, careful to keep out of her parents’ view. That had been something she had not been meant to hear.
For a moment, for one fleeting moment, she considered telling Alexander. Then she stamped that notion out hard. It was up to his parents to tell him that. It would be wrong to interfere. But keeping quiet was going to be hard.
***
Alexander swung by his hands from a low sycamore branch and landed with both feet on the ground. Rebecca was coming, a few yards away.
“Hey.”
“Hi.” She looked disquiet, almost upset.
He grinned, in an attempt to dispel the brooding atmosphere. “Do you want to come exploring with me?”
She seemed to shake herself, putting on a smile. “Sure. Where will we go?”
“Anywhere. Everywhere. That’s what you do when you explore, isn’t it?”
She nodded. “All right. You lead.”
The first thing they found that wasn’t trees was the custodial building, a small, wooden hut which was, as they had expected, locked. When they looked in the windows, they could see that the interior was filled with brooms, buckets, dust and cobwebs.
After that they wandered south through the deep loam. Although it was midday, the air was cool in the shade. Alexander didn’t see the concrete building until they were almost upon it.
He stopped, glancing behind him at Rebecca, who had folded her arms around herself and pulled up her hoodie. The roof of the building was low and flat, but in the middle the ground sloped down to a large, decorative door.
Alexander half-walked, half-slid down the slope, picking himself up at the bottom. The door was concrete and looked heavy. There were pictures on it, too. Leaves mostly, but some birds and suns, all in relief. The doorknob was dingy gold, with a keyhole above it.
“Hey Rebecca,” he called back. “Come look at this.”
There was a rustle and she appeared next to him. “Neat. Why is there all this stuff on it?”
“I dunno.” He tried the doorknob. ‘It’s locked.”
“The rest of the building doesn’t look like that. I wonder what this place is for.” She began scuffing the leaves away from the bottom of the door with her shoe.
Suddenly a bright gleam of gold caught Alexander’s eye. “Wait, stop.” He stooped down and picked it up. It was a key. An old-fashioned one, with a round handle and two prongs.
They looked at each other. Wordlessly, Alexander slipped the key into the lock and turned it. It clicked.
(May 14, 2012 - 8:59 pm)